Beat your hidden hiring biases

Start building a better, more diverse workforce

with data-driven hiring

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Diversity: from good thing

to must-have
The US population is changing.
And its in every employers
interests to ensure their own
workforce reflects that change.

Achieving that diversity

and realizing its benefits
means reaching the widest
possible range of candidates.

Not just because a more

diverse workforce will help
you connect more effectively
with your increasingly diverse
customers, students or
patients, but also because
theres strong evidence to
suggest organizations with
greater diversity financially
outperform their peers.

It also means assessing

them for their ability to do
the job theyre applying for.
And that alone.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

The hidden hiring biases that damage

workplace diversity
Two kinds of hidden bias
stop employers from making
these decisions.
There are the human biases
that everyone carries. The ones
shaped by the circumstances
of our birth and upbringing that
research has shown, time and
time again, affect the neutrality
of our decisions, whether we
realize it or not.

Then there are the procedural

biases. Your sourcing, selection,
interviewing and recruitment
processes can, by their nature,
discourage or exclude certain
candidates often without you
even knowing it.

Simply put, it means taking a

data-driven approach to hiring.

Removing these biases means

examining your current hiring
practices objectively. It means
digging up data, analyzing it,
and making decisions based
on it.

Where hidden bias

in the hiring process
can derail diversity

Over the next few pages,

well explain:
Why diversity matters
more than ever

How to remove hidden bias,

with data-driven hiring

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Why diversity matters

more than ever
At the time of writing,
US Census data shows that
the majority population in the
US is made up of non-Hispanic
white people. But thats not
going to be true for long.

And its not just our racial

mix thats evolving. Its our life
expectancies, and the kinds
of health support we need.
Its ideas around age, gender
equality, and gender itself.

By 2044, todays minority

racial populations are expected
to account for 50.3% of the
US population.1

To succeed, every organization

will increasingly need to reflect
these changes. But before we
explain why, heres a little more
about the state of workforce
diversity today.

1 https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2015/cb15-tps16.html

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Diversity today

In 2014, white people

accounted for 79% of the
US labor force,2 and 77.4%
of the population.3
Look beyond the big picture,
and theres even greater
disparity by profession.
There are 33 occupations
from steel workers to CEOs,
architects and aircraft pilots
where minorities hold only
one out of every ten jobs.4

Its not just on race that the US

workforce is failing to reflect
our population, its gender too.
Tech is one industry where
gender diversity is a perennially
hot topic not least because
many of its major players have
chosen to be open about the
race and gender composition
of their teams.
As of November 2015, less than
one in four people in leadership
positions in Facebook, Google,
Microsoft, Twitter and Yahoo

2 http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/cps/labor-force-characteristics-by-race-and-ethnicity-2014.pdf
3 http://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045215/00
4 http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/11/the-33-whitest-jobs-in-america/281180/

were women. The figure drops

to less than one in five when
you look at more technical
positions.5
A large proportion of employers
are still letting the call for and
benefits of greater diversity
pass them by. Recent research
suggests over a quarter (27.3%)
of American workplaces still
have no diversity initiatives or
practices in place.6

5 http://graphics.wsj.com/diversity-in-tech-companies
6 http://img.en25.com/Web/XpertHRUS/%7B9d9d2f58-200a-4f5b-b1f6-da8380ed5d6c%7D_
FC0119_XHR_201602_DiversityReport_Infographic.pdf

Beat your hidden hiring biases

The case for

embracing diversity
Its clear theres a way to go before our
workforce truly reflects our population.
But its a journey that is in all our interests
to make. Here are four great reasons why.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

1. When your organization mirrors

the people it serves, its easier to serve
them effectively
According to a survey of over
600 organizations, Increasing
the ability to serve customers
is the number one reason
employers are embracing
diversity.7

Dr Patricia Prelock, Dean of

the College of Nursing and
Health Sciences, University of
Vermont, explains the impact:

The patients were serving

now will look very different
Strengthening the connection
from the patients were going
between your staff and the
to be serving in 20 years []
people they serve is especially
If we dont have the cultural
important in healthcare,
context of the people were
where effective two-way
serving, were not going to
communications are critical
be effective as health care
to administering proper care
professionals. Its not just
and where interactions are,
in medicine; its in nursing,
by their nature, even more
speech pathology, physical
likely to be shaped by personal therapy, radiation therapy
values and beliefs.
all the health professions.8

