Recruiting with conscience when hiring diverse talent

there’s a mexican wave

sweeping through the creative industry

at the moment hitting every company

the thing with waves is it’s one of

those things where you see it heading in

your direction

and you know you need to respond to it

but the moment it

arrives to you there’s always a sort of

like awkwardness to the whole thing

especially if you’ve never taken part in

a mexican way before

now this wave is what i’d like to refer

to as the current

diversity hiring trend

companies are wanting to hire more

people of color

as well as gay trans and disabled people

and job ads these days are containing

sentences such as

bam people especially encouraged

to apply i’m a creative recruiter

and i’ve had an influx of requests

from companies that want me to help them

find a more

varied selection of people the wave has

hit them

and they’re responding accordingly and

in every diversity and inclusion manual

it mentions external recruiters like me

as one of the solutions

to help fill this talent gap you think

i’d be loving this

i’ve never been more popular by

companies as a supplier but i’ve got

something i’d like to say

and it is an urgent appeal

to every ceo and owner of a business

by all means please get swept up in the

wave

but i’d like you to consider your

direction

really carefully because there’s a

chance that

a non-carefully considered response

could be doing more harm than goods

and i’d like to explain why

because it just becomes this really

strange pick and mix recruitment game of

all

could we have a black gay

trans or disabled person human beings

being collected

like trophies like when you go into

reception and you sit there in an open

see an open plan office of people

strategically placed

looking at photos on the company website

as well with people

smiling look at us aren’t we diverse

but you can’t have the d of diversity

without the eye of inclusion

as someone who’s built their career on

creative recruitment with conscience

i’d be doing a disservice to anyone that

trusts me to find them

a career home if i’m taking part

in what essentially could be perceived

as tokenism

what do you think would happen if

someone from a marginalized background

joins a company

because they believe in their vision to

be more

diverse and inclusive this individual

needs a secure job

throws caution to the wind and they join

this organisation

but this company is full of things like

microaggressions

because the other members of staff

believe that this person was only hired

because of factors such as the colour of

their skin their sexual orientation or

their disability

this new hire would leave

because these situations can have such

an effect

on an individual’s self-esteem which can

take

months if not years to recover from

but not only that alone it’s also

expensive

the cost of loss to a company when

someone leaves

not only from a reputation point of view

but financials alone

can cost the company up to 200 percent

of that person’s salary in recruitment

and training fees

if you’re a ceo or an owner of a

business

i want you to ask yourself a set of free

really

serious questions one does your company

currently have an open

diverse and inclusive work culture two

how do you think your staff would

genuinely react

if you started hiring a variety of

people from diverse backgrounds

and three how willing are you

to proactively fix this one key reason

you might want to

is it affects your bottom line i mean

studies have suggested

that diverse teams can increase company

performances by up to

30 percent

and also millennials and gen zen

proactively seek diverse companies to

work for

so you’d also be missing out on top

talent for your company as well

and this isn’t when it’s just about

creative recruitment with conscience

this is when it becomes recruitment

with common sense and joyce parks

diversity advocate put it best

when she said diversity isn’t like

choking down

spoonfuls of oat bran because it’s

supposedly good for you

it’s literally like eating out a

wonderful new restaurant every

day but i just want you to imagine for a

second

how much better your company will be if

it’s full of

diverse motivated individuals

who are fully committed to pushing your

company forwards

because they wholeheartedly believe

you’re invested

in developing them and pushing them

forwards too

as a ceo of a company you have a

responsibility

to set the tone for your whole

organization

your employees look to you as their

leader so

your influence trickles down to the rest

of your company

but also in every organization there’s

key members of the team where if they’re

on board everyone else is on board

and this diversity and inclusion

training you’re trying to implement

won’t work if these key people are

rolling their eyes

and referring to it as a waste of time

everyone has to be on board with this

for it to work i work specifically

within the design and advertising

industry and we all know that

advertising

essentially reflects society back to

itself but advertising

fails as an industry if it doesn’t

contain people in boardrooms or design

teams

that reflect the rich tapestry of the

culture

that brands are trying to communicate

with because it’s full of individuals

that have the same

lived experiences of the people brands

are trying to talk to

as people we have so many different

identities

gender variant cisgender

working class middle class muslim

christian black white

gay straight an identity is just a part

of someone

but also our values

are what are really important and

shared values are essential

as well as integration within society

and an organization

when i run industry leaders talks which

is where i ask some of the biggest names

in

advertising and design what do you look

for

when recruiting for a creative for your

and team lot of them said to me well

along with grit resilience and

creativity

what we’re really looking for is that

person’s voice

because what makes a great creative is

every life experience

they’ve ever had been expressed into

their work

and if you want your agency to be

producing

groundbreaking progressive work that

moves society and the world forwards

it’s rich in culture narratives and

opinions

well you need to not only hire diverse

voices

but you need to really create a culture

where everyone feels empowered to

express their ideas

and to make sure that when anyone

talks that everyone is there to listen

and to truly hear their voices when they

speak

so as a ceo and an owner of a company

there are three things you can do

in regards to diversity and inclusion

within your company

one higher for potential

not just experience see when companies

come to me

and they say we would like to find you

to find us

a woman of color who has experience

working with some of the big sexy

clients and some of the big key accounts

and have proven experience there

this may not have happened so what you

need to do

is hire one to two levels down

and you need to be invested in their

growth you need to be their mentor and

they need to report directly

to you two

take a look around you who already works

in your organization

that’s already been overlooked

once you’ve identified talented

individuals

that already exist within your company

assign them a mentor

someone that is going to be that voice

that will speak up for them in the room

when they’re not there and be invested

in their growth as well

and three have an external

assessor come in and talk to your

employees

if you want people to feel they can

truly express themselves and their ideas

and their opinions on your company

and culture this person needs to be

external

don’t use hr because they work for you

and a huge part of their job

is on boarding people just bring someone

external

in get them to listen to your employees

and report that back to you and be

prepared to really listen to that

feedback

also educate yourself there’s so many

resources out there at the moment

and you’re gonna need to make sure you

learn

especially to be the right sort of

leader to take us into this

new world post pandemic the veil has

fallen

privilege has become openly

acknowledged we need to be allies

and we need to educate ourselves

2020 we all went through the same storm

but we navigated through it in different

boats

and realized that our mindsets are the

motor

and our future vision and dreams of the

lighthouse

to help us navigate the ways to bring us

safely

home i’d like to end

with a quote from the great poet amanda

gorman

for there’s always light if only we’re

brave enough

to see it if only we’re brave enough

to be it

you