Confirmation Bias Could Sabotage Your Hiring Process

Finding and hiring the best people for an organization is critical to growing a vibrant company and fostering a productive culture. However, without a defined hiring process, properly assessing candidates becomes difficult and can increase the risk of confirmation bias.

In the case of interviewing, confirmation bias means that hiring managers tend to make an assessment within the first few minutes of meeting a candidate, and for the rest of the interview, their brain looks for evidence to validate that initial impression. And hiring decisions made primarily with feelings can lead to human resource headaches and a very costly mistake.

While the hiring process can be subjective, it is important to collect information that can be used to compare candidates in a standardized way. This typically requires establishing a clear set of defined evaluation criteria ahead of the interview.

To radically rethink hiring and reduce confirmation bias, there are a few easy changes companies can make immediately:

1. Hire more slowly. How many times have companies heard this but continue to hire under duress?

2. Look for candidates who are already employed. Ten percent of top performers are already employed – this means hiring managers need to spend more time looking for those who are already working versus attracting inbound applications.

3. Decrease the power of managers in the hiring process. Implement a hiring committee or, at a minimum, have the manager share their answers and assessments to a third party to weigh in on the final hiring decision. Even the best-intentioned managers compromise their standards.

4. Expect the unexpected. The best people don’t always look like what you would expect. Hire people who are better than you in some meaningful way.

Hiring is an art and a science, as well as a long-term investment for any organization. Regardless of where companies find themselves, it’s a good practice to maintain an ongoing focus on finding and hiring talent. Putting a strategic process in place and growing overall hiring skills will greatly improve the positive impact, because nothing affects a business more than the people in the company.

Need help establishing a smart hiring process or finding a great hire? Click here to schedule a FREE 30-minute consultation session with the T3 Talent team.