7 Ways to Reduce Bias in Hiring
One of the ways our team helps organizations increase the diversity and inclusion in their team is to identify areas where bias exists in every day systems and culture, impacting not only how they grow and retain staff, but ultimately who they attract and hire to join the team.
The fact of the matter is that bias is all too common in hiring processes, even in organizations with the best of intentions (remember, impact is not intention!). Both unconscious and conscious racism, sexism, ageism, ableism, and more can impact who joins, thrives, and ultimately stays on your team.
Below are some ways to reduce bias in your hiring process. An additional bonus is that these strategies can also help attract a more diverse talent pool!
Refine your job descriptions: Get clear on what you are looking for and be transparent about it, use language that isn’t exclusive i.e. gendered pronouns, and always post your salary range and benefits clearly.
Set diversity recruitment goals: Setting goals for your candidate pool gives you a clear set of benchmarks to check your progress as your process develops. If you reach the second round of interviews and your pool is predominantly made up of similarly identifying candidates that don’t meet your goals, that’s a clear indicator to hit pause and do more recruitment.
Cast a wide net: do you typically post your jobs in the same places? Or share with the same network of folks you feel most comfortable with? If you do, you aren’t reaching a more diverse audience and setting up your process for personal bias from the start. Begin each process with a team-wide brainstorm of candidates, connectors, and networks for sharing that go beyond your normal audience.
Anonymize the application review process: It takes time, but the benefits are remarkable. Remove names and identifying characteristics from resumes or skill exercises and drop links in a spreadsheet for someone to review and rate anonymously, without making assumptions based on name, past roles, etc.
Set an interview structure (and stick to it!): off the cuff interviews won’t give you a fair analysis of your pool. By setting an interview structure, you are giving each candidate a fair chance to answer the same questions. Want to take it a step further, add a rating scale with specific criteria to meet for each question.
Value people’s time: no surprise, hiring takes time both on for the recruiter and the candidate. Assuming 9 to 5 availability and endless hours of time to do exercises will definitely exclude some candidates from your process. Consider interview windows slightly outside of working hours, and compensate candidates for their time spent on lengthy exercise or interview panels. (and don’t forget to give your interviewers flex time as well!)
Avoid single decision-makers: hiring doesn’t need to be consensus based, but it is best to have a hiring team who represent a range of perspectives across your organization so you can make an informed decision based on team culture & role fit.
Even if you can’t make all these changes at once, take them one step at a time. Taking steps to reduce bias in your hiring process will help you build a strong team, and provide your candidates with a clear and welcoming process to participate.
Looking for help on your recruitment processes? Drop us a line at info@devleopwell and we’ll be happy to help!