DEI Recruitment
Updated December 2022
Things To Keep In Mind When Recruiting Candidates
Diverse, Equitable, and Accessible Sourcing
Traditional Underrepresented Minorities (URMs) in the Workplace focus:
Initiatives to Attract Diverse Talent
Questions to Strengthen Equitable Recruitment?
Related Blog Posts, Lunch & Learns, Workshops, and Coaching
Purpose of this Template
This template should serve as a guide for transforming your recruitment process to ensure DEI is at the forefront. This is not all inclusive of all DEI recruitment resources, however, it is a starting point. Be sure to apply to your organization’s industry and position requirements.
Introduction
Recruiting is about building relationships and creating a network of talent. Even if someone isn’t interested in changing employers now, they may know someone talented who is currently searching – and they’ll know how to find you when they’re ready. Make those connections, use social media outlets to attract talent and continue to engage with them. Think of it like building relationships in sales: you may not get the customer now, but you keep the communication lines open for future opportunities. This includes:
- Job posting sites
- Internal and external recruiters
- Personal network (word of mouth)
- Brand awareness
- Job fairs and related events
- Social Media interaction (such as on LinkedIn for more business minded folks and TikTok for a younger generation)
Search profiles on LinkedIn, attend networking events, and build partner relationships. If you can build a network early, it will be easier to reach the talent that you need. Think about your target employee. If you can answer the following questions, you have a great shot at recruiting the right people for your role.
Things To Keep In Mind When Recruiting Candidates
- How can you build a talent network for future hiring needs?
- How can you use your social footprint to keep passive talent engaged?
- Who is your target employee?
- What are their interests?
- Where are they looking for jobs?
- What organizations might they be affiliated with?
Diverse, Equitable, and Accessible Sourcing
A sourcing strategy must begin with a thorough understanding of your organization’s diversity, identities, and how it is compared to the industry standard. When sourcing, ask, does your outreach match your diversity goals?
List questions or checklist
- What are your go-to community organizations, educational institutions, social media groups, etc. for reaching a diverse pool?
- In what ways can you adjust your search parameters?
- How tangible/public-facing are company DEI goals and at what step of the recruitment process are these communicated to candidates (e.g., auto email on company culture/DEI after applying)?
- How are Employee Resource Group (where applicable) goals and impact highlighted on public-facing pages?
- How do current and former employees speak about DEI on company review pages (e.g., Glassdoor + Indeed reviews)
Sourcing Methods
Digital & Ongoing:
- LinkedIn (Free for one posting)
- Angel.co (free)
- Company careers page
- Technical Job Sites: Hired, Vettery, WayUp, etc.
- Passive outreach
- DiversifyTech: Connecting marginalized folks in tech with career opportunities
- Jopwell: We represent and advance careers for Black, Latinx, and Native American students and professionals.
- Girls Who Code and Black Girls Code
- Black Remote She: A community for Black queer and trans women, nonbinary people and allies interested in working remotely.
- Mimconnect: help professionals of color land job opportunities in media, marketing, advertising, communications, tech and beyond.
External & Network
- Employee referrals
- Posting on personal LinkedIn pages
- Board of Advisors
- Personal network and mentors
- Virtual or in person meetups
- Non-career focused groups (Dreamers & Doers, Ladies Get Paid, Tech Ladies, Out In Tech Slack, etc.)
- External Recruiters: Underdog.io, SingleSprout, etc.
Traditional Underrepresented Minorities (URMs) in the Workplace focus:
- POCIT (People of Color In Tech)
- Rec Tech Media Diversity Hiring Tools
- Lattice Resources for Humans Magazine, Resourceful: 3 Essential Steps for a More Diverse Applicant Pool
- Jennifer Tardy Consulting, Diversity Recruiting Tools and Strategies
- Building An Equitable Top-Of-Funnel Pipeline
- Black Tech Talent
- COOP
- In Her Sight
- Inclusive
- Ladies Get Paid
- Lesbians Who Tech
- Multicultural Advertising Intern Program
- Opportunity at Work
- Out Professionals
Attracting Diverse Talent
Increase candidate pools from underrepresented backgrounds. Attract candidates from underrepresented backgrounds to our product and ensure our marketing practices are unbiased. In order to do so, it is recommended to created talent management objectives such as the following:
- Expand our sourcing networks and make job descriptions more inclusive and attractive to increase our candidate pools from underrepresented backgrounds.
- Increase our candidate pools from underrepresented backgrounds by x percentage.
