3 Ways Technology Can Help Promote Diversity in the Workplace

Traditional, unconscious biases have led to skewed hiring practices over the years, which in turn have led to a skewed workforce that is not gender or ethnically diverse. Technology can step in and help change the status of diversity in the workplace and help businesses achieve more.   

Workplace diversity is defined as the inclusion of all individuals in an organization’s workforce, regardless of gender, religion, ethnicity, race, age, sexual orientation, and physical or mental fitness.

HR experts have often debated the case of diversity and inclusion – is it just “good to do” to maintain an inclusive employer image, or is there a real benefit to business? Let’s look at some statistics to back the case of ethnic and gender diversity in the workplace:

• Research by Morgan StanleyOpens a new window in 2016 found that companies with higher gender diversity delivered slightly better returns and moderately outperformed those with lower gender diversity, on average in the past five years.
• McKinsey’s 2018 reportOpens a new window found that gender-diverse executive teams, which make the most important strategic and operational decisions, were correlated with profitable outcomes across geographies.
• The same report also revealed that companies with the most ethnically/culturally diverse boards worldwide are 43% more likely to experience higher profits.
   

Clearly, there is a business case to be made for hiring, engaging and retaining a diverse workforce. But are organizations, in fact, walking the walk? McKinsey’s Women in the WorkplaceOpens a new window study of 2018 revealed that women – particularly women of color – remain underrepresented in the workforce. Further, because of gender gaps, women hold only 38 percent of management positions in comparison to 62 percent held by men.

In his article on recruiting for a bright futureOpens a new window , Mike Kofi Okyere, CEO of Perengo, says, “A focus on diversity is worth the effort. Organizations that hire minorities are experiencing great rewards. It’s been found that for every one-percent increase in gender diversity, company revenue increases by three percent.”

Also read:  3 Reasons Why a Diverse Team is Crucial to a Startup’s SuccessOpens a new window

How Does Diversity Help a Business?

A diverse workforce can bring unique experiences and new-age capabilities to the table, such as collaboration, communication, innovation, and creative thinking. Their mindset can enable a better understanding of the mindsets (and requirements) of the customer base, a large part of which is also diverse.

For example, women are often the key decision-makers in the household when it comes to what to buy and what to eat. In the FMCG sector, a female employee may better understand what drives those buying decisions and help innovate to meet those specific needs by recommending new products. The company may be able to relate better to its customers and surpass their expectations – a real and tangible business benefit.

Also read: Why Diversity and Inclusion as a Core Value Leads to Successful CompaniesOpens a new window

How Can Technology Help Promote Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace?

With initiatives like equal pay dayOpens a new window , companies are working towards closing the gender and ethnic pay gap. However, just instituting such days is not enough. Active measures to overcome unconscious bias in hiring will lead to the development of a well-represented diverse workforce. Here are three ways technology can help do just that.

1. Create job descriptions that appeal to diverse candidates 

Job descriptions are usually an afterthought in recruiting. However, they are an important factor of an organization’s overall human capital strategy. In addition to setting candidate expectations, job descriptions are also an essential compliance checkpoint. Today, AI-powered analytics solutions can help employers identify bias in job descriptions, such as phrases that tend to be more masculine than feminine and recommend alternate phrases, words or sentences that help recruiters write more inclusive job descriptions. This can help reach out to the largely untapped diverse candidate pool out there.

2. Reduce unconscious bias

AI-powered recruiting solutions can be trained to perform objective assessments of skills, competencies, and talents, while ignoring demographic factors like gender, race, and age. Take, for example, bowmoOpens a new window – an HR-based software as a service platform (SaaS) – that helps eliminate the bias in database and resume searches. A pure skill-set-matching algorithm based on the Boyer-Moore string search algorithm makes this possible. The software is so designed that it does not use name, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or disability as screening parameters. It purely assesses the correct fit basis role, years of experience, technical skill/s, and sometimes education. 

3. Highlight disparity in compensation

Embracing workforce analyticsOpens a new window to address the diversity issue can help significantly. An analytics platform can comb through data from multiple sources and provide insights on the recruitment, compensation and benefits patterns of the organization, revealing pay gaps across the diverse workforce. A data-driven approach like this attaches real numbers to the diversity issue and can help CHROs create a strong business case to tackle the diversity and inclusion issue on priority.

What Can You Do to Promote Diversity in the Workplace?

Being diversity-friendly is not just about changing the processes and support systems in the workplace. It requires a deeper-level mindset change – a move towards unbiased acceptance of diverse individuals as equals in the workplace. This means CHROs must look at every HR intervention with a new lens if diversity is to be adopted as a business priority.

1. Compensation and benefits: Organizations’ compensation philosophy in terms of gender parity should be based on fairness, openness, and transparency.

2. Training and development: Mentoring and coaching can help underrepresented minorities (including women) gain confidence and direction in the business world. Sensitization workshops can be conducted across the organization to help employees accept diverse working styles, expectations, and problem-solving approaches.

3. Special needs: One example of special needs is the fact that many women may need to take time off for maternity. Often, women are seen as the primary caregiver in the family and may need time off to care for an elderly person too. Having a non-discriminatory employment model that factors in such needs is important.

4. Safety policies: Prevention of harassment at the workplace is one of the most important roles of HR. It is important to formulate policies keeping in mind the fact that the workplace of the future will be increasingly gender-diverse. Sexual, physical and emotional harassment policies should be clearly outlined and platforms provided for employees to safely report misconduct.

Also read: How AI in HR Will Close the Gender Pay GapOpens a new window

A Final Word

Ensuring diversity in the workplace is no longer merely a compliance issue. It is a necessity to represent a largely diverse customer base from the perspective of values as well as profitability. Businesses would benefit from following the example of IBM, that has made moves in hiring a neurodiverse workforceOpens a new window for the very specific skill sets this workforce can bring to the table. By using technology to aid the hiring process, companies can ensure that their workforce is a diverse, dynamic and happy one!  

What steps is your organization taking to incorporate diversity in the workplace? Let us know on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn. We’re always listening!

(Updated: 04/11/2019)