7 http://img.en25.com/Web/XpertHRUS/%7B9d9d2f58-200a-4f5b-b1f6-da8380ed5d6c%7D_
FC0119_XHR_201602_DiversityReport_Infographic.pdf
8 https://learn.uvm.edu/blog-health/cultural-diversity-in-healthcare

Beat your hidden hiring biases

2. You need to able to attract, and keep,

the best talent. And that talents going
to be diverse
45%
By 2020, students from
racial minorities will account
for 45% of the nation's public
high-school graduates.9
Organizations that can
demonstrate and foster
diversity are likely to have
a serious advantage in
attracting those graduates,
and harnessing the best
minds of the next generation.
And its not just the racial
demographic of graduates
thats shifting. For example,
Harvard is taking steps to
increase its proportion of

female Computer Science

graduates and meet growing
demand for women staff from
exactly the kind of major tech
companies mentioned earlier.10
As our population lives longer,
companies are also waking
up to the potential benefits
of battling age discrimination,
and employing older,
more experienced workers.
A decade ago less than onetenth of Americans aged
65 or over were employed.
As of last year, this has risen
to nearly one-fifth.11

9 http://chronicle.com/article/Wave-of-Diverse-College/136603
10 http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/2/22/computer-science-department-gender-gap/
11 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-09/where-retirement-isn-t-job-one

Heres the bottom line:

organizations which intentionally
or, more likely, unintentionally
fail to engage with diverse job
candidates increasingly risk
missing out on the very best
workers around.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Theres already evidence to

suggest having a more diverse
workforce can deliver serious
business benefits.
According to a McKinsey study,
companies that rank in the top
quartile for gender diversity
are 15% more likely to financially
outperform those that rank
in the bottom quartile.
Whats more, when you look at
racial diversity, that figure soars
to 35%.12

Given the higher

returns that diversity
is expected to bring,
we believe it is better
to invest now, since
winners will pull
further ahead and
laggards will fall
further behind.

The analysts conclusion?

12 http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/why-diversity-matters

3. Organizations with more diverse workforces

perform better financially

Beat your hidden hiring biases

10

4. The penalties for discrimination

are real, and costly
The financial and reputational
cost of not addressing diversity
in your workplace can be huge.
Consider the reach of the
#OscarsSoWhite Twitter
and social media hashtag
could something similar
trend for your brand?
Or, more recently, the media
firestorm that has erupted
regarding the advertising
industry, where alleged
inappropriate behavior
has led to the firings of
several CEOs.13

And then there are the

legal penalties. Last year,
the US Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission
(EEOC) secured more than
$525 million for victims of
workplace discrimination.

Recent EEOC lawsuits

have seen companies
forced to pay out:

$180,000

for setting unlawful

qualification standards,
and effectively screening
The EEOC also won one of
out job candidates with
the first lawsuits to protect
15
transgender workers, affirming disabilities.
that discrimination based on
sexual orientation is prohibited
by existing laws.14
for race discrimination
in the workplace.16

13 http://www.wsj.com/articles/madison-avenue-grapples-with-a-lack-of-diversity-1457914997
14 http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/wysk/2015_highlights.cfm
15 http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/1-26-16.cfm
16 http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/12-22-15.cfm

$4 million

Its illegal to discriminate

against job applicants
on grounds of:
Race
Color
Religion
National origin
Age (40 and over)
Sex
Pregnancy
Citizenship
Familial status
Disability status
Veteran status
Genetic information

Beat your hidden hiring biases

11

Where hidden bias

can derail diversity
If labor market forces,
the promise of competitive
advantage, and the threat
of legal action are all driving
organizations towards
increased diversity, whats
holding them back?

In many cases, the answer is

hidden hiring bias the kind
that even the most inclusive
organizations can harbor
without their knowledge.
These biases come in two
distinct forms: human bias
and process bias.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

12

Human bias
detnaW pleH

"Most of us believe
that we are ethical
and unbiased. []
But more than two
decades of research
confirms that, in
reality, most of us
fall woefully short
of our inflated
self-perception.17
Banaji, Bazerman and Chugh

17 https://hbr.org/2003/12/how-unethical-are-you/ar/1
18 http://www.nber.org/papers/w21560
19 http://www.pnas.org/content/109/41/16474.full

This quote comes from a

Harvard Business Review article
published in 2003. Since then,
the evidence supporting our
unconscious bias in hiring has
continued to stack up.
Theres the famous University
of Chicago and M.I.T. study
of the same year, to measure
racial discrimination in the labor
market. In it, researchers replied
to Help Wanted ads in Boston
and Chicago newspapers with
fictitious resumes, assigning
each either a White sounding
or African American sounding
name. The White sounding
names received 50% more
call backs.

