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Common Biases in the Hiring Process

Common Biases in the Hiring Process

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We all have internal biases knowingly or unknowingly.

 As humans, we tend to make hasty decisions.

 These biases are the order of the day by recruiters when looking for their next best-fit candidate.

Bias begins right from the resume selection, the shortlisting process to actual interviews.

 However, recruiters need to overcome their internal biases for market diversification because fair hiring brings more innovation.

Some of the biases that might affect your hiring processes are as discussed below;

Confirmation bias

Confirmation bias happens when one tries to get answers or feed their curiosity of an initial impression they first had of you.

 It entails overlooking evidence contrary to our initial judgment of someone.

Recruiters tend to ask irrelevant questions because they want to believe their instincts. 

They also want to confirm the correctness of the candidate based on their assessment.

 In many interviews,  the suitability of a candidate  is determined upon before the interview.

Sometimes it may be within   20 minutes of the interview.

By doing this, you miss great candidates for the position because you made a wrong judgment at the first encounter.

Affect Heuristics

Affect heuristics  occurs when a recruiter concludes the candidates’ suitability mentally without evaluating their full potential.

This shortcut is  sought when the panelists are tired of sitting through the interview.

For instance, a recruiter might dismiss a candidate as incompetent for their features.

These features may be ; dreadlocks, color, ethnicity, or a stutter  because they do not like people with certain traits.

Expectation anchor bias

Expectation anchor bias happens when recruiters have certain professional background information of a candidate  that they use to determine their best fit .

The recruiters then overlook other great candidates suitable for the position.

Hallo effect

A recruiter tends to happen when recruiters focus so much on one’s professional achievements and pros failing to conduct proper investigations of a candidate’s background to make a decision.

A recruiter may be swayed away by the candidates’ strengths throughout the recruitment process making them believe they are the best when there are better candidates than them.

Overconfidence Bias

This bias occurs when recruiters justify their final decisions because of their narcissistic ability that they know and can choose the right candidates unopposed.

The overconfidence allows the recruiter to make their decision whole overlooking their objectives of the recruitment process at the end of the day.

Similarity Attraction Bias

This occurs when a recruiter prefers a candidate with similar behavior as theirs even when the traits do not relate with the job description.

It is human nature to want to spend time with people you know you both will get along well, taking it to the work environment is a bit extra.

Beauty Bias

 Recruiters tend to think that looks affect how a person delivers. They, therefore, look for a successor with similar features to those of the predecessor.

Affinity Bias

This happens when a recruiter prefers a certain candidate because they feel a natural attraction towards them.

Maybe you both come from the same upcountry, worship at the same sanctuary, or have common friends.

A recruiter ends up settling for a candidate that may not be suitable because they emphasized things irrelevant to the hiring decision.

Judgment Bias

Recruiters tend to compare the latest received resumes to those that were submitted earlier thereby moving objectives with each.

They end up comparing resumes of one candidate to the other, making a decision based on them instead of looking at the skills and attributes relayed.

In conclusion, recruiters should try to make the recruitment process objective and structured. They also need to avoid being heuristic at all times by the fact that they are human.

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