Question

how is your work-life shaped by any biases your employer has?

Answer 1

Life is a consequence of unconscious biases. We are harbored by everyone and taken to the workplace. Unconscious organizational stereotypes can hinder diversity, hire and maintain efforts, and unknowingly form the culture of an organization. Unconscious bias can skew reviews of talent and performance. It also affects who is hired, promoted, and developed — and this undesirably undermines the culture of an organization. Biases can be based on skin colour, gender, age, height, weight, introversion versus extroversion, marital and parental status, disability status (e.g. using a wheelchair or a cane), foreign accents, where someone went to college, etc.

It is important that everyone knows that it is a priority, as with any far-reaching initiative. Set the expectation that with a company-wide announcement, you will make bias mitigation a priority. This is also where you start the process of gathering feedback. An anonymous survey is a good starting point for most companies. The first announcement doesn't have to be complicated: simply outline the "why" (e.g., building a more inclusive work culture), the "when" (e.g., in the coming weeks), and emphasize that employee feedback will be used to drive the process. Its purpose is to initiate conversations and motivate staff to complete your anonymous survey.

Another way of building bias awareness is through "perspective-taking." Simply put, perspective-taking involves putting yourself in the shoes of another person and focusing on how his or her experiences will differ from your own in a given situation. A study of three different diversity training programs found that perspective-taking in terms of long-term benefits was the most promising. When these assumptions are internalized over time, they can drain some of the women's confidence that more challenging roles can be done by them or their female colleagues. Whether we realize it or not, our perceptions of capacity are shaped by stereotypes. During tests, women are held to a higher standard and we are also held to a higher standard. Secret stereotypes like these can harm the career of a woman over time. This leads to reduced access to positions of leadership, stretch assignments, advancement, and pay.