Hiring decisions Archives - Job Interview Coaching

November 28, 2024November 28, 2024

Does Having a Tattoo Stop You From Getting Hired?

Summary:

A study ‘What does job applicants’ body art signal to employers?’ by Stijn Baert, Jolien Herregods, Philippe Sterkens, investigates how visible body art (e.g., tattoos and piercings) affects the hiring decisions of job recruiters.

The focus of the study was on how body art interacts with various candidate characteristics, such as gender, obesity, and qualifications.

In the experiment the researchers used a state-of-the-art scenario approach, where participants assumed the role of recruiters assessing job candidates.

They evaluated candidates based on vignettes that varied by body art type, obesity, and other factors like gender, academic performance, and job-related skills.

Key Findings:

Overall Impact of Body Art: The presence of body art did not significantly reduce the likelihood of being invited for an interview or hired, suggesting body art doesn’t universally affect hireability. However, there were some notable nuances.
Gender Differences: Body art negatively impacted male candidates’ hireability. Men with body art had a lower probability of being invited to an interview and scored worse on hireability measures compared to men without body art. No such effect was found for women. This highlights the interaction between body art and gender, with men facing greater stigmatization.
Obesity and Other Factors: Obesity also lowered hireability, and its effect was stronger than that of body art. Obese candidates were rated lower on hireability, collaboration, and personality traits like emotional stability, but higher on traits related to productivity (e.g., manageability).
Perceived Personality and Collaboration: Candidates with body art were viewed as less honest, emotionally stable, agreeable, and conscientious, although they were also seen as more extroverted and open to new experiences. This suggests body art may signal certain personality traits to recruiters, but these signals vary by gender.
Recruiter Characteristics: The study controlled for factors like recruiters’ experience, education, and tendency to provide socially desirable responses. It found no evidence that these factors influenced the overall results, suggesting that the effects were not due to bias from participants’ personal experiences or social desirability.

The study shows that body art does influence hiring decisions, particularly for male candidates, who are judged more harshly for wearing body art compared to females.

The impact of obesity on hireability was more pronounced than body art, which suggests that physical appearance plays a significant role in recruitment decisions.

While body art did not have a strong effect on hiring outcomes overall, it did influence perceptions of personality and collaboration, and its impact varied by gender.

The Impact of Body Art on Job Recruitment: What Employers Need to Know

In today’s rapidly evolving job market, one might assume that professional qualifications and experience are the sole determinants of hiring decisions, espcially with the increase in the use of a structured job interview

However, appearances and personal traits, including body art, can still play a significant role in shaping hiring outcomes.

The Research Behind the Stigma

A recent experiment conducted by Van Borm et al. (2021) sought to explore the effect of body art on recruitment decisions. The study was based on the methodology established by Auspurg and Hinz (2014) but expanded to cover a broader range of job sectors and candidate characteristics.

Participants in the study were placed in the role of recruiters and tasked with evaluating applicants for one of eight job groups, including professions such as software developers, travel agents, and poets. These jobs varied in terms of required educational level, customer contact, creativity, and reliability.

By presenting a diverse set of job applicants with varying levels of body art, weight, and gender, the experiment aimed to uncover any potential biases related to these factors in the hiring process.

Key Findings from the Experiment

Body Art Does Not Necessarily Lower Hireability Overall

One of the key insights from the experiment is that the presence of body art (whether tattoos or piercings) did not significantly lower the overall likelihood of being hired or invited for an interview. Across all participants, candidates with body art were not found to have lower odds of being selected for an interview or hired compared to candidates without body art.

Gender Differences in Perception of Body Art

The study revealed an important gender interaction. While body art had little impact on the hireability of female candidates, male candidates with visible body art were less likely to be invited for an interview or hired. Specifically, male candidates with body art saw a 5.4% decrease in the probability of being invited for an interview and a similar drop in hiring appropriateness scores. This suggests that body art may carry a more significant stigma when worn by men, possibly due to ingrained societal perceptions about masculinity and professionalism.

