How Your Hiring and Recruitment Processes Can Boost Diversity
Diversity has become a bit of a buzzword when it comes to businesses. It’s no secret that diversity can improve your business tenfold, with some studies reporting that it can even raise your company’s share prices.
The next step is to find practices that actually promote diversity at work. To that end, your hiring and recruitment processes may actually be your key to gaining a more diverse workforce. Here are some strategies you can use:
Building your company brand
At the end of the day, job listings are advertisements. After all, you’re still trying to sell your company to potential hires. As outlined in our Put Your Best Foot Forward post, complete employer profiles are a must when it comes to successful job postings. From the get-go, you should already emphasize the importance of a diverse workforce as part of your company culture; perhaps you can even encourage candidates from underrepresented groups to apply.
Leverage niche job posting sites
While LinkedIn and Indeed can help your job posting reach a wider audience, this might also lead to a lot of half-hearted applications that will just take time to sift through. Try to look for targeted job posting sites, like Recruit Disability and Hire Autism, which target specific underrepresented groups. Additionally, there are also job sites that only post openings from certain fields. Using both kinds of sites can help you get a more diverse — and not to mention qualified — team. Similarly, you can take your efforts offline and look for opportunities to meet your desired candidates where they actually spend their own time. For instance, there are numerous events and conferences that cater solely to women in tech. If you're looking to have more women in your startup, then these channels where you should look at utilizing.
Look at your current recruitment
The Financial Times cites unconscious biases as one of the most harmful things to your recruitment process, as you may be inadvertently closing your doors to great candidates without even knowing it. AI platforms such as Headstart create a more leveled playing field as computer algorithms match applicants to particular positions, removing biases that come with human recruiters. While training your recruiters is important, it is important to understand that it can be difficult to un-train associations you’ve always made. Fortunately, modern tools like AI provide a speedier solution.
Implement company policies to accommodate all candidates
Of course, it's not enough to appear diverse on paper; your policies have to reflect it too. Understand that different candidates have different needs and lifestyles. If you've got candidates with religious commitments, for instance, then you should offer some flexibility that allows them to take time off to be involved with their communities. Similarly, you should be prepared to adjust to women — especially moms. In cut-throat industries such as law, Campbell University School of Law professor Elizabeth E. Berenguer reveals that women end up having to choose between their job and family — a sacrifice that men rarely have to make. Because of these unforgiving barriers, excellent candidates have a harder time thriving and working their way up the corporate ladder. To combat this, an article by Special Counsel on ‘A Renewed Case for Diversity’ recommends having work/life balance programs for working moms, and having a dedicated committee to promote other diversity initiatives. Ensure these policies are upheld, and actively promote them as early as the recruitment phase. You'd be surprised what kind of doors you open to invigorate your work place.
Use employee referrals
Instead of just relying on HR to do the screening, you will have even better chances of getting great hires through employee referrals. Statistics on The Undercover Recruiter confirm that referrals actually have the highest applicant-to-hire conversion rate, compared to other methods. And if your goal is to reach out to more people who belong to a certain demographic, then your current employees should already have existing networks and friends with similar backgrounds. Talk to them and encourage them to refer their connections. But of course, be prepared to give them the tools they need to promote the company, like a simple bonus or incentive.
Indeed, the gospel of diversity is preached so often that we now take it as a given. Taking actionable steps to increase the diversity in your team shows that your company is willing to make the effort towards building a more diverse workforce.