What Is Unconscious Bias?

Unconscious biases are people's unintended preferences. They are formed by the
socialization of our personal experiences and representations of different groups in the
media. These experiences act as social filters in which we make assessments and
judgments of people around us.
Unconscious biases are social stereotypes about certain groups of people that
individuals form outside their conscious awareness.
Research tells us that human beings have natural tendencies to place individuals into
social categories. These categories are often based on social cues such as gender,
cultural background, age, height, or body size. We also categorize based on social
location, religious identity, or political affiliation.

Types of Unconscious Biases

Affinity Bias
It refers to the tendency to be partial to people who are similar to us.
Perception Bias
Perception bias is when someone cannot make an objective judgment about a person
because they belong to a group that they already have preconceived notions about.
The Halo Effect
When someone lets a trait positively influence their evaluation of other unrelated
characteristics, it is called the Halo Effect.
Confirmation Bias
When people seek out information that confirms their preexisting beliefs, it is called
Confirmation Bias.
Groupthink or Conformity
When people hold back their thoughts and opinions to fit in with a particular group, it
is called Groupthink or Conformity.

The Relatable Experience

Recruiting managers always have the best intentions for hiring the best talents. But do
they always succeed?
If you are a recruiting manager, you must have hired people based on their impeccable
resumes. Still, to your surprise, they were not the best performers and often had a hard
time meeting your company goals. And at the same time, the candidate you were
skeptical about turned out to be a star performer.
There can be many reasons behind this, but one of the significant factors lies in our
unconscious biases. It impacts talent management processes in decision-making.
Often, recruiting managers hire people who look similar or share similar behavioral
attributes.
Recommended Resource: A Complete Guide On Talent Management.

4 Steps to Tackle Unconscious Bias

1. Practice Blind Hiring:
Blind hiring is a recruitment tool for eliminating biases during recruitment. Here, the
candidates' details, gender, cultural background, age, height, and ethnicity are
blackout. They are selected based on their expertise, skills, and experiences.
This hiring practice not only helps an organization to eliminate unconscious biases but
also helps in promoting diversity and inclusion in the workplace.
It is commonplace to see incompetent people working in a company who harms the
organization more than they do good. Such hires are a result of the biases that arise
from the traditional hiring method. A conventional hiring method encourages the
hiring manager to prefer one candidate over others based on his belief system,
personal liking, or social prejudice. With blind hiring, the organizations make sure
they hire only the fittest person based on his skill set.

2. Understand Your Biases:

Understand your own biases. Even though you are a rational thinker and make
conscious decisions while recruiting, you can fall into the unconscious loop. The
unconscious brain uses associations based on social categories to develop biases. For
example, if we are constantly exposed to women as primary school teachers and men
as organizational leaders, these associations become wired within the human brain.
You need to be honest and aware of your own biases and have a systematic approach
to find a solution. In a talk show Gail Tolstoi-Miller, the award-winning career coach
and strategist, shared her experiences on unconscious bias in her 20 years long career.
When she became aware of her preferences, she extensively researched unconscious
bias, wrote down all her assumptions, judgments, and perceptions. She found that she
doesn't like candidates wearing bright red polka dot dresses. She unconsciously put
candidates in a no pile for wearing it. Just like her, it's essential to be self-aware and
honestly take measures to prevent it.

3. Fight the First Impression:

Studies have proved that you form your first impression of a person in the first 100
milliseconds. This proves that even before you have conscious thoughts about a
person you are meeting, you create your unconscious judgment. And the damage is
done even before the blink of your eyes. Most of us are not even aware of it.
Recruiting managers too fall under this trap and often make a decision that eventually
impacts the organization.
So how do you outsmart something that you are not even conscious of? To tackle this
problem, you have to constantly remind yourself that you are unaware of your first
impression.

4. Define Your Inner Focus:

Once you become aware of your own bias, then you can reduce the bias by taking
counteractions. For example, if you are gender-biased, you can counteract thinking
about all the influential and successful women leaders. This practice will train your
inner focus and gradually give you more excellent perspectives and redefine your
assumptions and perceptions. And also, surround yourself with positive words and
images about people you might have stereotypical thoughts about to eliminate your
negative biases.

Wrapping Up
So when you are busy hiring new candidates or even sipping your favorite coffee, you
can introspect on your own biases. Make sure you take immediate measures not to let
unconscious bias influence your decision-making.
The more we expose ourselves to break our stereotypical thoughts and perceptions,
we create room for less discrimination.