Body Art Impacts Perceived Personality and Collaborativeness

Another crucial finding was that job candidates with visible body art were often perceived as less desirable colleagues. Recruiters rated these candidates as less pleasant to collaborate with, both as an employer and as a colleague. Interestingly, candidates with body art were also perceived as less honest, emotionally stable, agreeable, and conscientious. However, they were seen as more extroverted and open to new experiences, which may be beneficial in certain roles.

Obesity as a Parallel Stigma

In addition to body art, the study also explored the effects of obesity on hiring decisions. Similar to body art, candidates who appeared obese were rated lower in terms of hireability and personality, though they were seen as more productive in certain contexts. This finding emphasizes that physical appearance—whether in the form of body art or weight—can significantly influence hiring decisions, despite the lack of a direct link to job performance.

Actionable Points for Job Seekers

If you’re applying for jobs and have visible body art, the research suggests there are some important factors to consider in order to improve your chances of being hired:

1. Choose the Right Role

Not all jobs perceive body art the same way. For instance, positions that demand high levels of customer interaction or roles that are more traditionally “corporate” may have stricter standards around appearance. On the other hand, creative fields, such as graphic design, marketing, or the arts, are likely to have a more lenient view of body art. Consider whether the company’s culture aligns with your style and appearance before applying.

2. Understand the Gender Dynamics

The study showed that body art had a more significant negative effect on male candidates. This suggests that male candidates may need to be more strategic about when and how they showcase body art, especially if applying for roles in conservative industries. While it’s important to be authentic, understanding the cultural context of a given industry or organization can help mitigate any biases.

3. Leverage Your Other Strengths

If you have body art and are concerned about biases, you can proactively showcase other strengths that may counterbalance any perceived negative traits. Highlight your qualifications, relevant experience, and skills that align with the job description. Additionally, demonstrating your ability to collaborate and your commitment to the job can help break down stereotypes associated with body art.

4. Prepare to Address the Issue Directly

If you suspect that body art might be a concern during an interview, be prepared to address it directly and confidently. You could frame it as a form of self-expression or creativity, depending on the role you’re applying for. In some cases, explaining the significance of your tattoos or piercings might help hiring managers see them as a reflection of your individuality rather than as a hindrance.

Actionable Points for Hiring Professionals

As an employer, it’s essential to be aware of potential biases that may influence your hiring decisions. Here are some steps you can take to ensure a more inclusive and fair recruitment process:

1. Focus on Skills, Not Appearance

While body art may influence first impressions, it should never overshadow a candidate’s qualifications and experience. Instead of letting visible body art dictate your decision, focus on assessing candidates based on their skills, qualifications, and fit for the role.

Create a structured interview process that emphasizes job-relevant criteria, and avoid making judgments based on physical appearance alone.

2. Standardize Evaluation Criteria

The presence of body art can easily trigger implicit biases, leading recruiters to make assumptions about a candidate’s personality or work ethic. One way to counteract this is to use a standardized evaluation system. For instance, rate candidates on a consistent scale using objective criteria related to job performance. This helps ensure that all applicants are evaluated fairly and consistently, regardless of their appearance.

3. Educate Your Hiring Team on Bias

Hiring managers and recruiters should receive training to help them recognize and mitigate biases, including those related to body art.

Conducting regular workshops on unconscious bias, and educating your team on the impact of appearance-based discrimination, can improve decision-making and create a more inclusive recruitment process. ***other research shows how unconcious bias training is only effective if employees volunteer to attend the training

4. Adopt a Culture of Diversity and Inclusion

A company’s culture plays a significant role in shaping attitudes toward body art. To create a more inclusive workplace, foster a culture that values diversity in all its forms, including self-expression.

Encourage employees to be themselves and show that you embrace diversity in your hiring process. This sends a positive message to potential candidates and ensures that your organization attracts a wide range of talent.

The research reveals that body art, such as tattoos and piercings, can influence hiring decisions, but the impact is not universal. Gender, job type, and societal perceptions all play a role in how body art is viewed in the hiring process. While men may experience a greater stigma, body art does not always hinder a candidate’s chances, especially in creative industries or roles that emphasize individuality.

