Step 1: Plan Your Recruitment Process

Step 1: Plan Your Recruitment Process and Discuss EDI as a Committee

Before you start the work of recruiting and selecting a qualified candidate, it’s important to set the Hiring Committee up for success.

To properly prepare the Hiring Committee for the search, the following tasks should be accomplished:

• Create a Recruitment Strategy, approved by the Manager or Head of Human Resources, which includes information about general position requirements and a budget for ensuring the requirements are met. The Manager or Head of Human Resources should ensure all hiring members receive training in equity and unconscious bias (in other words, all members should complete this training and repeat as needed.)
• The HR Hiring Team should set the proper tone for the search. They must create a safe environment that encourages open and candid dialogue, with an equity and inclusion lens.
• Appoint an Equity Champion to the hiring team. One member of the hiring team could be designated as an Equity Champion who is responsible for guiding the team through EDI considerations, pointing out potential biases, and being the central equity and inclusion lens for the Committee’s activities. While every Committee member should take an equity lens to their work, the Equity Champion can be centrally focused on such a task and would guide the team or committee through discussions of how each candidate’s record might be read through an equity and inclusion lens.
• Allow adequate time for deliberations. Set aside enough time for the hiring team or committee to do its work. This is essential to identify and eliminate biases in the processes. The manager should make sure that committee members are aware they will engage in deliberate and methodical discussions of each candidate.
• The HR Hiring Manager must understand that unconscious bias is unconscious and people will not be aware of it. This means that members should be prepared to support each other to ensure a fair and equitable process is used. Part of this process must be a commitment from each committee member to the others to monitor each other for instances of unconscious bias.