How to eliminate bias in recruitment

Just 9% of organisations rate their diversity initiatives as very effective. Their biggest obstacle? Unconscious bias in recruitment. Here, we share how workplace bias is created and Talos360’s steps to build an unbiased recruitment process.

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What is recruitment bias?

Recruitment bias refers to an unconscious bias shown during the recruitment process that could restrict your organisation’s ability to hire based on an even playing field. Such internal prejudice may centre around age, gender, race, sexual orientation or social background, to name just a few.

Workplace bias often occurs early in the hiring process, sometimes before a candidate has even stepped through the door. It can even be present in your job adverts or social media advertising.

Often, unconscious bias in recruitment is completely unintentional, but if you let it slide, it could hurt your chances of securing top talent. These days, top-quality candidates are actively looking for organisations that value and work towards a diverse workforce. 

The solution to unconscious bias in recruitment? By implementing an unbiased recruitment process, you can ensure a fair recruitment process, remove any potential barriers and remain compliant with unbiased recruitment industry standards. 

Struggling with recruitment bias? Request your FREE recruitment review

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What creates unconscious bias in recruitment?

Recruitment bias may be conscious or unconscious, meaning that the management or individual in charge of the recruitment process may be either fully aware or completely unaware of their own prejudices. 

The issue with unconscious bias in recruitment is that it is often difficult for an individual to recognise that it is affecting their hiring process.

We all hold unconscious bias in one way or another, but when this relates to certain individuals or social groups, it can compromise the diversity of a company’s workforce.

Common types of workplace bias can include:

• Unconscious bias – this can relate to a candidate’s gender, age, race, class, appearance, or sexuality, among other factors

• Affinity bias – this refers to the bias hirers may feel towards candidates who they share a similarity or ‘affinity’ with. For example, they may have been to the same university or support the same football team. This is also sometimes referred to as similarity attraction bias

• Confirmation bias – this type of workplace bias is where hiring managers decide whether a candidate is suitable or not depending on their pre-existing beliefs. This means they’re not necessarily giving applicants a fair shot at the interview.

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How to ensure an unbiased recruitment strategy

Having acknowledged the value of a diverse and inclusive workforce, it’s crucial to ensure that a fair and unbiased recruitment initiative is in place to promote this. 

Read on for guidance on how to create a hiring strategy checklist that’s as free from recruitment bias as possible.

1. Check the language in your job ads

It’s important to ensure that your job advertisements promote diversity and multiculturalism to attract candidates from these backgrounds. 

Words such as ‘repairman’ or ‘waitress’ can be exclusive on the basis of gender, and may discourage otherwise valuable individuals from applying for the role. This is a common example of unconscious bias in recruitment but an easy one to rectify.

2. Promote your company’s vision on workplace equality

Including information on how your business is striving to reduce workplace bias and create a diverse workforce in job advertisements or ‘about’ pages creates the vision of an accepting and inviting workplace environment. This may encourage a more diverse range of individuals to apply for job vacancies, creating a sense of inclusion from the off.

This is not just a tick-box exercise – a reported 76% of UK job seekers consider an organisation’s DE&I values when considering job offers, so sharing your values and vision could help you attract the talent you need. 

3. Use an anonymised screening process

By removing information such as age, name, and gender from applications, the danger of unconscious bias in recruitment can be vastly decreased. This encourages an attitude of ranking applicants by their occupational value, not how young or old they are or where they were born.

It is an ongoing mission in society to promote inclusivity within everyday life. Making your workplace one that values diversity within its workforce is a vital stepping stone to achieving this goal.

4. Control needed in the hiring process

Controlling each step of the hiring process from job adverts to candidate management right through until employee onboarding can help to reduce any potential recruitment bias your candidates might face. 

Best practice is to flag each section of the hiring process that may be biased. These mostly include applications, screening and interviewing. This is a more advanced process of reducing workplace bias, requiring an intuitive applicant tracking system with unbiased recruitment features. 

5. Range of decision-makers

One of the best ways to build an unbiased recruitment process is to include a range of decision-makers throughout your hiring process. This will ensure you’re making hiring decisions solely based on a candidate’s suitability to the role instead of any potential recruitment bias.

Using scorecards to compare and rate candidates as they progress through the hiring process can make this process even more efficient. 

6. Quick application process 

For a no-fuss application process, you need to ditch the login screens. A password-protected applicant form doesn’t help anyone and is simply another obstacle for your applicants. Besides, you can achieve a much more unbiased recruitment process without them. 

You should also encourage your candidates to upload their CV as a PDF, not only does this allow you to utilise CV redaction features in your ATS, but it’s a much easier process for candidates too. 

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What ATS features do you need for an unbiased recruitment process?

Building a hiring strategy that reduces recruitment bias is all good, but without the right tech in place it’s worthless. 

With the right recruitment software, you can implement the most effective workplace bias initiatives with ease. But to do that, you need the right applicant tracking system features. Below are some of the best hiring software features we recommend for an unbiased recruitment process:

1. CV redaction 

When you think of unbiased recruitment the first thing that comes to mind is CV redaction. Essentially hiding any sensitive information on candidates’ CVs, CV redaction can help keep candidates anonymous and eliminate unconscious bias in recruitment.

