5 Top tips for recruiting a diverse workforce

If your existing workforce is fairly homogeneous, you may just need to shake up the way you recruit to ensure your business appeals to a greater variety of candidates.

There’s clear evidence that having greater diversity within your workforce can boost your organisation’s performance. A recent study by McKinsey found that firms in the top quartile for gender diversity are 21% more likely to enjoy above-average profitability than those in the lowest quartile, while those in the top quartile for ethnic diversity are 33% more likely to see higher-than-average profits than those in the bottom quartile.

This won’t be a surprise for most recruiters, many of whom know that it’s a wise move to recruit people from different backgrounds – whether in regards to their gender, socio-economic level, race, religion or any other characteristic. By building a diverse team, you not only stand to benefit from broader range of skills and experience, you can also make your organisation more reflective of society as a whole and help you to reach a wider audience,

If you’re ready to gain all the benefits diversity can bring to your team, here’s how to attract candidates from all backgrounds to your business:

Highlight your diversity

Research has shown that two-thirds of job-seekers consider how diverse a company is when they are evaluating a job offer, so it’s important for you to be vocal about the diversity that already exists within your organisation. Remember, diversity isn’t just about race or gender – if you can highlight how employees with different levels of experience, education, or skills are thriving within your organisation, you’re likely to appeal to a wider range of candidates.

Implement inclusive company policies

When you’re looking to attract diverse candidates to your organisation, you need to ensure that your company culture will enable them to feel respected, appreciated and included. So think about how you could add to or change your current policies to make them more inclusive of a wide variety of people. Parents are likely to look for flexible working hours, for example, while a generous approach to time off for religious and cultural observances is likely to appeal to religious candidates.

Reach out to them where they are

If you always use the same channels for recruitment, you’re likely to get more of the same kind of candidates. Promoting your job ads purely on job boards may mean you miss out on younger talent that may be more inclined to search for jobs on social media, for example. You can expand your reach by recruiting through new channels, such as through professional associations that cater to diverse candidates or networking groups for professionals with the skills, experience or attributes you’re looking for.

Word your job adverts carefully

Review your job adverts to ensure that they don’t include anything that may deter diverse candidates from applying for your roles. Simply making it clear which job requirements are ‘nice-to-have’ and which are essential can be crucial if you’re looking to recruit more women, for example, as while men are likely to apply for jobs for which they only meet 60% of the criteria, women are much more likely to hesitate unless they meet 100% of the requirements. You should also avoid unnecessary corporate jargon, which may put off younger, less experienced candidates.

Engage your workforce

While it’s really important that your organisation’s focus on diversity is understood and supported from the top, you should ensure that your entire workforce understands the benefits of a diverse team to get everyone on board and ready to welcome new talent. You should also encourage your staff to come to you with any ideas on how you can improve inclusivity in your workplace – those from diverse backgrounds may have ideas that you haven’t yet considered.

By following these steps, you should see the number of applications you receive from diverse candidates rise – and when you do, Reach ATS can help you to find the best person for the job.

From automatically shortlisting candidates to remove unconscious bias to helping you stay in touch with each candidate throughout the process, there are a range of ways Reach ATS makes it easy for you to reach and recruit diverse talent. To find out more, feel free to contact us and read more about our candidate attraction services.