Erasing Institutional Bias

Gender,?racial?and other biases poison?organizations and society at large.

Whether subtle or overt, conscious or unconscious,?bias pervades individuals, organizations and institutions.?Systemic or institutional bias exists when some groups hold advantage over others within a certain power structure.?From slavery and Jim Crow laws to the Electoral College – which was designed to stop average?US citizens from choosing?the?president through?popular vote – bias surrounds you?and affects everyone.?Recently, more people than ever,?including the historically privileged,?have come together to fight bias. There can be no better time for action.

Combat bias by acknowledging it and doing something about it. This means identifying your own biases, as well as those that exist within your organization and?society.?Moreover, you must?recognize?and own your past role in supporting these biases. Ingrained, systemic bias, in particular, doesn’t loosen its grip easily;?you can’t remove?it alone.?Once you identify and expose systemic bias, organize?others to help you eliminate it.

“One of the problems with systemic bias is that erasing it seems an insurmountable task from the vantage point of a single individual.”

Systemic bias denies people opportunities?by dismissing them as job candidates and pigeonholing them?in their careers. It?discriminates against certain customers,?denies?firms?and nations the ability to reach their full potential, and?favors men over women,?and white people over those of color.?Systemic bias can?even rob certain people groups of?their freedom or life when they encounter America’s?biased and?racist criminal justice system. Biases have a cumulative effect. A Black woman, for example, faces even more?bias, in sum total,?than the?distinct racial and gender discrimination she experiences.?When everyone belongs and can thrive, organizations perform better and society itself improves.

Work to eradicate biases with a clear action?plan and unassailable data.

To remove organizational and institutional bias,?individuals must take responsibility for their own part in it, and then – crucially –?contribute to the solution. To do so, follow four broad steps:?

1. Assess your past part in contributing to systemic bias.
2. Plan your approach to stopping systemic bias.
3. Build support from others.
4. Create and continue momentum for change.

“Systems were built biased by humans and systems can be dismantled and made just by humans.”

Start?by honestly examining a given bias, its effects, and anything you do or have done that supports it in any way. If you skip this step, you’ll lose credibility if exposed as contributing to the very problems you want others to eliminate.?Next,?establish?a clear plan of action.?Gather and analyze?data related to the problem. Share?evidence-based insights from the data. Then, break?down the biased processes designed and perpetuated by your organization over the years. Rebuild?them?without bias.?Measure your progress and assign clear responsibilities.

Use data to make an unassailable case where misinformation, injustice?and unfairness exist. This exposes people’s erroneous beliefs that, for example, immigrants are taking over the country;?that such individuals commit a disproportionate number of crimes;?or that?minorities draw on government support more than other groups.?It helps others?see their unconscious biases, including subtle stereotypes that undermine women and people of color?in their careers.?In organizations, exposure backed by hard data?puts the onus on leaders and others to change, or else admit they support discrimination and favoritism.

Once you’ve identified a bias, articulated its effects and backed?it up with data, find colleagues to join the effort. To change ingrained culture and years or decades of systemic?bias you’ll need?intense?and persistent?efforts from many people.?Start by getting just one person to join?you. Gaining that support counters those who might try to dismiss you as the lone dissenter. Make sure you have your argument?prepared, and can signal your own strong commitment, while allowing others in as equals.?The more?diverse your group, the better.?As you attract allies, your momentum grows, making elimination of entrenched biases possible.

Weed hiring?discrimination out of your?recruitment processes.

Occupational bias pigeonholes people, often women, into low-paying and dead-end jobs, and it devalues the work they may do at home and/or caring for others.?This bias?also?disadvantages people who apply to jobs traditionally associated with the other sex. Think, for example, of?the unconscious bias that dictates that doctors are men and nurses are women.?Hiring biases persist even where firms bemoan problems around finding enough diverse candidates. These?organizations often rely on employee referrals and recruit from the same places. They promote diverse employees in much smaller numbers than warranted, yet fail to draw the connection between these practices and their inability to attract and retain minority workers.

Fight hiring and occupational bias by examining your past role in furthering it. For example, have you ever examined the job postings you use to attract applicants to certain positions? Have you made unconscious gender assumptions that have caused?bias in sourcing candidates??Ask yourself what you can do to make improvements.?Gather?the data. If you wonder why your firm hires so few women into tech positions, for example,?look into your recruitment advertising practices?–?including the wording of job?ads, and where those ads appear.?Eliminate hidden biases in which external recruiters might screen out people with Black or foreign-sounding names, or draw adverse conclusions from candidates’ social media pages.?

Make connections with diverse organizations, including historically Black colleges, and insist that a number of diverse candidates be included in every hiring process. Ensure that coaching, mentoring, succession?and other developmental programs include diverse candidates. Reject the notion that your organization should hire based on “cultural fit,” as this too?can lead?to a homogeneous workplace.

“Inaction and silence are choices. Sometimes your silence harms people.”

Create a compelling, evidence-based story from your data, and use it to recruit others to your cause. Build?it into a movement – in this case, to review and rewrite job descriptions, to look at where the firm advertises opportunities, examine how it screens candidates, and determine how it portrays the firm and relevant careers on its website. Set goals and track your progress.

