Keeping Bias in Check

Consultant and Chartered Occupational Psychologist Daniel Mannheimer describes how bias is a challenge for building diverse teams and the categories of bias that need to be overcome when recruiting.

Making instant judgements and quick decisions by using just our gut feeling has been instrumental in human survival for millennia. We are naturally drawn to the familiar and the similar, and naturally repelled by the different and the strange. All very beneficial for evolution and longevity but not so great in recruitment. Diverse teams are good for business so how do we win the war against our subjective views to become more objective in our hiring processes and ensure a diverse workforce?

In the hiring process, unconscious bias happens when you form an opinion about candidates based solely on first impressions. Or, when you prefer one candidate over another simply because the first one seems like someone you might be friends with outside of work. Even in the early hiring stages, a candidate’s CV, their name, or their hometown could influence your opinion more than you think. In short, unconscious bias influences your decision using criteria irrelevant to the job.

“Forewarned is forearmed and understanding the forces at play and particularly the major types of bias that you may be experiencing, is a key first step to managing its negative potential.”

Some major types of bias

Stereotypes
Stereotype bias plays a significant role in how we perceive and characterise others. One study[1] illustrates this by finding that its participants were quicker to associate ‘White’ with positive attributes such as ‘smart’ or ‘pleasant’, compared with the pairing of ‘Black’ with the same positive attributes. We have biases around how candidates look, how they sound, where they went to university and where they worked previously.

Differences in interpretation
Interpretation bias relates to information-processing and is a tendency to inappropriately analyse ambiguous stimuli, scenarios, and events. If a candidate has a gap in their CV for example, then we may see that as wholly negative an irresponsible or unreliable period of unemployment. We fail to consider that they may have filled this gap with an experience or learning that would be enriching and beneficial in their role.

Halo and Horn Effects
If a candidate makes a good or bad first impression on paper or in person, then that is likely to linger and influence their entire recruitment journey and make their treatment less objective. For example, studies[2] have shown that attractiveness is ‘associated’ with positive traits despite being of no relevance to a role. The halo/horns effect bias is the tendency to allow one good or bad trait to overshadow others.

Primacy and Recency Effects
Primacy bias is the tendency to emphasise information learned early on over information encountered later. Relative to this is recency bias, where recruiters tend to focus on the most recent time period rather than taking a longer view.

Fatigue and Mood
Does the fifteenth CV you read get the same examination as the first? Does a candidate get the same treatment in their interview if it is the fourth interview of the day for the panel? Probably not, we get tired, we get irritable, and we get bored. This will have a detrimental effect on our perceptions of a candidate’s skill.

Benchmarking
Recruiters may be liable to compare candidates against each other rather than against actual job requirements. One may be more attractive, funnier, speak more languages than another candidate, but is that relevant? They may be equally skilled for a role.

Similar-to-me
We have a natural affinity and therefore bias towards people who share traits, experiences, or other similarities to us. If they have the same skin colour, grew up in our hometown, went to the same school, practice the same hobby then we can unconsciously favour them. Overcoming ‘recruiting in our own image’ is essential for building diverse teams and avoiding groupthink.

What to do about bias

Understanding where biases are coming from and how they affect our hiring decisions may not entirely preclude our unconscious bias, but, ultimately, we’ll be more conscious of it when it does happen. We cannot completely avoid them, but we can monitor them.

We can create job profiles that do not alienate minorities or appeal to one group above another. We can create job descriptions that demonstrate the values-based competencies required. We can standardise our assessment processes and use psychometric and values-based methodologies for selection. We can use past behaviours to predict future performance. Most importantly, we need to constantly refresh our awareness of our potential bias in order to minimise its impact.

At Alumni we have worked with sourcing leadership and talent for more than 30 years. Having developed tried and tested methodologies designed to minimise bias in our recruitment processes allows us to act as a trusted advisor to our clients. By applying our expertise, analysing the context of the role and asking the right questions around the required skills, and what experience and competencies are actually needed, we help challenge the candidate profile, help our clients navigate and secure future success and stay open-minded.

If you would like to know more about inclusive recruitment, explore our wide network of diverse candidates or discuss awareness and development programmes, then please get in touch.

Daniel Mannheimer

Consultant and Chartered Occupational Psychologist
E-mail

References

[1] Measuring individual differences in implicit cognition: The implicit association test. By Greenwald, Anthony G.,McGhee, Debbie E.,Schwartz, Jordan L. K. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 74(6), Jun 1998, 1464-1480

[2] https://news.rice.edu/news/2006/rice-study-suggests-people-are-more-trusting-attractive-strangers

Keeping Bias in Check

Keeping Bias in Check

Some major types of bias

What to do about bias

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