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5 Powerful Recruiting Strategies for Diversity Hiring
https://www.whatjobs.com/news/news-stories/5-powerful-recruiting-strategies-for-diversity-hiring
By Hugh Fort in Careers, posted January 19, 2023
Diversity has become more mainstream in today’s workplace than ever before.
Governments have seen how important it is and passed laws to ensure it is used in the workplace. For example, the United States has introduced the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission guidelines in the 1960s, which requires fair hiring processes through law.
Workplace diversity has numerous advantages for both businesses and society as a whole. It eliminates any bias, ensuring that those fit for the job - regardless of their sexual orientation, race, or gender - are employed. Nevertheless, diversity will not happen out of the blue, as there must be deliberate efforts from the company’s side.
Ensuring diversity in the workforce lies primarily with HR. Nonetheless, the overall company leadership must set the pace for its implementation. Keeping that in mind, we will explore five powerful strategies to boost diversity in the hiring process.
What is Diversity Hiring?
iGaming fans that play slots Iv games know that different games bring different flavors to the gambling experience. The same applies to the workforce: the more diverse the team is, the more innovative solutions it can generate.
A BCG survey revealed that companies with diverse teams reported 45% in average innovation revenue, compared to 26% from below-average employers, which shows how much diversity contributes to the numbers when it comes to innovation.
Diversity hiring is an employment process free from bias. It involves a reduced preference for particular candidates and gives a fair trial regardless of age, gender, race, religion, etc. In other words, it relies solely on job performance for its selection.
The Top 5 Recruiting Strategies for Diversity Hiring
Here are the best strategies to achieve a bias-free hiring process:
Level the Playing Field for Candidate Sourcing
Hiring a diverse workforce begins with the job posting. Interestingly, the response you will get depends on the wording in the vacancy information. More diverse candidates will apply if they perceive that the job posting is free of any preferences.
Leveling the playing field does not mean reducing the professional requirements for the job. It means limiting the use of preferred ages, gender, race, religion, and other individual characteristics. For instance, a male candidate will not apply for a job he is qualified for if the job posting states “female only.”
Another way of leveling the playing field is by proving that the workplace supports diversity. That could involve giving crucial statistics on the ratio of male to female workers, age group, religion, etc. Glassdoor reports that nearly 76% of employees consider diversity crucial when reviewing vacancies and companies. Proving your diversity will encourage them to apply for or accept your job offer.
Blind Hiring
This strategy begins at the screening stage. It involves removing candidates' personal information to allow HR to focus on their professional and experience aspects. Furthermore, there is software for this, just like HR technology for talent management and other use cases.
Blind hiring has become an effective strategy for diversifying the workforce. However, there are instances where HR must focus on job applications from a particular region. An example would be a company’s corporate social responsibility to employ a certain percentage of its staff from the host community.
In order to streamline the screening process while maintaining a fair and unbiased approach, many organizations are now leveraging resume reader software.
This advanced software automates the process of sifting through resumes, scanning for relevant qualifications, experiences, and skills, while discarding any personal information that could lead to biased decisions.
Set a Diversity Metric of KPI
HR staff may work to ensure the company has a diverse workforce, but it's up to company leaders to steer the ship in that direction. One method is establishing a clear metric for how much diversity is required in the business. That could mean increasing the percentage of males or females, diversifying the workers from different religions, etc.
Setting a diversity metric or target as a company goal gives the hiring process more leeway. HR can openly focus on diversifying the workforce without bias.
Target a Diverse Talent Pool
This technique goes beyond making the job posting as open and unbiased as possible. It involves sending them to talent pools with a diverse candidate base. You will need to do a little digging to find these pools, apart from the ones you often use.
Go for pools with an appropriate mix of different ages, races, religions, genders, etc. Doing this accomplishes two things. First, it allows you to find candidates from all spheres, provided they have the professional qualifications and experience for the job.
Second, it puts your company in a good light by proving to job applicants that you favor a diversified workplace. The response will be more positive.
Have a Diversified Interview Panel
Having unbiased job postings and even using blind hiring is a step in the right direction. Your interview panel must be diversified, with more employees demanding a more diversified workforce. Include people from different divides to ensure the candidates feel safe and are treated fairly.
Doing that will give you a diversified workforce and generate positive reports about your company.
Conclusion
A diversified workforce is possible with the right strategies. Everything, from the job posting to screening and interviewing, must be designed for diversity. Also, using technology can help reduce the amount of work and bias in the early stages of hiring.
Have a clear goal of keeping the workforce diversified. That will often trickle down to the hiring process.
