How to Avoid Leaving Diverse Talent Untapped
Connie* is an African American woman in her 50s with an Ivy League Education. She successfully led global teams and initiatives including sales and programs in the tech industry. Connie took a break from her career to take care of a family member. When she was ready to jump back into the job market, she experienced difficulties finding another job. Despite a successful and proven track record with stellar references, she experienced challenges re-entering an industry known for its dismal diversity stats. Connie asked, “How serious is the tech industry in improving diversity? I’m on LinkedIn with a tech background and I’m clearly black. Why haven’t I received responses for jobs at Google, Facebook and others if they’re serious about diversity?”
Connie is not alone. Ageism in Silicon Valley is a known issue. Google recently settled a long-running class-action lawsuit for $11 million claiming that it discriminated against hundreds of older workers by failing to hire them because of their age. Unconscious bias against women and underrepresented minorities compound the problem.
Silicon Valley’s hiring practices are often so limiting that without the right graduation year (preferably not before 2016), previous employment at GAFAM company (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft) or a NATU company (Netflix, Airbnb, Tesla, Uber) — you may not even get past a company’s resume screener or computer algorithm.
So When Did Experience Become a Dirty Word?
Employers looking for talent that’s deemed “hungry” and not “bogged down by process” may be doing their company a disservice by confusing desired behaviors with perceived biases related to age and experience. Companies need to ensure that their HR/People leaders and teams are strong and empowered to help guide the organization to get what they really want in the talent pool.
“The People role is not for the weak,” said Mari Kemp, Head of People, Samba TV. “When the organization says it wants to hire a senior director with no more than 5–6 years of experience because they say they want someone who will just get things done and not be bogged down with things, you need to be able to question back — Why? This has nothing to do with the years of experience, what they are describing is a personality characteristic. You need to be able to challenge the organization on behalf of the people.”
Hiring Managers Can’t Take a Back Seat in Hiring
Silicon Valley along with many industries are increasingly outsourcing the recruitment function. In his HBR article, “Your Approach to Hiring is All Wrong,” Dane E. Holmes reports that about 40% of US companies have outsourced much of its recruitment and hiring function to “recruitment process outsourcers” which in turn often use subcontractors, typically in India and the Philippines. As a result, hiring managers need to be actively engaged with recruiters on the desired skills, behaviors and characteristics required for a role — and have frequent checkpoints to discuss who gets sent through the process and who doesn’t. Many times, recruiters will reject qualified candidates because of very narrow parameters or implicit bias.
“I actually spot check recruiters. I tell them to give me the 10 resumes that they have cut — even the wacky ones that you can’t believe applied for the job,” said Renee Lahti, CIO, Hitachi Vantara. “I have a conversation with the recruiter on why each was eliminated, using a design thinking element of REFRAME. I recently filled a key role in six weeks. She’s one of the most effective contributors on the team, but her background would have eliminated her right way using the traditional process.”
How to Broaden Your Talent Horizons
1.Train All Hiring Managers AND Recruiters for Unconscious Bias
Unconscious bias can prevent you from getting the best talent needed for a role and certainly prevent you and your company from progressing on its diversity goals. Ensure all hiring managers and recruiters are trained for unconscious bias so that candidates are selected based on the kinds of skills, experience and behaviors required for a role vs. demographic characteristics like gender, race and age. Unconscious bias isn’t a topic just for HR teams.
2.Evaluate Resumes Based on Facts and Not on Presumptions
Companies are now starting to implement “blind hiring” practices to eliminate bias in their recruitment practices. “Blind hiring” may include removing information such as names, addresses, and graduation dates from resumes. Why can this information be problematic in hiring? In a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research, resumes with “white-sounding” names (the study uses “Emily Walsh” and “Greg Baker”) got nearly 50 percent more callbacks than those of “black-sounding” names (the study uses “Lakisha Washington” and “Jamal Jones”) — with identical work history, experiences and skillsets. Addresses can lead to bias because it can infer race, socioeconomic status and whether or not a candidate may have a long commute. Showing graduation dates and a complete listing of years of experience can lead to bias against a candidate’s age.
3.Standardize the Interview Process
Structure is your friend when it comes to interviews. To minimize guess work and those vague “I can’t put my finger on it” comments, ensure all interviewers have a set of agreed-to questions and criteria with required skills and behaviors for the role. When evaluating candidates, implement a standardized score card that can help interviewers stay on task during the conversation. Panel interviews can be helpful to reduce first impression and personality bias that may occur when you are only getting one person’s point of view. Panel interviews can also be a time saver for the candidate and the hiring manager.
4.Use Referrals to Bring in Candidates from Diverse Backgrounds
Employee referrals are widely regarded as an excellent source of quality hires. However, employee referrals can hinder a company’s diversity efforts. According to a report from PayScale, despite making up just 34% of the labor market, white men account for 40% of successful referrals, 30% are white women, and 17% are men of color. Consider incentivizing your employees to refer diversity candidates. Companies like Accenture and Intel offer bigger bonuses to employees for diverse referrals. Companies can also leverage their existing employees resource groups (ERGs) for to find leads on potential candidates.
5.Consider Transferable Skills and Experiences
Say a candidate’s previous employers or job titles may not be a 100% match with what you may have envisioned for a role. Do you immediately reject them? Not necessarily. Many candidates have transferable skills from previous roles and experiences that may prove to be a perfect fit for the role you’re looking to fill. Ask the candidate how they have handled similar examples of challenges and/or opportunities that one may come across in the role. This may give you valuable insights into thought processes and capabilities beyond preconceived notions of a candidate’s “perfect” background.
The acquisition of top talent remains a priority among Silicon Valley companies and yet we are still struggling to move the needle on diversity. We are still finding diverse candidates (by age, gender, race, disability, etc.) who are equally if not more qualified, but unable to breakthrough Silicon Valley’s narrow and sometimes biased screenings. Perhaps it’s time to take a broader view.
*Name changed for privacy
