Everyone operates from a place of bias. Our biases are the way that our brains tend to make sense of the world around us, and we all take mental “shortcuts” when processing information. Sometimes these shortcuts are helpful, sometimes they are not. The thing is, many of these shortcuts often operate outside of our awareness and can be described as unconscious bias. We all jump to conclusions sometimes- even in the workplace. In a business setting, unconscious bias shows up when we assume we know things about a person or circumstance that aren’t actually true. Then, we make decisions based on information we never even had.
Where does unconscious bias come from? Most often it stems from life experience, culture, and other experiential information that we continually absorb through our engagement with the world. Unconscious bias can drive less than favourable behaviours in us and those around us. In a workplace setting unconscious bias can be particularly problematic, whether it applies to race, religion, accent, gender, appearance, education, socioeconomic status, previous experience, and many other factors.
In today’s blog, we’ll be breaking down ways that you can identify, and address, unconscious bias in the workplace.
The Impact in the Workplace
One of the reasons it’s important to address unconscious bias is because it can have a negative impact on the people you work with (and beyond). In business, people-related decisions are made every day, particularly when it comes to task delegation, promotions, recruitment, and performance tracking. If bias is influencing these decisions, it can often lead to a less diverse, less inclusive workplace.
Different Types of Unconscious Bias
Psychologists and Neuroscientists have identified more than 200 types of cognitive biases that impact our thinking and decision making. The following are just a few of the most common, and most problematic, forms of bias:
- Affinity bias is when we show a preference for people who we believe are similar to us. This similarity could be in appearance, interest, even cultural norms.
- Confirmation bias is one of the most talked about forms of bias. This occurs when we develop an initial opinion of someone or something, and then seek out evidence that backs up our opinion, often ignoring contrary evidence.
- Beauty bias is a self-explanatory one, and is when we unconsciously favour those we deem attractive. An example of this would be hiring someone attractive even though they are less experienced than other candidates.
- Gender bias is when you treat someone differently purely because of their gender.
- The halo effect is when you focus only on the positive aspects of someone’s character, overlooking all of the negatives because you ultimately like the person. The flip side of this is the horns effect; focusing only on the negative aspects of someone’s character.
How to Mitigate Unconscious Bias in the Workplace
The first step in reducing unconscious bias in the workplace is by being aware that it actually exists. That may seem obvious, but many people in business overlook the negative impact of unconscious bias on a daily basis, purely because it doesn’t affect them. In reality, unconscious bias affects everyone. Understanding that there is bias in almost everything that we do, we can begin to take action and create processes that will allow for questioning around the way that we decide to move forward in business.
It’s also important to understand that it is difficult to see bias in ourselves, but can easily spot other people’s bias. A recruitment team, for example, should feel comfortable speaking up when they feel like unconscious bias is affecting certain decisions. Another way to mitigate bias in a recruitment process is by normalising information on candidates CVs. This is a common practice in many organisations and can go a long way to help level the playing field for candidates. There may however be other biases that show up depending on this process. First stage interviews for instance might introduce any number of the above mentioned biases. This illustrates the importance of ensuring we have multiple perspectives and allowing space to challenge each other in the area of bias.
There are a number of ways that businesses can reduce unconscious bias on a daily basis. Keeping a record of reasoning behind decisions, taking more time to make decisions, and investing in unconscious bias training are all key to creating a diverse, inclusive, and welcoming workplace.
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