In 2015, researchers used

a similar methodology to
test bias around candidate
disability. The fictional
applicants with disabilities
received 26% fewer
expressions of employer
interest than those without
disabilities.18
Academics at Yale have also
shown that science researchers
will rate male candidates as
more qualified for the position
of lab manager than female
candidates, even when the
qualifications presented to
them are exactly the same.19

Human bias comes in a variety

of forms. When it comes
to hiring, perhaps the most
crucial are:
Implicit bias judging
people according to
unconscious stereotypes
In-group bias favoring
people in your own circles
When the latter is company
policy, it becomes a different
kind of bias

Beat your hidden hiring biases

13

Process biases

74%

62%
Its not just humans that carry
hidden bias. Its the processes
we create. The methods
organizations use to source,
screen and hire employees can
lead them to rule out some of the
best candidates at every stage.
Often without even noticing.

Sourcing bias
Its natural to have favored
channels for posting job
vacancies, and for actively
sourcing candidates
channels you use because
theyve worked well in the
past. But if, for example,
you rely exclusively on
the same social networks,
or on your same connections,
you risk ruling out the best,
most diverse talent, simply
by not reaching it.

20 http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/01/06/african-americans-and-technology-use/

Application bias
A lot of jobs require good
written English and good
computer skills. But a lot
of them dont. If you have
the same online application
form to complete for all your
vacancies, you can miss out
on candidates just because
they lack the language or IT
skills or easy internet access
to jump through this hoop
youve set.

For example, a study by the

Pew Research Center found
74% of white Americans have
some sort of home broadband
connection, versus just 62% of
African Americans but blacks
and whites are on more equal
footing when it comes to other
types of access, especially
on mobile platforms.20

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Qualification bias
The most qualified candidate
isnt always the most capable
of doing the job.
Prizing schooling or even the
prestige of previous employers
limits the diversity of your
hires to the diversity of those
institutions or organizations.

14

Reference bias
Traditional, unstructured
recommendation letters and
references are a hassle to source,
and often say very little about
a candidates power to perform
in the role youre looking to fill.
Whats worse, theyve been
shown to exhibit bias.

21 http://www.thedp.com/article/2011/01/study_shows_gender_bias_in_rec_letters

Researchers at Rice University

and the University of Houston
found that, when writing in
support of female candidates,
references were more likely
to focus on personal qualities,
potentially at the expense
of other key strengths
like for example, their academic
research.21

Interview bias
Without a solid framework
to guide them, its easy for
interviewers to unwittingly
discourage a candidate from
accepting a position by asking
culturally insensitive and
potentially illegal questions,
that delve beyond their ability
to do the job.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Assessment bias
As with interview questions,
its crucial that any assessments
you use during candidate
selection target job-specific skills
and dont unfairly impact one
protected class over another.

15

Brand bias
What do your candidates see
when they view your website,
meet your interview panel, or
take a tour of your workplace?
The way your brand presents
itself and the kind of culture
it nurtures affects the
candidates you attract and
can ultimately limit the diversity
of the people on your payroll.
(A negative culture doesnt
only discourage new hires;
it also makes existing staff
less likely to give their all.)

22 https://hbr.org/2014/03/fear-of-being-different-stifles-talent

In a recent study of 3,000 employees at large

U.S. firms, 50% indicated that the pressure
they felt to play down their differences
diminished their sense of commitment.22

Beat your hidden hiring biases

16

How to remove hidden bias,

with data-driven hiring
Together, these hidden biases
can seriously skew the kind of
candidates you reach, attract,
hire and retain meaning you
miss out on the best talent and,
at the same time, miss out on
the benefits of a more diverse
workforce.
Removing hidden biases means
looking afresh at the way you
hire analyzing your current
processes, and finding ways
to check gut feelings against
hard evidence of a candidates
power to perform.

