Diversity and inclusion have been an Achilles’ heel in many organizations for years now. According to a May 2020 McKinsey report, about 50% of organizations in their longitudinal study have made “little or no progress.” It’s not surprising that recruiters say diversity and inclusion are among the top 5 initiatives they are focusing on in 2020.
Part of the challenge TA teams need to overcome is bias in the hiring process, and that’s where validated, proven assessments can make an impact. With pre-employment assessments like those in Modern Hire’s enterprise hiring platform, recruiters ensure that the candidates most likely to have on-the-job success are quickly identified through a data-informed, transparent process that drastically minimizes bias.
Accessing data-driven candidate qualification
Outdated hiring processes can contain aspects that de-select candidates based on gender, ethnicity, age, and other attributes. Unconscious bias is continuously present, but one of the ways to get to candidate qualification that turns a blind eye to these attributes is by integrating and embedding validated, proven assessments directly into the hiring workflow. Modern Hire’s enterprise hiring platform enables this data-driven candidate qualification through the use of pre-hire assessments, with advanced artificial intelligence to process and automatically understand interview responses and other natural behavioral indicators. The resulting data points are then translated into the priority for recruiters and hiring managers – predictors of on-the-job success. By using predictive analytics, not instincts, to understand candidate potential, hiring teams can minimize bias and concentrate on getting best-fit candidates into the role without tokenism.
The link between data and transparency
To hire a diverse workforce, organizations need to build a diverse applicant pool. Data-driven transparency can be an effective strategy in applicant attraction, and some are taking transparency to new levels by making their diversity statistics public. Hubspot’s 2020 Diversity Report is the fourth consecutive annual report the tech giant has released. It offers a snapshot of Hubspot’s workforce and new hires across departments and types of positions as represented by gender (or gender-neutral or decline to identify), race/ethnicity, and age. Though the tech sector is setting the trend in diversity reporting, other industries are starting to follow suit.
In its May 2020 report, McKinsey spotlights retailer Target’s use of data to drive transparency as a best practice for diversity and inclusion. In the report, McKinsey states, “Progress on I&D is meticulously tracked, with a dedicated I&D analytics team….Business leaders are expected to make use of this disaggregated data to drive their talent decisions.” A workforce that reflects its consumer base is a foundational strategy for Target, one that is likely to contribute to company sustainability when the retail sector is seeing a significant decline.
Diverse hiring doesn’t hold without inclusion
Diversity hiring initiatives can’t succeed over the long-term without an inclusive culture that welcomes and values differences in employees’ experiences and perspectives. That’s why a high level of transparency is so essential: Candidates want and need honest insight into the culture and employment experience to make their best decision about a job offer. Participants in Talent Board’s 2019 North American candidate experience research said company culture is the most critical marketing content they want to see from potential employers.
As a candidate-focused enterprise hiring platform, Modern Hire helps organizations create that transparency in several ways:
- Virtual Job Tryouts educate and engage candidates with realistic scenarios they are likely to encounter on the job
- TA teams can easily embed content at many interaction points along the process to provide candidates with greater insight into the culture
- The platform enables two-way communication between candidates and recruiters and hiring managers
As organizations build momentum with hiring and workforce diversity, the processes and technology they use will become the norm rather than merely a business initiative. With Modern Hire’s platform, TA teams can drive deeper understanding between candidate and company so everyone can make more informed decisions.