For job seekers, being strategic about the roles they apply for, understanding how their appearance may be perceived, and leveraging their strengths can help mitigate any biases. For employers, focusing on qualifications, providing bias training, and fostering an inclusive culture can ensure that recruitment practices are fair and equitable.

By adopting these actionable steps, both job seekers and hiring professionals can navigate the complexities of body art in the hiring process, ultimately creating a more inclusive, diverse, and fair work environment.

July 26, 2021July 26, 2021

How do you know if an Interviewer likes you?

Job hunters ask ‘how do you know if an interviewer likes me?’ because they are anxious about the recruitment process.

What the applicant is really asking is, ‘how likely is it that I will be offered the position after the job interview?’

But, likeability does effect the job interview outcome. This article will break down the impact of likeability in the job interview and how an interviewee can increase job offers by being liked by an interview panel.

Is the interview a fair process?

The goal of any recruitment process is to predict the job performance of each interviewee.

The predicted job performance is the main factor in the offering of the advertised position to one applicant over another.

The second factor, that influences the ‘main’ factor, the predicting of the job performance, is likeability.

To improve likeability, applicants must understand the psychology behind liking.

Humans like:

Familiarity (affinity bias)
What other people like (social proof)
Things that make us feel good (emotional connection)

Likeability starts before the interview starts.

Unconscious bias is the process of an opinion being made at the subconscious level, instantaneously, about a person (or group) base on any number of stimuli.

In recruitment processes, where the employers task is to make a conscious, logical, opinion on the applicants suitability for the job role, unconscious bias can be created by a persons:

Perceived age
Gender
Ethnicity
Body mass
Accent
Body language
Any number of things

The truth is, that an interviewer, when meeting the applicant for the first time, will make an opinion about that person prior to asking them an interview question. The opinion, which is an unconscious bias, as the employer doesn’t know the applicant, is made in milliseconds.

This is the initial likeability factor.

You meet someone and you like or dislike them, but you don’t know why. Or your gut feeling makes you cautious or open, or you feel drawn towards someone or you want to get away from them 9running from a potential threat).

The initial likeability is created based on a persons own experiences including the culture they grew up in.

If for example, the environment a person grew up in, generalized that a person/group with X characteristic was lazy, the interviewer with this limiting belief would search for evidence to back up their prejudice.

Research shows, that characteristics on the applicants application form, social media feed or from the opinions of others can create a pre-interview opinion.

Not all opinions are negative.

If an employer read on the candidates application form that they had a degree from a leading university, Oxford or Cambridge, as an example, a positive pre-interview opinion can be created.

In fact, if the candidate attended the same university as the interviewer, the interviewer, due to affinity bias, will have rapport with the applicant.

Having a published industry related book, or having been quoted in sector magazines, or even possessing a social media feed filled with industry updates can create authority prior to the job interview.

Strong eye contact, positive body language and being physically attractive all shape the initial opinion, as the employer meets the applicant for the very first time.

In short, the employer prior to meeting an applicant will make a positive or negative generalization (I like or don’t like this person) at the subconscious level, due to a number of different factors.

“Unconscious bias creates a likeability factor that acts as a filter during the forthcoming job interview”
Chris Delaney Author of What is Your Interview Identity.

Challenging the Initial Impression.

Most interviewers aren’t consciously aware of the reason behind their initial likeability impression.

A racist, sexist or ageist interviewer, as an example, is aware (and doesn’t care) that they dislike a certain group.

In this case it will be hard to challenge the limiting belief. But, in the main, the initial feeling about a stranger is subconscious.

For an employer who has an initial reaction, as an example, to a female applying for a traditionally masculine role, they become aware (and they care that this initial filter wont effect the interview process) making an effort to override the unconscious bias.

For many people, the unconscious bias reaction, isn’t a reflection of the values they hold true to themselves. Imagine, for example, an obese applicant applies for a job in your team.

Is the obese applicant male or female?

It doesn’t matter which gender you choose, what matters is that you automatically choose a gender – this is unconscious bias in play.

The job interview environment is designed to be a logical place, with answers being cross-reference against the job criteria. Employers, apart from the ‘aware and don’t care’ interviewers, want to hire the most suitable applicant no matter what the persons age, gender, ethnicity, etc.

