How to Hire the Best Team: A Practical Guide to Inclusive Hiring

In an ecosystem, biodiversity makes the ecosystem hold together, function and be resilient.

In a building the concrete and the rebar work together to make the building strong. Neither is strong enough without the other.

So, too, your team.

You want to hire and grow the best available people for the mission your team has and will have in the future, as best you can tell. What you don't want to do is hire people who all

• Think like you
• Look like you
• Have the same strengths as you
• Are more enthusiastic than they are competent
• Have the same blind spots as you
• Have the same development areas as you
  

Why? Cognitive diversity, demographic diversity and improving your own selection technique.

Cognitive diversity: differences in perspectives, problem-solving styles and experiences enhance innovation and decision quality by introducing more options and wider perspectives. Teams with varied backgrounds are somewhat better at identifying risks and generating creative solutions. Synergy from diversity: Managing team diversity to enhance performance Daan van Knippenberg, Lisa H. Nishii, & David J. G. Dwertmann

Demographic diversity: differences in gender, ethnicity, age and so on offer similar improvements on problem solving and there is evidence that there is less risk for the same performance. UK Financial Conduct Authority Review of research literature that provides evidence of the impact of diversity and inclusion in the workplace

"On balance, the evidence points to more positive outcomes, for business performance to some extent, and especially for corporate governance and risk management for diverse and inclusive organisations, particularly when it comes to gender"

"Diverse teams can have differences of opinion but are more innovative and better at solving problems creatively"

Improving your own selection technique: It is human nature to be swayed by people we like - by people with whom we "connect". The risk here is that you might like the person, but they might not be the best candidate for the actual role. I cringed into my seat recently at a leadership panel discussion when one of the panellists said they carefully examined if a new candidate "would fit in with the rest of the guys".

"Although homosocial reproduction may reduce uncertainty and facilitate communication, it also serves as a critical mechanism of exclusion and inequality in organizations. As people select organizational incumbents who are socially similar to themselves, they systematically exclude individuals who are different from the norm" Homosocial  Reproduction, Lauren A. Rivera

From biology, we know that monocultures are not very resilient. 

So, hiring and building a diverse, supportive, strong, effective team is not something to leave to chance

Here is what I do for Inclusive Hiring

• Whilst creating the job description, think carefully about the key skills required to do the job, as far as you know.
• Write those skills into the job description. Then candidates can see them and think about whether they possess them.
• Sift CVs, resumes against those skills and invite the most-suitable candidates for a conversation.
  • If your job is externally-visible and people can apply for it then you will need help with the sifting as you will get too many applications.
• Make a scoring matrix with a column for each skill and a row for each candidate. Add a column for your notes.
• Construct behavioural questions designed to elicit evidence of those skills. Your organization may have a library you can use. If not, write them yourself based on the skills.
  • Don't overthink this. I tend to need business process improvement skills for my work, so I might ask "Please describe a time you systematically improved a business process". You can probe for detail in the answer
• Assemble a diverse panel of interviewers. Have them interview the candidates separately.
  • You need at least two other independent assessments as well as yours.
  • Consider subconscious bias training for those interviewers if that is not already in place in your organization
  • Stress use of the standardized behavioural interviewing questions that probe on evidence for the defined skills
• Score each candidate against each skill on a 1 to 5 scale with 5 being the highest. Sometimes this is called a Likert Scale.
  • 5 means they could teach the skill
  • 4 means they are great at it
  • 3 means they are an able practitioner
  • 2 means they are learning the skill
  • 1 means they don't know much about it yet
• Ask the other interviewers to run the same process and send the results to you.
  • Don't let them confer or see each other's assessments at this stage, otherwise you lose the perspective.
• Collate the scores and assemble the panel to discuss. You will find a much clearer profile of each candidate emerges from the different perspectives of the panel. This in itself also illustrates the point about Inclusive Hiring.
• Offer the job to the person with the highest overall score.
  
  • You can be confident they have the skills to do a good job

Onboarding and Beyond

Support the new hire through their onboarding and ramp with a training plan, buddy and recommended 1:1 network to get started in the new role. Co-create a development plan, especially as you have an idea of where development might be needed from the assessment process.

The hiring process outlined above has a number of advantages, in my experience:

• It forces you to think about the important skills up front, and therefore communicate them in the job description.
• It provides an objective assessment framework. This helps you to avoid homosocial reproduction and gravitating towards people you like.
• It includes the perspectives of others so the scan covers more than you can see as an individual.
• It gives you an objective record if candidates have queries about the outcome.

You may have additional practices that are required in your jurisdiction or organization.

I hope this helps with objectivity on internal and external hiring. Do reach out if you would like help with this or any of the technology matters discussed in other articles.

To go deeper on how to write job descriptions to be as inclusive as possible then Inclusive recruitment: Guide for people professionals is an excellent next-level resource.

You can reach me on LinkedIn and at fieldenablement.com