5 Actionable Tips for Building More Diverse Teams

10 min readOct 18, 2021

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The research is overwhelmingly in support of diverse teams — diverse teams are more creative, better at problem-solving, and show higher employee engagement. And yet throughout my career in tech, the teams I’ve been part of have rarely included people of color, those who were openly gay or queer, individuals from non-traditional educational backgrounds, or other women.

Even in the most inclusive and open-minded teams, it’s hard to be “the only”. It doesn’t always feel safe to speak up, ask questions, and contribute in ways that result in better collaboration, decision-making, and products.

Finding and retaining diverse candidates can feel like yet another hurdle in an already cumbersome process. I’ve heard fellow tech leaders ask: Where are all the good candidates?! Why are people dropping out of our process or ghosting us?? Sure we want a more diverse team, but it’s so hard to find qualified people! The good news is that hiring diverse talent for your team is possible with several small, practical changes.

Implementing these 5 tips will enable you to attract a broader audience, reduce bias, and give your team the confidence to objectively evaluate candidates. And ultimately, you’ll be better positioned to build high-performing, diverse teams. So let’s jump into the tips!

#1: Define the role upfront 🏁🎬🚧✍️🔧

Before you begin writing the job ad, spend some time thinking about what your team really needs. I recommend using a template like Kate Leto’s Role Canvas. The Role Canvas will help you evaluate candidates objectively, consistently, and fairly across your hiring process.

With your team, brainstorm against these prompts, and summarize in a one-pager that’s made available to everyone participating in the hiring process.

Using the role canvas as a guide, ask:

Why are we hiring for this role? What will this person be working on every day?
What is this role accountable for? What outcomes or goals will this person be working towards? What should they have achieved in 6 months or a year?
What technical skills are needed for this role?
What human skills (or soft skills) are needed for this role?

In listing out the technical and human skills, prioritize them, and differentiate between absolute must-have vs nice to have. I recommend keeping the must-haves to a minimum, which will help widen your pool of candidates. The content from your Role Canvas will help shape your job ad, interview question bank, and scorecard, which are defined in the next tips.

#2: Use inclusive language 🌐🌈⁉️✋❤️🤗

Once you have the role defined, it’s time to write your job ad. One of the best ways to attract a diverse group of candidates is to use inclusive language.

Did you know that certain words or phrases are interpreted by readers as being masculine or feminine, and this impacts who applies?

Words like decision, driven, self-sufficient, champion, and active, all code masculine, meaning they are associated with stereotypically masculine traits. And words like commit, interpersonal, support, connect, and collaborate code feminine.

Research has shown that when job ads include too many masculine-associated words, women won’t apply. But, the reverse isn’t true — job ads with neutral or more feminine-associated language will not prevent men from applying. There are online checkers that can help you analyze the language in your job ad.

What are some other ways you can use inclusive language in your job ads?

Use gender-neutral language in the job titles; avoid words like “guru”, “rockstar”, “ninja”, which tend to only attract male applicants
Avoid pronouns — for example, instead of writing, “He/She will be responsible for xyz,” write, “The Product Manager will be responsible for xyz”
Avoid superlatives — like masculine-coded words, superlatives like “expert” or “world-class” will limit who will apply
Limit the number of hard requirements. Did you know that men apply for jobs when they meet 60% of the criteria, but women only apply when they meet 100% of what’s listed? And overall, women apply to 20% fewer jobs than men.*
Express your commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion by cross-linking to documentation about existing policies or initiatives
Call out flexible and family-friendly benefits like home office, paid time off, flexible schedules, and more

In addition to inclusive language in your job ad, you can add extra fields into your application form to allow applicants to list their preferred pronouns or request special accommodations.

Recommended reads:

Recommended tools:

https://datapeople.io/language-analytics-for-job-posts/
https://textio.com/products/
http://gender-decoder.katmatfield.com/ (this one is free)
https://fairlanguage.com/autokorrektur-tool-fuer-gendergerechte-sprache/ (also free and available in German)

#3: Use structured interviews 🎙🤝🗣💬👂🕒

Structured interviews are a way of standardizing the interview format, questions, and evaluation. This ensures that your hiring process reflects the role and that all candidates are evaluated consistently, fairly, and with as little bias as possible.

Work with your team to create a question bank and a scorecard for the role. This ensures that all candidates are being evaluated equally, regardless of who the interviewer is for each conversation. Use the content from your role canvas as the starting point.

I recommend including behavioral interview questions, which focus on examples from the candidate’s experience — the aim of this question format is to enable your team to assess whether the skills and values demonstrated by the candidate will lead them to be successful in your role. A behavioral question might sound like, “Tell me about a piece of work that you’re most proud of.”

Always ask candidates the same core questions for the role, and mark these as “Must Ask” in your question bank document. At the top of each question bank, I also like to include a few bullets about key attributes for the role, plus “green lights” and “red lights”. This will help your interviewers remember what they’re listening for during the interviews.

Before the interview, ensure everyone in the hiring committee has received a proper briefing about the role, interview process, evaluation criteria, and next steps. This will help your team feel confident and prepared.

During the interview, you might be inclined to make small talk to break the ice — but resist! In making chit-chat, you might accidentally stumble across something that biases you in favor or against the candidate. Instead, break the ice with brief introductions, and then jump in with the questions once everyone is present.

During the interview, take notes that will help you remember the conversation. After the interview, don’t rush to complete your scorecard or make a judgment about whether or not to continue with the candidate. Wait at least 30 minutes, and then reflect. Avoid discussing the candidate with the hiring committee until all of the scorecards are submitted — this reduces groupthink.