One barrier to a fair interview process is that the duration of the job interview is long for one person to remain totally focused. Again, like with unconcise bias, the mind will create short cuts.

The initial short-cut the brain makes is ‘likeability’ created by the initial impression. The second short-cut, or snap decision, is the applicants ‘interview identity’.

The ‘interview identity’ is created in the first, and possibly second job interview question. Or more specific the applicants answers to each question.

If the interviewee states their sector related competencies confidently, showing added value, worth and skillset (knowledge, experience and unique selling points) the interview identity will be positive.

But, an answer that lacks specifics and filled with self-declared weaknesses and excessive use of filler words is likely to create a negative identity.

The interview identity, to generalize, is the applicant being suitable or unsuitable for the advertised position.

Check your interview identity by taking the interview prediction grid test.

An ‘aware and care’ employer, with an initial negative impression (likeability factor) can easily be swayed if the initial interview answers highlight a high level of industry knowledge and experience (suitability).

Suitability is a logical choice and likeability is emotional. The new filter created by the ‘suability’ factor, the applicants interview identity, becomes the main focus. The mind, then searches for evidence to back up their belief ‘this interviewee is suitable/not suitable for the role’.

***the initial likeability factor can effect the suitability short-cut.

In fact, some high-scoring answers can create a ‘charismatic’ or ‘optimistic’ interview identity.

Signs that an Interviewer likes you?

It is easy to spot an interested interviewer.

If an employer doesn’t believe the candidate is suitable for the role, they will want to end the interview process as quickly as possible.

For an interested interviewer, they will show signs of desire by:

Asking additional questions to help the applicant mention the required criteria relevant for that job question
Positive non-verbal communication to encourage more descriptive answers from the candidate
Sharing personal stories to build rapport with the applicant with a view to help them take the offered role
Stating their high opinion of the applicant
Discussing future projects that the candidate would be suited for
Checks competition by asking about the interviewees other job interviews

Remember that just because the interviewer is interested in an applicant, this doesn’t always lead to a job offer, as the next applicant may have a stronger interview identity.

January 3, 2021January 13, 2021

3 Hidden Forces Affecting Hiring Decisions

Logically, the most suitable applicant will be hired for each advertised position.

This article will look at how an interviewees interview performance is affected directly by the interviewer.

Prior to the job interview, many factors affect which type of candidate will apply for the advertised role; the job advert copy, organisational reputation, the salary on offer, and several other factors.

Factors, simply put, create supply and demand.

A high paid job role would attract a high number of applicants, even those career professionals who are happy in their current position.

Jobs that require a particular skill or a rare qualification will require an HR team to encourage applicants who will feel, due to the level of their expertise, can get a high paid job in a number of companies. This can lead to recruitment managers recruiting less experienced employees than they had planned to.

On the other hand, recruits advertising for common skilled jobs may receive a vast amount of applications, requiring a recruitment process that can quickly reduce the number of applicants the organisation is interested in interviewing.

Without going into too much detail, the popularity of the job role, the employer’s need for a certain skill, and the salary band of the job position, from an applicant’s perspective, increases or decreases competition.

The less competition; the number of applicants applying for the job role, the level of other interviewees’ knowledge and experience, and the interveiw performance of all candidates, increases or decreases the likelihood of an interviewee being successful or not.

Unforeseen forces

In addition to the factors affecting the number, and competency level, of applicants attending a job interview, or even applying for the job role, is the unforeseen forces affecting the applicant’s ability to highlight their level of industry-related skills.

Two types of interviewers

The size of an organisation gives a clue to the skill level of the interviewer. Generally speaking, small businesses, due to the average annual company revenue can’t afford to hire a full-time recruitment team.

Often in start-ups and small sized companies, the owner will interview applicants for the new role. Even medium sizes business often fail to use skilled interviewers for recruitment, relying on team managers to conduct the job interview.

Whereas large organisations often have an HR (human resource) team with staff members dedicated to recruitment, or at the very least offer training on: how to conduct job interviews, the barrier of unconscious bias and how to recruit high-performing teams.

