Políticas institucionais de gestão da diversidade: uma análise da Universidade Federal de Uberlândia

Abstract

Diversity is a contemporary theme that has acquired significant relevance, being discussed in organizations, companies and academia, however, studies on the management of diversity, especially in public institutions, are still rare. Diversity management consists of complex processes involving all, not just individuals considered to be part of minority groups. The fact that organizations increase their workforce, including in their workforce people belonging to minority groups, does not mean that it is implementing diversity management, since it goes beyond the increase in the workforce and legal mandates. In a broader sense, diversity involves other aspects such as educational background, sexual orientation, age, religion, origin, language, values, attitudes, personality, personal and professional history, geographical origin, length of service, lifestyle and others. This context demands that managers and their teams be prepared to live with the groups considered different, and it is desirable that the organizations implant a management model that addresses all the dimensions of diversity, which means a challenge for the organizations. In public higher education institutions, due to their administrative nature, diversity management is an even more serious challenge for public managers. This is because in the environment of public universities, teachers, students and technical-administrative coexist in the midst of differences that must be recognized. Given this scenario, the central problem of this study is the following question: how are the institutionalized policies of diversity management characterized at the Federal University of Uberlândia/UFU? In order to answer this question, the present research had as general objective to characterize the institutional policies of diversity management of the Federal University of Uberlândia, and for that, we carried out a qualitative research of interpretative approach, of the document type. For the collection of the empirical material, institutional documents were analyzed, which were analyzed through the technique of content analysis according to Bardin (1977). The main results point out that UFU's diversity policies prioritize teaching and extension, are largely focused on students, and the legal aspect underlies these policies. We note the silence and omission of the University in relation to a discussion of institutional policies for the management of diversity.