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Affinity bias3/17/2023 ![]() Overcoming unconscious bias in your hiring has a ripple effect of building an exceptional team that attracts exceptional candidates. This diversity within organizations fosters better problem-solving, innovation, and thoughtful strategic planning.įurthermore, studies have shown that talented candidates seek out diverse work environments. Diversity across all facets, including, but not limited to, race, socioeconomic status, gender, and sexual orientation, brings together individuals who each contribute unique experiences and perspectives. Making choices that are unconsciously rooted in bias is detrimental to individuals and the organization as a whole by creating a workplace lacking in diversity. Why Addressing Unconscious Bias Benefits Your Organization For people being able to use their discretion to hire people who are just like them, that they are comfortable with, that look like them, that act like them, that talk like them.” The truth is the soft stuff is often a euphemism in many cases for bias. Or, a candidate may be selected over others because “I could see myself hanging out with them after work.”Īs HBS Professor Youngme Moon noted in a HBS After Hours Podcast, “There are so many industries that have a history of relying on the soft stuff, and the soft stuff has worked in the favor of a particular kind of individual. In recruiting specifically, unconscious bias and affinity bias often express themselves as a preference for one candidate or another because of “ culture fit.” Resumes may be selected because of a shared alma mater, or because of an unconscious bias to one name over another. Closely related to unconscious bias is affinity bias in which people tend to gravitate towards others who look, act, and think as they do. ![]() Unconscious or implicit bias is the mental processes that cause us to act in ways that reinforce stereotypes even when in our conscious mind we would deem that behavior counter to our value system. Below are several resources and recommendations compiled from experts at the Harvard Business School, along with actions you can take now to make a lasting difference. However, when it comes to building high performing teams, diversity is proven to be key.The importance of naming and addressing institutional racism has many people focusing on what one can do, as individuals and as employers, to improve diversity, inclusion and understanding at one’s organization. We limit our risk, subsequently shifting our freethinking to conservatism, ultimately stunting business growth. We seek familiarity, hiring the profiles of those who have performed well for us in the past. ![]() So often our bold ideas, our plans to create a uniquely different, high performing team are undone as a result of the pressures of a new position. We must challenge our conventional thought patterns. Those companies in the top quartile for gender diversity were 15 per cent more likely to achieve financial returns above the national industry median. The results revealed a statistically significant connection between diversity and financial performance. McKinsey published a study in 2018 titled “Diversity Matters”, which looked at the data from a group of 366 companies from across a range of industries in the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States and Latin America. The benefits of a workforce comprised of those of different ages, backgrounds and cultures is well documented. ![]() ![]() Therefore, our blind spots, when left unrecognised, may result in a real issue when considering the development of talent pipelining and succession planning. When considering affinity bias in relation to language skills across leadership, assertiveness and relationship building, professionals from non- English speaking backgrounds were rated lower than those of Anglo descent. Research from a recent Ted Talk presented by Dr Helen Turnbull, a leading inclusion & bias expert, brought this issue to life. If we are to ultimately achieve inclusion, we must highlight such biases and work hard to overcome them. As a consequence, our personal “blind-spots” are impacting not only the careers of those “outsiders” but also our ability to grow, develop and nurture a culturally diverse team, something which has been well documented to have a direct impact on business performance. Looking at this in the context of an interview, for those comfortably sitting within our “in” group, their experience will be much more enjoyable and sympathetic compared with those placed in our “out” group. Such a nondisruptive decision has no positive impact when considering the organisational change companies seek in respect of diversity and inclusion. Selecting those who we feel we can relate to and those who we feel will slide seamlessly into the prevailing corporate culture. It’s apparent that we all have a propensity for affinity bias. ![]()
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