Supplier Diversity is a business strategy that has seen its highs and lows over the past decade. Despite its unusual growth, the field, which focuses on purchases from underrepresented groups such as minorities, women, LGBT, veterans, and disabled people, is position to expand over the next decade. Why do you ask? Because the future population of America demands it.
We are heading into a world where underrepresented groups are a larger percentage of the American population then ever before. As this number grows, the need to generate wealth within these communities has become necessary for the future of the country. If businesses that support the communities are not managed properly, we could see a country that continually loses its status on a global competitive field.
Corporations have understood this and are seemingly doing more to ensure that their future consumer base has enough opportunities to grow their own net worth and purchase from their brand. “While some companies have leveraged this opportunity to brandish their corporate citizenship models, other companies have proactively responded to this paradigm by devising strategies that go beyond the basics of compliance and self-preservation from public scandal and scrutiny to promote the civic duty.”
With minorities in particular set to be the majority in the workplace soon, the need for a population with expertise in a number of fields has become more necessary each and every day. Currently these groups are under utilized even with the support they’ve been given. If more can be done to grow the current batch of small and diverse businesses we can see a group of people with a growing population set to continue American leadership within one or two generations.
