DEI efforts are essential for customer experience leaders. To delight diverse customers, they should have people from diverse backgrounds on their team to understand the customer. The best way to do it is to rethink and reexamine hiring practices. Jen Bailin, chief revenue officer, SAP CX, provides a few strategies to effectively cast a wider hiring net to recruit the next generation of CX talent.
Now more than ever, businesses are committed to promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the workforce. They understand that diverse workforces help foster new ideas, thought processes, and greater productivity.Â
But diversity in the workforce remains largely an aspirational goal. Consider this sobering studyOpens a new window released earlier this year by Built In: Within the tech industry, 35% of companies report still being at the beginning stages of developing their DEI programs; another 30% admit they either don’t have any DEI programs in place or are making unacceptably poor progress.
DEI efforts are particularly important for Customer Experience leaders to be thinking about. Our customer experience (CX) teams must have differing backgrounds, insights, and experiences. We aim to delight customers across the globe, and if our CX team isn’t as equally diverse, we won’t be able to fully understand our customers and their perspectives or meet their needs.â€
In my view, the best way to begin tackling this challenge is to reexamine and rethink hiring practices critically. Companies that aren’t diverse are likely to hire more of the same.Â
Thus, businesses should work consciously to overcome their default tendencies by proactively casting wider nets during the hiring process. Here are my key strategies for how companies can effectively cast a wider hiring net as they recruit the next generation of CX talent:
1. Reevaluate What Types of Skills and Backgrounds Are Most Important
Many companies tend to form a search image for job openings modeled after top-performing employees already working in these jobs. As a result, companies end up gravitating toward job candidates with the same skill sets and backgrounds as existing employees.Â
It’s essential to be aware of this default position and consciously fight against it. For example, if the search image for a specific position is dominated by prescriptive technical skills and specific educational credentials, the company should be reevaluating how vital the technical skills are concerning a proven track record of being an effective team player and of thinking outside the box. Prerequisites and preferred qualifications have an enormous bearing on the candidates applying for a particular job. That’s why it’s essential to reconsider all of these elements of the search image.Â
Over my career, I’ve seen time and again how important a person’s desire, attitude, and work ethic are. I want to lead teams and people that propel growth, and I believe that soft skills are a better indicator of success in building your CX teams. That’s the secret sauce. Â
2. Diversify Where You Post Job Announcements
Companies that post jobs in all of the usual places will get all of the usual applicants. Instead, it’s important to consciously target communities and people who would help diversify your workforce.
There are job recruiting sites for just about every demographic imaginable, from military veterans to workers older than age 50 to workers from specific ethnic, cultural, and racial groups. Reevaluating where you post jobs will help drive better diversity within your applicant pool.
See More: 3 Reasons Why a Diverse Team is Crucial to a Startup’s Success
3. Network Directly With Diverse Job Candidates
Businesses tend to recruit within their own social circles and networks. Thus, it’s important to network in other groups and settings consciously.Â
Companies can identify underrepresented candidates and build personal relationships with them long before they apply, helping them grow professionally and encouraging them to apply to specific job openings as they arise.Â
Companies also can target specific types of diversity, for example, hosting workshops and mentoring sessions with affinity-based organizations on local college campuses or conducting in-person outreach at a local veterans’ center, women’s shelter, or cultural center.Â
4. Customize Your EEO Statement
Most companies include an equal employment opportunity (EEO) statement on their websites and job descriptions. Unfortunately, most of these statements are generic, impersonal, and legal sounding. Prospective candidates from diverse backgrounds often take the time to read EEO statements, which means that they notice when the company is using boilerplate language.Â
An easy way to communicate to prospective job candidates that a company is truly committed to providing equal opportunities for all is to customize the EEO statement. The statement should be simple, direct, and from the heart.
5. Diversify Your Hiring Team
When prospective job applicants come in for an interview, they typically meet and interact with multiple people who make up the hiring team. If this hiring team comprises only people from a specific background that doesn’t match the applicant’s own, it can be off-putting for the applicant.Â
The solution is simple: organizations need to diversify their hiring team with the faces of people representing the types of diversity the organization wants to attract. For organizations that aren’t fortunate enough to have this diversity already within their ranks, the key is to get creative. Perhaps they can recruit diverse board members, investors, or outside hiring advisers who can, through their relationship with the organization, visibly reinforce the company’s commitment to achieving DEI.
See More:Â 4 Ways To Optimize Your Global Hiring Strategy for DEI Success
6. Develop Internal Clarity About What Types of Diversity You Want
Workforce diversity is, by definition, a nebulous term that means different things to different people. Thus, when a company commits to diversity in the workforce, it’s vital for the company to develop internal clarity about what specifically the organization is seeking to achieve with its DEI goals. These types of conversations can feel uncomfortable at first. But when the hiring team and others in the organization have internal clarity about what diversity means, they can be much more effective and targeted in their networking and recruiting activities and during their reviews of job applications.
For customer experience leaders, I think it’s essential to look at your customer base. Is your team representative of that base? What perspectives do you need to add to your team to align more closely?Â
Conclusion
DEI is important to every aspect of business, especially in building strong CX teams. Business leaders must take a critical eye on their hiring practices to overcome biases and not only recruit but also retain a diverse workforce. That’s where the magic is.
What strategies have you developed to hire more diverse talent to your customer experience team? Share with us on FacebookOpens a new window , TwitterOpens a new window , and LinkedInOpens a new window .
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