January 12, 2022

Recruiting With Attention to Gender Diversity

Paula Santonocito Headshot
Paula Santonocito
SENIOR MANAGER, RESEARCHER & WRITER
January 12, 2022

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Diversity, including gender diversity, is a goal for many hiring organizations. In our Recruiting Top Trends for 2021 whitepaper, we indicated that diversity would be a focus this past year, and it certainly has been.

Because hiring organizations have learned that employing people from underrepresented groups has a positive impact on corporate culture, innovation, and the bottom line, as well as far-reaching societal impacts, diversity is expected to remain a priority. Two Appcast whitepapers, Diversity Recruiting: Finding and Hiring Candidates and Diversity Recruiting: A Guide to Best Practice Language Usage, can help with diversity challenges you may face.

The Guide to Best Practice Language Usage references the Gender Bias Decoder, a tool that our colleagues at Totaljobs in the UK developed and have been using. The Decoder was designed to help hiring organizations review job ads for gender bias and craft ads that will further diversity recruiting.

Recently, Appcast, in collaboration with Totaljobs and StepStone, launched a U.S. version of the tool, which is now available for your use.

How the Appcast Gender Bias Decoder Works

The Appcast Gender Bias Decoder allows you to check your job ads for gender-coded words – words associated with gender stereotypes – that may cause female candidates to not apply.

It highlights both male-coded and female-coded words, but it is the male-coded words that are identified for the purpose of replacement. This is because research from the University of Waterloo and Duke University shows that male candidates will still apply for jobs when job ads include female-coded words, but female candidates are less likely to apply for jobs when job ads include male-coded words.

How do you know if your job ad is gender biased?

Simply enter your job ad into the Decoder and results are returned.

Going forward, you may want to use the Appcast Gender Bias Decoder in connection with your job ad creation process to help further your diversity goals and attract more candidates.

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