Unconsious Bias - Corporate Membership

Explore and debate four central ideas that are challenging the conventional wisdom on Diversity & Inclusion.

The benefits of diversity and inclusion include greater employee engagement, increased innovation, and improved overall company performance. However, increasing the diversity and inclusion of any organization is easier said than done. Despite significant efforts, results are lagging across most industries.

Join Dr. David Rock and Dr. Heidi Grant to unpack and debate important research insights including, the reason diversity training often backfires, why diverse teams are less comfortable (but that’s actually a good thing), and more. Participants will dig into the Institute’s point of view and debate how this and other emerging research could reshape the D&I space.

This presentation outlined the biggest insights from our latest research in Diversity & Inclusion, including the articles:

Why are many companies struggling to create diverse workforces, despite spending millions on diversity training and recruitment?

Implicit bias may be partly to blame. Even people with the best intentions harbor attitudes or beliefs outside their conscious awareness. These blind spots can have a negative impact on hiring and people decisions. To make matters worse, research shows that conventional bias training as we’ve been doing it up until now has not been delivering big results.

Join Dr. Jay Van Bavel and Dr. Tessa West (NYU) to explore a research-based action plan for mitigating bias in hiring. This presentation will expand upon their latest article in the Wall Street Journal, providing a comprehensive overview of the research and seven specific steps HR leaders can take to remove bias from the selection process.

If you work in HR, you do not want to miss this chance to gain actionable insights and hear directly from the researchers.

Why is it that many of the world’s most advanced companies struggle to create diversified workforces, despite spending hundreds of millions of dollars on diversity training and recruitment? Implicit bias may be partly to blame…

Read the article here.

Despite the benefits, many companies are reluctant to nix traditional written performance reviews and ratings because of concerns about legal risk. Three myths underlie their reluctance. First, they believe performance reviews contain information that is helpful or reliable when defending against legal claims. Second, they worry that it will expose their company to lawsuits if they are lacking documentation that could protect them from legal risk. Third, they believe that written reviews are required by law.
Drawing on neuroscience, we discuss how unconscious processes lead annual performance reviews and ratings to be biased and therefore inaccurate, and why that trend is likely to continue as long as annual performance reviews and ratings are relied upon. As a result of these inaccuracies, annual performance reviews and ratings are dramatically more helpful to employees than employers in legal cases.

In an increasingly global marketplace, diversity and inclusion are being recognized more and more as imperative for business success. Diverse and inclusive teams are smarter, more creative, and make better decisions. While an increasing number of organizations are embracing the notion of diversity, the practice of inclusion is often overlooked. Being respected, valued, and welcome to contribute equates to more than just good feelings: Humans have a biologically based need to belong—to feel included, supported, and valued by others socially. In fact, research shows that social exclusion can negatively impact performance, productivity, and pro-social behavior, among other consequences. The challenge is, we often make others feel excluded without realizing it. First, the language, nonverbal cues, and subtle interactions we engage in can communicate signals of exclusion. Second, initiatives that focus on minimizing exclusion can actually increase feelings of out-group. Essentially, if we’re not actively including, chances are we’re accidentally excluding. To address this challenge, rather than focus on how to not exclude, we provide a neuroscience-based approach focused on what to do more of in order to achieve an inclusive workplace.

This morning I walked five metres across the office to talk to a colleague and he mentioned that he was sitting “in Siberia”.

It might sound like an exaggeration, given that he’s at a desk on the edge of a busy newsroom, but it struck a chord with me after a recent interview with a neuroleadership expert.

Unconscious bias usually comes up in terms of racism, sexism or ageism. But after two and a half years of research with University of California Los Angeles professor Matthew Lieberman, neuroleadership expert David Rock identified that people have up to 150 forms of unconscious biases that fall into five categories.

Despite decades of effort and major investment dedicated to reducing bias in organizational settings, it persists.

The central challenge in removing bias from decisions is that most biases operate unconsciously. While raising awareness can help people to realize that they might be biased, it does not enable them to recognize bias in their own thinking–we simply do not have conscious access to the operations of bias in the brain.

In this paper, we propose an alternative solution to mitigating bias, derived from a brain-based perspective. We identify processes that can interrupted and redirect unconsciously biased thinking. We provide The SEEDS Model® for designing and guiding the use of such processes. The SEEDS Model® simplifies the roughly 150 identified cognitive biases and recognizes five categories of bias, each category responsive to a different set of actions that will help mitigate them.

Become a member to access this paper or log in now.

Become a member to access this content or log in now.

Diversity & Inclusion Report from the 2015 NeuroLeadership Summit: Accelerate Leadership

Organizations have historically struggled with diversity and inclusion. There is now a shifting tide, with major organizational focus being put into making a difference in that arena. In this session panelists from leading industry research firms will present findings on the state of diversity and inclusion, and engage in discussion with industry leaders, and neuroscientists to explore the right way forward.

Become a member to access this content or log in now.
Diversity & Inclusion Report from the 2015 NeuroLeadership Summit: Accelerate Leadership
Organizations have historically struggled with diversity and inclusion. There is now a shifting tide, with major organizational focus being put into making a difference in that arena. In this session panelists from leading industry research firms will present findings on the state of diversity and inclusion, and engage in discussion with industry leaders, and neuroscientists to explore the right way forward.

Bias is a big issue for companies — and people in general. It affects everything from hiring to purchasing decisions and everything in between. The fact is, whether we like it or not, we’re all biased. We can’t help it. It’s prewired in our brains and makes us who we are.

So what can companies do about it?

Read the full article and watch the video here.