After creating the objective, focus on the specific key performance indicators (KPIs) that can be measured to demonstrate success and return on investment (ROI). Here are a few examples:
- Collaborate and partner with internal ERG groups
- Work with HR/Recruiting team to review job descriptions and career page
- Attend DEI focused events across regions
- Partner with established organization(s) positively impacting DEI in the tech world
- Expand understanding of best practices for attracting diverse talent from corporate and nonprofit leaders and become knowledge leaders on DEI
- Commit to increasing organizational knowledge of DEI
Initiatives to Attract Diverse Talent
- Collaborate and partner with at least one ERG and organize/sponsor an event together
- Attend at least one event per team member focused on underrepresented groups to boost diversity of candidate pools (ongoing)
- Partner with one or two organizations (ie. Black Girls Who Code, Women Who Code, etc.)
- Read and discuss an article at biweekly meetings
- Host events for a group like Women of Color in Tech, Women Who Code, or Blacks in Tech or a booth at the Tech Inclusion Conference
- Invite a guest speaker from the DEI community to speak at your company. Especially if you already have regular talks on technical topics, or on leadership - set aside a couple of slots for DEI
- Develop relationships with organizations like Code2040 and #YesWeCode
- Attend local events focused on underrepresented groups in tech (e.g., Afrotech)
- Make benefits and perks visible to those outside the organization (parental leave etc.)
- Partner or advertise with groups that work with job-seekers from underrepresented backgrounds (e.g. MLT, Women Who Code, Levo League, or other similar organizations.)
- Ensure marketing campaigns and product use inclusive language
- Have recruiters and hiring managers attend demographically diverse events
- Ask current employees to refer people from underrepresented backgrounds in their networks
- Make job descriptions more attractive to candidates from underrepresented backgrounds by adding a diversity statement and using inclusive language.
- Host DEI hackathons and invite external prospective candidates to participate (large company example)
- Provide ERG Leaders and members with a repository for employee stories, programs, activations to be shared on external sites to attract talent (e.g., LinkedIn)
Questions to Strengthen Equitable Recruitment?
- Is the workforce across all levels and functions generally representative in gender, race, neurodiversity, etc?
- Does the organization have a reputation for quality diversity and inclusion efforts?
- Is turnover for underrepresented groups more prevalent?
- Are there a variety of positions and job types? Part-time, job sharing, and other flexible work arrangements are available for all appropriate positions?
- Is there a comprehensive range of flexible benefits and services, including education, health, and counseling?
- Are positions, benefits, work arrangements, and services adaptable to changing conditions, technology, and innovative ideas?
- Does the organization maintain equitable internal and external compensation and job classification practices?
- Does the organization have innovative job design resulting in employees being paid for performance rather than “putting in time,” and enabling flexible work options?
- Have inequitable previous compensation systems been addressed and individuals compensated?
- Have classification and compensation systems been modified to address conscious and unconscious biases and assumptions?
- Is the performance review process equitable and are managers submitting performance reviews for employees at equitable rates across the board regardless of race, gender, etc.
Resources
- Resourceful: 3 Essential Steps for a More Diverse Applicant Pool | Lattice
- Github: Hiring Without Whiteboards
- What to Do (and Not to Do) in Interviews to Improve Diversity Hiring
- Qualified Diversity Recruiter — Jennifer Tardy Consulting
- HR + RECRUITMENT: Useful Tools for Recruiting Representative, Diverse Talent
- Diversity Hiring Tools
- How to Automatically Build Boolean OR Strings
- How to Search LinkedIn for Diversity Sourcing
- 5 Expert Secrets To Increase Workplace Diversity
Related Blog Posts, Lunch & Learns, Workshops, and Coaching
- Embrace DEIB to Attract Top Talent Lunch & Learn
- What the heck is DEI, anyways? Workshop
- Bias and the Interview Process Workshop
- Designing Programs with Racial Equity in Mind Workshop
- Cultivating Inclusivity at Work Lunch & Learn
- DEI 101 Lunch & Learn
- Moving Forward on an Imperfect DEIBA Journey Lunch & Learn
- Managing Diverse Teams Lunch & Learn
- Cultivating Workplace Belonging Lunch & Learn
- Building a Shared DEIBA Vocabulary Lunch & Learn
- Your DEI Strategy Session Lunch & Learn
- Neurodiversity 101: The Next Chapter in Your Diversity Story
- Understanding Identity, Power, & Privilege Lunch & Learn
- Ethical Allyship Lunch & Learn
- 5 Tips to Ensure Your DEIBA Initiatives Will Work
- 4 Approaches to Consider When Building a Diverse Workplace
Contributors to this Template
- Ayanna Kelly, DEI Product Manager & Mental Health & Latinx Culture Advisor
- Jes Osrow SHRM-SCP, Co-Founder & DEI Specialist
- Guishard Revan, DEI Strategist & ERG Community Builder
- Alana Korol, Design & Communications Senior Associate
