The step by step guide to improving your D&I metrics.
D&I is a top priority for people leaders around the world, but often it’s hard to understand where to start to fix the problem. The Caraffi experts have put together a step-by-step guide that will help you create lasting change on your organisation’s ability to attract, recruit and retain diverse talent.
STEP ONE – Conduct a diversity hiring audit on your current hiring process
Assess the diversity of your current hiring process and identify any potential bottlenecks and discrepancies. Is D&I a top of the funnel issue? Or is more of a leaking pipeline issue?
Until you analyse your diversity hiring data, you cannot get an accurate picture of how to improve.
Ask yourself:
- What are the strengths of my diversity hiring?
- What are the challenges in my diversity hiring?
- What does the data show are the barriers to better D&I in my organisation?
STEP TWO – Pick one metric to improve
Trying to overhaul your diversity hiring metrics can be overwhelming. The simplest way to improve your diversity hiring is to pick one metric to improve upon.
For example, maybe it’s increasing the percentage of qualified female employees in tech-related roles by 10% within 6 months. Or, increasing the percentage of qualified visible minorities on your sales team by 15% within 12 months.
STEP THREE – Attract and source more diverse talent.
If your diversity hiring audit reveals that you are failing to find and attract diverse candidates in the first place, there are several things you can do.
1. Re-word your job posting
Studies has found that the language you use in your job description could deter diverse talent from applying to your role.
To attract more female candidates, avoid using too many “masculine-type” words (e.g., ambitious, dominate, challenging) in your job posting.
This tool can help you understand if your job descriptions contain any particularly gendered language.
2. Showcase your existing diversity
One of the biggest barriers to increasing workplace diversity is that diversity attracts diversity. Glassdoor found that 67% of job seekers use diversity is an important factor when considering companies and job offers.
Look at the pictures and videos of your workplace on your website and social profiles. If they don’t show diverse talent, it’s likely diverse talent won’t apply.
3. Offer workplace flexibility
Research has found a strong predictor of employees leaving their organisations is a long commute. Because distance from city office locations is often correlated with more diverse neighbourhoods, offering work from home options and flexible work hours not only attract more diverse candidates, it helps decrease expensive turnover.
4. Encourage referrals from minority employees
In general, people’s social and professional networks are made up of people who are demographically similar. You can leverage this network similarity effect by encouraging minority employees to make referrals since they are more likely to refer members of their community. Minority employee referrals help increase your diversity hiring with the added benefits of hiring from referrals in the first place.
STEP FOUR – Increase diversity in your candidate screening
Many of the usual criteria for candidate screening such as their prior company, their school, or their personal connection, often decrease the diversity of the candidate pipeline.
If your diversity hiring audit reveals that you have a leaking pipeline at your candidate screening, there are a couple great tools you can try.
1. Pre-hire assessment
Research has found that companies that use a pre-hire personality assessment have workplaces that are more racially diverse.
Personality assessments help increase workplace diversity because personality scores do not significantly differ for minority group members.
2. Blind hiring
Blind hiring is any technique that anonymizes or “blinds” personal information about a candidate from the recruiter or hiring manager that can lead to unconscious (or conscious) bias about the candidate.
Currently, software that anonymizes resumes by removing names, schools, and even addresses as well as software that anonymizes pre-hire testing exist and are showing promising signs of reducing unconscious bias.
STEP FIVE – Increase diversity in your candidate shortlisting process
If your diversity hiring audit reveals the bottleneck is in your candidate shortlisting, there are two techniques you should know about.
1. The “two-in-the-pool” effect
Research featured in Harvard Business Review found that when the final candidate pool has only one minority candidate, he or she has virtually no chances of being hired.
If there are at least two female candidates in the final candidate pool, the odds of hiring a female candidate are 79 times greater. If there are least two minority candidates in the final candidate pool, the odds of hiring a minority candidate are 194 times greater. Hence, the “two in the pool effect.”
2. Intelligent shortlisting
Automated intelligent shortlisting increases workplace diversity by replacing the most tedious and time-consuming part of recruitment: manual shortlisting.
Intelligent shortlisting software lives inside your ATS and uses your resume database to learn about existing employees’ experience, skills, and other criteria. The shortlisting software then objectively and consistently applies these criteria across all candidates, which reduces problems related to unconscious biases and accidental discrimination.
STEP SIX – Evaluate your diversity hiring metrics
Go back to the diversity hiring metric goal you decided on in Step 2.
Did you hit your goal? Which strategies were effective and which ones were not?
If you were successful at hitting your diversity hiring goal, rinse, and repeat. If not, evaluate which strategies were effective and which ones were not and re-iterate your process.
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