Introduction

Intergovernmental Organisations (IGO) play an increasingly important role in international management. Especially in cross national challenges such as Natural Resource Management (NRM) where market mechanisms do not necessarily work due to the collective good character of natural resources such as watersheds or fish, IGOs are founded as an alternative form of management. It is in the nature of these organisations that people from different cultures, religions, political systems, and other variables of diversity work together for and with likewise diverse stakeholders such as partner and donor organisations, governmental institutions, small to large corporations, civil society institutions and diverse groups of citizens from different countries in order to secure a sustainable use of the environmental resources. This diversity poses a great challenge to executive managers in these organisations. Managing Diversity, deriving from the personnel policy field of business administration, is a management concept that can aid managers and organisations to deal with diversity as it is concerned with “... the need to perceive, to understand, to value and last but not least to manage existing diversity and potential similarities of employees at an optimum degree”

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