Essentially, it means collecting

a little data and making some
big decisions around the way
you source, select and support
your staff.
Here are some practical steps
you might want to take:

Beat your hidden hiring biases

17

Data-driven sourcing

Run the numbers on how

Analyze where hires are
your hires are reaching you.
coming from do you
What proportion arrive through: have a disproportionately high
number of graduates from
Referrals via
the same group of academic
personal networks
institutions?
Online job listings
Social network listings
Print job listings
Job fairs or
community events

Use this information as the

basis for a re-evaluation of
the way you source candidates,
seeking opportunities to
broaden your reach. Passive
sourcing tools can help here
letting the people your
new, diverse hires chose as
references (their former peers
and managers), opt in to hear
about your future vacancies.

Review the language and

technical requirements
necessary for a candidate to
successfully apply for your
job vacancies.
Then review the key skills
required for each of your
job roles.
Where applying for the job
requires skills beyond the
scope of the role itself, take
steps to provide additional
support to potential candidates.
Even better, offer different
methods of application
e.g. the chance to submit a
resume, rather than complete
a lengthy form online.

Look to make life easier

for candidates without
easy home internet access,
by making your application
process as mobile-friendly
as possible.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

18

Data-driven selection

Its hard to combat hidden

bias when the way you hire
varies with each new vacancy.
So, seek to standardize selection,
interviewing and referencing
processes.

Think about the size

and composition of
your interviewing panels.
A larger panel could help
you counteract human bias,
while a more diverse panel
may help a wider range of
applicants feel like theyre
going to fit in.

Replace traditional reference

checking and home-grown
candidate assessments with
an online reference solution
one thats proven to assess
job-specific skills and not to be
biased against any protected
classes, and complies with
EEOC guidelines and statutes.

23 https://www.opm.gov/news/speeches-remarks/di-collaboration-and-innovation-summit/
24 http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-boss-doesnt-want-your-resume-1452025908

Provide hiring managers

with job-specific behavioral
interview questions and ensure
a structured process so all
candidates are asked the same
questions and evaluated equally.
Train your hiring managers
in hiring best practices, and
emphasize that any questions
asked of job candidates must
be relevant to the job for which
theyre applying.

Take advantage of new

online and mobile solutions
to support your hiring processes
theyll help keep data auditable
and available for easy analysis
of hiring decisions and trends.

Consider blind-hiring
techniques, like redacting
applicant names or educational
backgrounds before screening.
As employers seek to overcome
human biases, such practices
are becoming more popular
a US agency tried it for slection
panels and increased its share
of women in executive roles
by 41%.23 Cloud storage firm
Compose Inc. recently gained
attention for its blind-hiring
tactics asking candidates to
write short stories about data,
and work on mock projects
and assignments.24

Beat your hidden hiring biases

19

Data-driven diversity

When candidates turn a job

offer down, try to find out why.

Keep in contact with new

hires, asking for feedback
on their experiences.

Monitor staff turnover

to ensure your staff
members are leaving for the
right reasons and that your
workplace feels open and
welcoming to new hires
of all genders, orientations,
ages and backgrounds.

Use the information

youve gleaned to
constantly revise both your
hiring processes, and the way
your brand presents itself.
This could involve establishing
additional support, or targeted
mentoring programs.

Seek out candidates

with a high level of
cultural sensitivity, whatever
their own background.
While such soft skills are
notoriously difficult to identify
and test, pre-hire assessments
that reach out to a candidates
previous peers and managers
can shed invaluable light on
their past and likely future
behavior. Selecting candidates
with a history of being culturally
sensitive could help you
actively foster a more inclusive
working environment.

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Hire the best.

Whoever they are.
The great thing about spreading your hiring
net wider, and closing up the bias-shaped
holes that allow potentially brilliant candidates
to slip through?
The more you do it, the easier it gets. The more
diverse your workforce, the easier it becomes
to demonstrate your inclusive brand values to
prospective employees, and attract the best
people, regardless of race, gender, age or any
other class.

20

Beat your hidden hiring biases

Who we are
At SkillSurvey, we pride ourselves on bringing scientific
rigor to recruitment.
With cloud-based online reference checking and
passive sourcing solutions, we help public and private
organizations of all kinds from hospitals and colleges,
to technology and hospitality businesses reach more
potential candidates.
And then we help them quickly and legally assess
job-specific skills, without adverse bias.
To see what you can achieve, download our ebook
The Science of Successful Hiring or just get in touch.
skillsurvey.com

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SkillSurvey, Inc. - SkillSurvey and Pre-Hire 360 are registered trademarks of SkillSurvey Inc. SkillSurveys Pre-Hire 360 is a patented solution. For more information see www.skillsurvey.com/patents.