When many people think of diversity, they think first of ethnicity and race, and then gender, diversity is much broader and it involves those Human qualities that are different from our own and outside the groups to which we belong, yet present in other individuals and groups [1].

According to Rev. Fr. (Dr) Nkeze George, President of the Catholic University Institute of Buea (CUIB) it’s important to understand how these dimensions affect performance, motivation, success, and interactions with others institutional structures and practices that have presented barriers to some dimensions of diversity and which should be examined, challenged, and removed.

Diversity also comprises a wide variety of other differences, including work experience, parental status, educational background, geographic location etc. and managing diversity means more than simply observing legal and policy requirements.

CUIB knows value and affirm that social diversity contributes to the richness of the Catholic University Institute of Buea community and thus boosts the quality of campus life for individuals and groups, also the university institute take pride in its achievements and celebrate its differences [2].

Background of the study/company review

The Catholic University Institute of Buea (CUIB) South West Region, Cameroon, was approved as a non-profit making university in two separate letters.

The authorization to create CUIB on 09/01/0194 of 11 June 2009 and the authorization to start was signed by the Honorable Minister of Higher Education Prof Jacque Fame Ndongo by decision no 10/02173/N/MINSUP/DDES/ESUP/SAC/NJE/ebm dated 26^th of May 2010.

Its primary purpose is to train professional servant leaders with moral and spiritual values so that they may be responsible to their communities. The proprietor/chancellor of the Catholic University of Buea is the Bishop of the Diocese of Buea.

In June 2011, another arm of the University, the Business and Research Park was created as a legal entity of its own by the Cameroon laws no RC BUC.2031-B023 with the name CUIB-Centre for entrepreneurship research and innovation [3].

From the President’s message of 2015/2016 academic year, he reiterated that anyone who steps into the CUIB campus will notice that CUIB has a strong sense of community and campus pride. It clearly makes a difference in the lives of students and the surrounding communities in Buea. The students, staff and faculty go out weekly to carryout volunteerism in surrounding communities. Just five years old, the rest of the country has begun noticing its accomplishments through its students who are not only likeable and humble but are strong academically as they can compete with their peers internationally and win internal awards. Examples include, the Tony Elumelu entrepreneurship awards, the Anzisha award etc.

The Catholic University Institute of Buea Sport Academic (CUSA), Went operational in December 2014 with authorisation no 1106/G37/ C84/VOL II/SAAJP with the main aim of assisting young, talented and excellent skilled Cameroonians in the various field of sport like football, volleyball, basketball, handball etc [2].

Diversity is the quality or state of having many different forms, types, ideas and it is the state of having people who are different in races or who have different cultural background.

It involves people of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, age, physical abilities, religious beliefs, political beliefs, or other ideologies [4].

Diversity exists when you go above and beyond being aware of the differences or accepting the differences to the point of actively including people who are different from you. Diversity is learning from our differences to make the whole community a better place [5].

Diversity aims to recognise, respect and value people’s differences to contribute and realise their full potential by promoting an inclusive culture for all faculty, staff and students, thus ensuring individuals or groups of individuals are treated fairly and equally and no less favourably, specific to their needs, including areas of race, gender, disability, religion or belief, sexual orientation and age [6].

In broad terms, diversity is any dimension that can be used to differentiate groups and people from one another, it means respect for and appreciation of the differences in ethnicity, gender, age, national origin, disability, sexual orientation, education, and religion [7].

Equality and diversity can however be promoted by the following ways:

• Treating all faculty, staff and students fairly

• Creating an inclusive culture for all faculty, staff and students

• Ensuring equal access to opportunities to enable students to fully participate in the learning process.

• Enabling all faculty, staff and students to develop to their full potential

• Equipping staff and students with the skills to challenge inequality and discrimination in their work/study environment

• Making certain that any learning materials do not discriminate against any individuals or groups

• Ensuring policies, procedures and processes don’t discriminate [6].

Veal [8] indicated that an empirical approach is the collection and analysis of data; it could be quantitative or qualitative, primary or secondary. No research is purely empirical; it is usually informed by some sort of theory or conceptual frame work. Some researchers are of the opinion that a single research method may use both quantitative and qualitative techniques and procedures in combination as well as use primary and secondary data. The quantitative and qualitative data collection techniques and analysis procedure each have their own strength and weaknesses.

For this research work, the researchers used both primary and secondary data that was information collected from the Catholic University Institute of Buea bulletins and other University documents and websites. Primary data was collected from oral interviews administered by the office of Human resource management with all the personnel (faculty and staff) of CUIB [9,10].

The Catholic University Institute of Buea recruit its employees based on their competencies and skill, without regard to gender or disability. Table 1 above shows the numerical strength of its employees according to Divisions in Cameroon with Mezam and Manyu Divisons having 14.38% of the total workers and Nigerians and Italians having 0.63% of the total workers.

Table 1: Numerical strength of divisions.

Table 2 above shows the strength of diversity of the workers of the Catholic University of Buea according to the Regions with the South West Region having 43.75% and foreigners having 1.25%. It should however be noted that its employees are coming from six Regions out of a total of ten Regions of the country (Cameroon).

Table 2: Strengths according to regions.

Table 3 above shows the strength of employees of CUIB according to denomination with the Catholic denomination having a greater majority (69.74%) and the Moslem denomination having (0.66%).

Table 3: Strength according to denomination.

This researcher encountered the following limitation while carrying out this research:

• The finances needed to carry out this research work were insufficient to enable the researcher to move to other towns to gather the available literature.

• The researcher could not find enough literature as textbooks concerning this area of study was not available in the University as well as the public libraries.

• Poor roads also hinder the researcher from moving to places to collect the needed literature.

Workplace diversity has become an increasingly important part of the Business or company workplace. The Catholic University of Buea recruit its employees based on their competencies and skill, without regard to gender or disability. In business, cultural diversity within an organization is considered beneficial to the retention of staff as well as their productivity. It is also likely to increase an organization’s flexibility and responsiveness to the diversity of its clients, customers and partners in an increasingly globalized world. Access to a larger talent pool is one of the biggest advantages of having an employment recruitment policy that values diversity.