CV redaction tools in applicant tracking systems including Talos ATS will typically hide a candidate’s gender, age, name, background, location, and even places of education to ensure complete anonymity. 

If you are choosing an ATS based on your unbiased recruitment requirements, CV redaction should be first on your list of non-negotiable features. 

2. Easy application forms

As we’ve mentioned, a quick and easy application process is standard practice for any organisation looking to reduce workplace bias. But for applications to be truly unbiased, you must have an easy-apply system in place. 

Applications must have as little barriers for candidates as possible. That means simple fields, no login screens and the capability to upload a CV as a PDF; otherwise, your CV redaction tool simply won’t know what to do with itself. 

3. Scorecards 

Scorecards are the ideal unbiased recruitment tool for organisations looking to reduce any potential recruitment bias. Hiring managers use scorecards to accurately assess candidates throughout the process based on predetermined criteria for the role. 

Using scorecards in conjunction with CV redaction, hiring managers can effectively progress candidates throughout the hiring process without displaying any potential workplace bias. However, if a candidate did feel as though they were judged unfairly, organisations can use scorecards to demonstrate a completely unbiased recruitment process. 

These tools don’t just help you secure the best candidate; they can also help your current staff. When employees are treated equally, they place more trust in their workplace,which has seen productivity rates in some businesses increase by as much as 50%.

4. Reporting 

As with any part of the recruitment process, reporting is essential to the success of your unbiased recruitment efforts. With the right reporting features, you can track and report on your ED&I data throughout the hiring process. 

This will help you identify where you’re going wrong, what areas of your recruitment process are falling short and what you need to work on to reduce any workplace bias in your hiring. 

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How to identify where your hiring is biased 

Now, before you go searching for an ATS that has all these features and more, you should first assess your needs for unbiased recruitment. Are you operating within an industry that requires a completely unbiased recruitment process, or are you working against your own targets?

With Talent Analytics you can obtain market insights taken from billions of data points to really see if your hiring habits are in fact biased and in need of some work, or simply in line with industry averages. 

If you find some instances of recruitment bias after comparing it against market insights, you should then work on trying to fix it. With the proper research, you can determine which ATS features you need to implement in your recruitment process. 

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What is unconscious bias training?

While using tech is a great way to reduce bias in recruitment, you can also train your people to identify where unconscious bias is creeping into their processes, and how to limit it. 

Unconscious bias training aims to reduce the risk of workplace bias in companies’ hiring processes. This is when unconscious prejudice affects recruiters’ preferences when selecting candidates for a role. Eliminating this bias promotes equity and inclusion in a company’s workforce.

Does unconscious bias training really work?

Unconscious bias training comes with mixed results. Before you opt for in-depth training for your HR team, it’s worth considering the pros and cons, as well as the more straightforward alternatives…

Advantages of unconscious bias training 

Unconscious bias training can be a positive way to promote equity in your hiring process. Here are some of its advantages:

• Accessible for all employers and HR professionals
• Led by professionals in Diversity & Inclusion practices 
• An effective first step to promoting hiring equity

Drawbacks of unconscious bias training 

While unconscious bias training can be a positive first step towards inclusive hiring, it does have a few drawbacks:

• Theory doesn’t always prove effective in practice
• May lead to ‘positive discrimination’ if handled incorrectly
• Targets the effect of the prejudice, not the source
• Can be costly and time-consuming for employers

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What are the alternatives to unconscious bias training?

There are some effective alternatives to unconscious bias training, helping more employers achieve equity in their hiring strategy.

1. Success profiles

Some organisations have implemented their own methods to reduce unconscious bias in recruitment. In 2018, the UK government introduced ‘Success Profiles’ to ensure that any candidate who applied for civil servant roles was accurately assessed against the same criteria. 

These profiles judged candidates across five different criteria: experience, ability, technical skills, strengths, and behaviours, in an effort to rule out workplace bias while recruiting.

2. Anonymised hiring 

Anonymised hiring is a powerful way to promote Diversity & Inclusion in your recruitment process. This involves removing information, such as names, gender, location, and age, from candidate records – reducing the risk of bias towards these attributes. 

Recruitment software has made it easier than ever to implement anonymised hiring tactics. Talos ATS lets you hide unnecessary information from candidate profiles, promoting fair, unbiased recruitment practices. 

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Reduce workplace bias with Talos ATS 

As an advanced applicant tracking system, Talos ATS is capable of supporting you to reduce bias in your recruitment. With a number of features used by organisations to remain compliant in their industry and meet ED&I targets, there is no better system to suit your unbiased recruitment needs. 

From CV redacting to ED&I reporting features, Talos ATS can help you manage unbiased recruitment campaigns from start to finish.

Talos ATS has several features available for you to use to reduce potential workplace bias in your hiring process, including:

• AI-assisted recruitment advertising
• Talent Analytics
• Candidate Assessments
• Easy-apply applications
• CV redaction 
• Scorecards 
• Video Interviews
• AI-interview insights 
• ED&I reporting

Want to build a unbiased recruitment process? With Talos ATS, you can!

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