Gender bias is still rampant, including its?more subtle variant:?“benevolent sexism.”

Despite laws forbidding it, gender bias continues. Some males experience gender bias – male nurses, for example – but, in general, women earn less, receive fewer promotions,?and suffer more workplace harassment than men.?Moreover, women still suffer from maternity bias, in which employers avoid hiring, or don’t promote pregnant women or?those of childbearing years.?Subtle gender biases pervade most organizations even today. Men may compliment women on their looks or figure, categorize all women as more compassionate,?praise gay men for being organized and sharp dressers,?or?imply?that?office cleanliness is up to women (even if,?very subtly, by?criticizing men for their “natural” untidy tendencies).

The #MeToo movement that started in 2017 has made progress against overt sexual harassment and assault in the workplace, but?a more subtle “benevolent sexism” still exists. This type of bias does more harm than you might imagine. The executive who takes a younger woman under his wing may have no sexual designs on her. But if he?constantly insinuates?that she requires his help –?by praising her for female-associated traits, and, in general, by patronizing?her –?that?executive undermines her confidence and credibility.

“Benevolent sexism works to compliment women using stereotypes about them.”

To combat gender bias, follow the same steps as with hiring bias. Determine what you want to change, collect and analyze the associated data, craft a better approach or solution, find allies,?take action, set goals, and hold yourself and your?group accountable by tracking metrics toward your goal.

Executives may be more inclined to stamp out racial bias when they see statistics that buttress employees’ individual experiences.

Racism still pervades the systems and institutions of American society –?from the way the criminal?justice system operates, to?segregation in housing, employment, banking?and health care.?Racial biases continue, in part, because so many people believe it comes down to the?individual: If you’re not racist, you may erroneously believe that your responsibility?ends there;?only other people can?change their ways.?The?attitude of individual responsibility helps perpetuate?systemic racism in organizations and institutions.

“When you read bias as an individual problem that you don’t have rather than a systemic issue that requires collaborative work to dismantle, you become part of the problem instead of an ally for change.”

At work,?and elsewhere, victims of racism encounter overt or unintentional microaggressions constantly. Small, offhand remarks can cut deeply without the violator ever knowing. Asking a person of color where they’re from (“no, where are you really from”) constitutes an obnoxious microaggression?–?just?as assuming that any person of Asian descent has good math skills reveals ignorance. Those?who talk over women or minorities in meetings, or assume minorities and?women were promoted or hired based on their race or gender perpetuate microaggressions.

When working to identify, analyze and take action against racial biases,?take even more care to have your data and your team of allies ready. Few people or leaders take kindly to implications of racism of any sort. Remember too, that achieving some level of racial diversity only addresses part of the problem. People must also feel included and a sense of?belonging. Conduct listening sessions and focus groups to complement data from surveys. Executives may wake up to the way people feel when you combine statistics with qualitative data that reveals how people experience the organization.

Boost your firm’s bottom line by identifying and eliminating customer bias.

Outside your workforce, your customers may suffer biases as well. A car salesman might judge a person based on their clothes; nonprofits might focus all their energy on wealthy, white donors; Hollywood might cast white actors in native or non-white roles, or?buy into the myth that movies or shows with Black leads can’t succeed. Firms might build products aimed at only a majority demographic. The list goes on and, through lost sales, it hurts firms as well?as those they ignore.

“Films with diverse casts made the most money at the box office and cashed in on their investments with the most success.”

Ask yourself, do you know your customers? How did the firm determine where to advertise and?whom to target??Have you missed entire demographics that might buy from you? If so, what could your firm do to serve them?

America’s prison system serves as a manifestation?of crushing?retribution?bias.

Across society, minorities –?especially Black Americans –?face an awful form of bias that affects their lives nearly?from cradle to grave. The uniquely American need to punish people –?and then punish them again – dates back to slavery,?Jim Crow laws and?lopsided drug laws. It?extends to new immigrants. With the highest rate of incarceration in the world, and laws designed to convict minorities, while sparing white people, the United States today continues to perpetuate?centuries of injustice.?Xenophobia and racism fuel America’s retribution bias, including the widespread?belief that immigrants and Black people account for a disproportionate amount of overall crime,?and that convicts – even long after they’ve served their terms – deserve ostracism, stigmatization and punitive post-prison burdens.

“We define ‘retribution bias’ as a socially held and institutionally enacted bias toward exacting retribution – a bias favoring punishment.”

Retribution bias harms minorities more than others –?people of color account for a staggering 67%?of the US prison population, while only constituting?37% of the population overall. However,?anyone caught up in the criminal justice system suffers, as do their families. Firms that discriminate against ex-cons?lose the chance at finding hard-working and?loyal employees.?They also lose the contributions of undocumented immigrants, whom the system hounds and demonizes.

Combat retribution bias in the same way you fight other biases. When Alex Mejias felt he had to do something about rampant police killings of men of color, he built an internal case for action within his small consulting firm. He crafted a statement of his concerns and proposed actions, then circulated it, building awareness and amassing allies. With his team, he formed Businesses for Black Lives, and brought in neighboring companies to join.?Mejias and his team gathered data, zeroed in on root causes, determined a course of action?and measured their progress.