In short, large business, compared to smaller companies, will use trained job interviewers.

How an interviewee’s performance is affected during the job interview.

Prior to the job interview of each applicant, the hiring manager will initially read the candidate’s application to help form an impression of the individual they will be interviewing.

The candidate’s previous education, workplaces and positions held, create an assumption. This opinion, created from the application form, creates the halo or horns effect.

A pre-interview, positive (halo) or negative (horns), impression can be the difference between an applicant being offered the advertised job role or receiving the rejection letter.

This is because humans use once piece of criteria – attractiveness, as an example, to presume another trait without having any evidence. Experiments show, as an example, how people presume an attractive person to be intelligent.

Having worked at a well known company, or attended the same university as the recruiter or stating industry facts, models and theories on the application form can create a positive (Halo) generalisation.

This belief, in this example, is that the applicant is hirable, is taken, unconsciously, into the job interview.

The interviewer, believing the candidate deserves the job role, makes subconscious micro-changes to the way they act within the job interview, which encourages a better performance from the applicant, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It is the little, seemingly non-significant, actions that affect an interviewee’s job interview performance; smiling, eye contact and the nodding of the head from an employer can be seen as signs of likeability and encouragement to the applicant.

Pre-learnt judgements

Strongly held beliefs by an interviewer have a direct impact on the outcome of a job interview.

If, as an example, a start up company believe that ‘older’ applicants aren’t creative, this belief will be hard to break even when evidence, that contradicts the opinion, is presented.

Generalisations, stereotypes and prejudices create an unfair job interview process.

Organisations, to counter the interviewer’s perception disorders, put employees and recruitment managers through mandatory unconscious bias and diversity training.

The problem here is that research has shown how unconscious bias training alone isn’t enough to make the required changes needed in the recruitment of a diverse workforce.

One reason for this is that people react negatively to being ‘controlled’. It is the ‘mandatory’ element of training that creates the feeling of being ‘controlled’ meaning that a voluntary option would improve the change process for those who opted to take up the offered courses.

What is needed is a change in workplace culture, where unconscious bias training is part of a wider programme. Evidence over the last 20 years, from implementing health and safety into the workplace and into employees’ conscious awareness, reducing death and injury numbers, has shown how multiple approaches for change can be highly effective.

Common prejudices that affect recruitment processes include:

Age
Gender
Religion
Ethnicity
Disabilities

Perceived competencies

A recruitment programme, and therefore the job interview, is designed to predict the job performance of each applicant.

The ability to predict how a future, potential, employee would act within the culture of the organisation helps employers to build high-performing teams.

The final hidden force affecting the hiring decision of a recruitment team is the interview identity associated, unconsciously, to each applicant.

As the process of asking structured interview questions helps hiring managers cross reference the applicants skill set and experiences – their competencies, against the essential knowledge and experience required for the job role in question.

The process, throughout a full job interview, is taxing. Whenever the brian has to compute a vast amount of data it will use a shortcut.

The shortcut, in a job interview, is the process of creating an ‘interview identity’.

Based on the employers perception of the candidates level of knowledge and experience, and their level of confidence, the interviewer after asking the initial interview questions will, at a basic level , categorise the applicant from incompetent to employable.

Once a generic identity has been associated to an interviewee, the interviewer will use the generalization as a filter. Similar to the ‘halo’ or ‘horns’ effect, but based on job competencies, the interviewer’s behaviour can change, positively or negatively, depending on 1 of 16 ‘interview identities’.

Interestly, highly skilled and experience applicants can miss out on a job offer due to the associated interview identity.

It is the applicants behaviour, during the interveiw start, that creates the generalisation.

Negative identities are created by:

Self-disclosing weaknesses
Lack of eye contact
Not knowing the job criteria
High use of filler words
Weak answer that are short and lack detail

Whereas the following help to create a positive interview identity:

Being a self-promoter
Good use of language; varying words, unique words and generally using a large number of words
Smiling and being seen as confident
Varying projection; volume, emotional voice and use of pauses
Using examples

Your own interview identity can be discovered by taking the interview prediction grid test: