Effective Diversity Recruiting Strategy: 6 Practical Tips

Effective Diversity Recruiting Strategy: 6 Practical Tips The recruitment process needs to well-organized and planned out to deliver the results a company is looking for. Recruiters tend to create a strategy that will help them get them to reach out to the talents they're interested in and find the best possible candidates. But, sticking to the same recruitment strategy means not bringing any innovation, diversity, or creativity into your teams. That's why diversity recruiting is a strategy every company should consider. If you want to make positive changes in your teams and bring people with fresh ideas and a unique skill set, you need to consider diversity recruiting. Below, you’ll find everything you need to know about diversity recruiting, including 6 practical tips for your diversity recruiting strategy.

What is Diversity Recruiting?

As the name indicates, diversity recruitment is a process and practice of reaching out to and hiring candidates without bias or discrimination. The idea behind this is that recruiters are giving equal chances to all candidates, regardless of their characteristics, background, or status of a minority.

Diversity recruiting will disregard factors such as:

  • gender

  • age

  • race

  • ethnicity

  • sexual orientation

  • religion

  • background

  • education

  • etc.

Naturally, the goal of the recruiter is still to find the best possible candidate through the talent management process. But, they're doing it with an open mind, free from prejudice, and ready to provide an opportunity to a promising but atypical candidate.

Why Do You Need Diversity in Your Teams?

Diversity in your teams is not a convenience you should try out. It’s actually a necessity if you truly want to build a successful company and respect moral values.

A diverse team is beneficial for the overall success of the company, on different levels. The benefits include:

  • bigger candidate pools

  • versatility in previous experiences and contribution to the team

  • a broad range of skills

  • innovation

  • bigger job satisfaction

  • cultural awareness

Not to mention that diversity in your teams is a noble and moral thing to do since no individual should be judged by a set of characteristics they've inherited or adopted.

With a diverse team of people working together, you’re increasing the level of creativity and innovation, as well as employee engagement. Your team members will each contribute to the team differently, thus creating a more successful work atmosphere.

6 Practical Tips for a Diversity Recruiting Strategy

Now that you know how important and beneficial a diverse team can be, you need to consider applying these practical tips to your recruiting strategy to include more diverse candidates.

1. Use Diverse Candidate Sources

The first thing you need to inspect is the sources from which you reach out to candidates and notify them about your job openings. If you're only doing it from one source, you're only going to attract the same group of people.

That’s why you should expand your reach, and search for candidates in places such as:

  • different job boards

  • social media

  • diversity organizations

  • colleges

  • hiring events

  • groups your target candidates might be members of

Do the research and see where your target candidates might be hanging out. Post the job openings there and invite them to apply.

2. Don’t Use Biased Language

If you want diverse candidates to feel welcome to apply for your job post, make sure you don’t use biased language in your job descriptions. Instead, focus on using bias-free language that will not make any candidate feel unwelcome or unqualified. Turn to professional writing help if you feel that you fail to come up with proper use of language yourself.

That’s why you need to:

  • avoid using specific gender pronouns

  • avoid using overly masculine or feminine vocabulary

  • read your job description from different points of view

Try making sure that your job descriptions will attract the people you wish to see as members of your team.

3. Build a Diverse-Employer Brand

Hiring talents from a diverse talent pool is something you should be proud of. Also, you should use it as a major part of who you are as a company and a brand.

That means that you should openly advocate:

  • diversity in the workplace

  • respecting individual employees needs

  • benefits of a diverse team

  • employees stories

Make diversity a part of your company and diverse candidates will be encouraged to apply for a job you're offering.

4. Provide Support to Diverse Employees

To truly attract and recruit more diverse candidates, you’ll need to provide the support they need through your company policy. Employees should be feeling safe and encouraged to talk about their beliefs, culture, and needs.

For example, if you’re trying to hire more women in your teams, your workplace policy should cover maternity leave or flexible work hours.

Also, allow your employees to celebrate their holidays and have days off when there's an important religious or community event.

This way, you'll show you care for all your employees and are respecting their specific needs.

5. Rethink Job Requirements

Sometimes, employer and recruiters create a list of requirements that can intimidate and drive off the diverse candidates they're looking for. Of course, some requirements are simply obligatory. But, if you look closely, you'll be able to loosen up the requirements list.

You could consider hiring people who:

    • don’t (yet) have a college degree

  • don't have previous experience in the same position (but are eager to learn)

  • don’t meet all the requirements (just the priority ones)

Think of it this way: would you rather have an employee with a college degree but zero innovation and creativity, or someone who's talented and eager to learn but doesn't have a college degree?

Rethink the job requirements list you're posting in the job description and make it more suitable for diverse candidates.

6. Rethink Your Hiring Strategy

Sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you'll fail to recognize the unconscious bias that you're applying to your recruiting process. To open to diversity and truly consider non-traditional candidates, you'll need to rethink your hiring strategy.

Ask yourself the big questions:

  • What is the first thing I look for in a resume? Why? Is it bias?

  • Are we truly considering non-traditional candidates?

  • Who are the last 10 candidates we’ve hired? Can I call this group of people diverse?

Answering these and similar questions honestly will help you analyze and rate your employee selection strategy in terms of diversity.

Final Thoughts

An effective diverse recruiting strategy is based on eliminating bias and discrimination and allowing different candidates to fight for the same job position, with equal chances of being accepted. A diverse team will strengthen your company in terms of business success, branding, and ethic.

Use the practical tips we've listed above to write an effective diversity recruiting strategy and find the talented people you're looking for.

Author’s Bio

Dorian Martin is a freelance writer, editor, and blogger for Get Good grade online research paper writing service. He loves to write about all things digital and topics related to recruiting, finding talent, and employee retention.