Oliver Wilde was appointed the HR Director at Golden Trust Merchant Bank in Quebec, Canada on August 5, 2018. Being the first female HR Director and originating from the Caribbean workplace diversity was one of her priorities, and she was determined to make it happen. Banks are required to deal with an increasingly diverse clientele and therefore must manage diversity at two levels: in their own workforce, as they are legally bound to do, and in the market, by fulfilling their clients’ needs. Golden Trust Merchant Bank has 10,000 unionized employees with visible minority groups accounting for less than 15% of the workforce; the Bank’s employees were almost entirely French-speaking Quebecois. Women constituted a significant proportion of the workforce, but were under-represented in management jobs. Indeed, while over 80% of administrative and office employees were women, they represented only 18% of senior managers. Since the introduction of the first Employment Equity Act, in 1986, several employment equity plans had been devised, but none had led to any concrete changes. Paula understands that there are competent and talented people which the Bank would benefit from having in its ranks who are among the underrepresented groups. She was also convinced that, with a more diversified workforce, the Bank would be better able to respond to the needs of its increasingly diverse clientele. According to Olivia, it was a matter of performing better, rather than simply complying with legal requirements. In addition to managing the issue of diversity at Golden Trust Merchant Bank, Canada, the bank wants to expand into Latin American and the Caribbean within the next three (3) years. QUESTIONS Olivia has commissioned your team to provide consultancy services to create a Diversity and Inclusion Strategy to assist Olivia with the Canadian operations and the eventual expansion into the Latin American and Caribbean region. This strategy should address the following: a. Whether a convergence of divergence approach should be adopted for operations in the Latin American and Caribbean; b. Three (3) initiatives that can be implemented to foster diversity, equity and inclusion; c. Identify the two (2) challenges you expect to encounter in implementing these strategies and how you will overcome them; and d. Justifications that can be used to gain Executive Management buy-in for the initiatives.