Recommended reads:

Interview scorecard: https://resources.workable.com/backstage/interview-kits-scorecards
Example behavioral interview questions: https://www.themuse.com/advice/30-behavioral-interview-questions-you-should-be-ready-to-answer
More example behavioral interview questions: https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/interviewing/most-common-behavioral-interview-questions-and-answers
Structured Interview Training Guide from Google: https://rework.withgoogle.com/guides/hiring-use-structured-interviewing/steps/introduction/
https://www.betterteam.com/structured-interviews
Reduce interviewer bias: https://www.digitalhrtech.com/interviewer-bias/

#4: Make a shortlist ✅🔖📗✍️🗒📂📌

I’ve observed that many jobs are open to rolling applications, meaning that the job is open until it’s filled. But, this isn’t the best tactic if you’re looking to build a diverse team. This is where your shortlist comes in.

First, include an application deadline in your job ad. After the application window has closed, it’s time to begin reviewing profiles and creating your shortlist. When looking at CVs, consider how the person’s experience would translate to the skills called out in your Role Canvas. Include two team members in this part of the process, for example, the recruiter and the hiring manager. This reduces bias in the initial candidate screenings.

Refer back to the diversity targets for your team, and check that your shortlist is adequately diverse. For example, if you’re looking for your team to be made up of 50% women, then you would want your shortlist to have that balance. Starting with the right mix of candidates in your shortlist means that it’s increasingly likely you’ll end up with a more diverse team.

If you don’t like the idea of application deadlines, try a blind recruiting approach. This means stripping out all personal or identifying information from the CVs before you do a review. Many applicant tracking systems have this feature built-in. But, if your recruiting software doesn’t have this feature, you could get someone outside the hiring committee to anonymize the CVs as they come in.

Recommended reads:

#5: Consider alternate formats 🎛 🔀🧪✈️👀🕵️‍🔎️️️

And lastly, create opportunities for candidates to showcase their skills and character in different formats.

Rather than starting your interview process with a telephone call, ask applicants to submit video interview responses instead. This allows candidates to present themselves in a space where they feel comfortable, for example, at home, and also enables multiple tries if they’re nervous or don’t like their answer. And videos mean that the whole hiring committee can “meet” the candidate from the first step.

Another option is to ask candidates to do a take-home assignment or provide short answer questions in a written format, as a replacement for an in-person interview. A great take-home assignment is short, meaning maximum 2–3 hours to complete, is representative of the work the person would do in the role, and is followed up with feedback. The goal isn’t to ask candidates to do free work, but instead, assess different skills than you would see in a standard interview setting.

And lastly, you might want to incorporate a personality profiler like Gallup or LINC, which will help you objectively build a balanced team. But use caution — it’s easy to gravitate towards profiles that are similar to yours or to people you’ve liked working with in the past. You don’t want to end up with a team of people who are all the same profile.

The added benefit of these alternate evaluation methods is that they’re all asynchronous. This levels the playing field and enables a much larger pool of candidates to participate in your hiring process.

Recommended reads:

Pre-recorded interviews: https://resources.workable.com/tutorial/pre-recorded-video-interviews
How to design take-home coding challenges: https://codesubmit.io/blog/take-home-coding-challenge/

Recommended tools:

MyInterview: https://www.myinterview.com/
ATS for blind recruitment and alternate application formats: https://www.beapplied.com/

Diversity is only the first step ✨

Incorporating these 5 tips into your hiring process is a great starting point, but diversity is so much more than hiring the right people. It also means providing the tools and professional environment needed to thrive, which is why a diversity strategy without inclusion can’t be successful.

So, what does it look like when you’ve got it right? In an inclusive environment:

Leaders ensure that everyone feels comfortable to speak up and can be heard
Leaders provide sponsorship and visibility — they amplify
Team members are empowered to make decisions
Colleagues don’t have to compromise on being authentic at work
It’s safe to suggest new ideas and fail
Constructive and actionable feedback is given like a professional gift
Credit for success is shared across the team
There are clear and defined paths for advancement

There are a lot of metaphors that help us understand what diversity, inclusion, and belonging mean.

I particularly like this one from Liz & Mollie, the authors of No Hard Feelings: “Diversity is having a seat at the table, inclusion is having a voice, and belonging is having that voice be heard. When we feel belonging, we feel valued not for fitting in, but for everything that makes us unique.”

Recommended reads:

Full disclosure: I’m not a diversity and inclusion expert. The tips in this article are a reflection of my ongoing journey to create fair hiring processes and practices as a hiring manager. There’s always more that can be said on the topic. If I’ve gotten anything wrong, I hope you’ll leave a comment with constructive feedback and any corrections.

Even more reads:

Platforms for reaching more diverse candidates:

Agile Insider

5 Actionable Tips for Building More Diverse Teams

#1: Define the role upfront 🏁🎬🚧✍️🔧

Using the role canvas as a guide, ask:

#2: Use inclusive language 🌐🌈⁉️✋❤️🤗

What are some other ways you can use inclusive language in your job ads?

#3: Use structured interviews 🎙🤝🗣💬👂🕒

#4: Make a shortlist ✅🔖📗✍️🗒📂📌

#5: Consider alternate formats 🎛 🔀🧪✈️👀🕵️‍🔎️️️

Diversity is only the first step ✨

Published in Agile Insider

Written by Merissa Silk

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