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Managing Diversity in the United States Army Essay

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The United States Army consists of soldiers from many diverse cultures. Citizenship is not a requirement to join the Army, so people enlist from across the United States as well as from many countries around the world. The Army has its own unique culture that is a conglomeration of the many cultures that make up its population. Each new soldier is expected to adapt to this new culture and integrate as a member of a larger team. Helping new soldiers make this adaptation as quickly as possible and with few difficulties is a challenge for the leaders of new soldiers throughout the Army. The primary challenge for leaders in the Army is taking a group of individuals and molding them into a team. The framework that is employed to the …show more content…

10). The Army does little to understand the values or cultures of new recruits as the authors suggest. Instead, leaders try to impose the Army’s own values onto new soldiers. One of the first requirements in basic training is to memorize the Army’s seven values: loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity and personal courage. These values are reinforced in training throughout the Army and are meant to supplant whatever values were already present. Haircuts and clothing become uniform in an attempt to strip away a soldier’s individuality. Communication with families is very limited during initial training. It becomes harder for anyone to identify with his or her own culture as time passes. As cruel as this might sound, it is a necessary step in developing soldiers that place the mission first. During war, it is crucial that soldiers react to orders without thinking. Cultural biases can interfere with this. Many cultures place a lot of importance on respecting elders. People are expected to defer to someone who is older. This presents a problem in the Army when a leader has soldiers who are older than him. The leader’s orders must be obeyed without hesitation. By establishing a new values system, the problem of varying cultures is minimized. Years ago it was said that “if the Army wanted you to have a

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