We recently hosted the ISE Diversity & Inclusion forum at the Milkround offices, where we saw a number of employers talking about hot topics in the industry, as well as the actions employers can and should be taking in order to overcome their diversity challenges.
To kick things off, we heard from Tristram Hooley, ISE Research Chief Officer, who explored the latest ISE Annual Student Recruitment Survey. Among their research, Tristram spoke about the importance employers are placing on diversity, reporting that 96 per cent of respondents are prioritising at least one or more diversity issues, with some being very focused on multiple diversity strands.
More interestingly, the findings showed us that whilst 67 per cent of employers are changing the way they manage recruitment to address concerns about diversity, when looking at how representative this is of their actual hires and the wider population, the results are very different. People who attended state schools, women, first-generation graduates and disabled people are all under-represented amongst current hires. The average proportion of hires who attended a state school, for example, is 57 per cent and the average UK population average is 91 per cent, showing a clear contrast between what is being done and what the overall population looks like.
Social Mobility and Contextual Recruitment
We then heard from Timi Dorgu, Senior Digital Account Manager from Rare Recruitment and Jen Baird, Graduate Recruitment Manager at Hogan Lovells – who spoke about how Rare’s Contextual Recruitment System can transform the hiring decision process and increase diversity too. The system indicates to employers any candidates who have come from disadvantaged backgrounds or those who are resilient outperformers, allowing employers to deliver tangible results when it comes to diversity.
A behavioural science approach to Diversity & Inclusion
Alice Scott from Development Beyond Learning (DBL) shared research on behavioural science, explaining that it’s not always easy to completely eliminate bias and influence from recruitment decision making. She noted that behavioural science can help employers since it looks at how people really behave, instead of how we think they ought to behave.
Alice spoke to us about how removing information with inaccurate ‘representative models’ in application processes or hiding demographic information on forms can help to focus attention to purely just data, which could lead to more diverse and inclusive actions from employers.
ASD Awareness
Lastly, we heard from Nick Heckscher from ASPIeRATIONS which is a Community Interest Company, set up to help employers attract, recruit and retain highly-skilled, autistic talent. Nick spoke about the benefits of employing high-functioning autistic and Asperger’s individuals into a team, with the increased capacity for innovation and enhanced employee retention rates.
If you want to speak to us about diversity and inclusion and how Milkround can better your student and graduate recruitment processes then please don’t hesitate to get in touch: https://recruiting.milkround.com/
