Monday, March 28, 2011

LGBT - The forgotten diversity group

In some ways it seems like an odd thing to say that LGBT is the "forgotten" diversity group because, at least in Canada, alternative genders and lifestyles have become largely an accepted community (or at the very least a well known one) and yet I think when it comes to issues of employment there is an element of truth to it.

There are a couple of reasons for this, the first being that it's an example of the gap that can exist between "awareness" and "action" when it comes to any business culture changing initiatives, but of course specifically as we are most interested in, diversity ones. In short knowing that we should be doing something or aren't doing enough is better than not knowing, but it isn't the same as actually doing something.

Part of the issue here is that sometimes knowing that we should be doing something doesn't mean that we actually know what that something is. As a diversity group LGBT can fall into this category because for many organizations both knowing how to identify members of this group and what steps to take to make sure that they are incorporated as part of a diversity strategy are a bit tricky.

Like any successful corporate strategy it begins with clearly communicating objectives to all employees. Making sure that employees know what sorts of behaviour are acceptable and not acceptable when it comes to LGBT groups should be done just like any other diversity group. Even more fostering a culture of acceptance and inclusion starts with everyone understanding what the expectations are, and what the eventual goals are and those should be communicated clearly as well. When all the members of the team know what the goal is, that is having success by creating a diverse culture that is welcoming to the best candidates for all opportunities, you're more likely to reach that goal.

LGBT can also be difficult to address from the diversity standpoint because members of this group are more likely to be victims of quiet discrimination. The reality of the "old boys club" lives on and can exclude LGBT just like women, visible minorities and others. Sometimes members of diverse groups aren't being actively discriminated against but their opportunities for advancement in an organization are limited because they don't participate in the same social events or share the same interests that members of management might.

The second reason I think that LGBT can get overlooked has to do with cultural sensitivities and it's possibly even more of a problem. The fact is that there are many cultures and countries where LGBT personas are not seen as acceptable and/or wanted. Even in North America there are groups who would seek to persecute and discriminate against others on the basis of their sexual orientation and when it comes to opinions the world over this, sadly, counts as enlightened. It's a serious problem and its tentacles do extend into diversity initiatives here as well.

For example, with some cultural groups who historically and currently in their home countries suppress and/or discriminate against LGBT how can your organization be inclusive of both these groups? It almost seems impossible on the face of it, the existence of one group is offensive to another group so how can the two co-exist?

The fact of the matter is that while it does seem like a complication it is no different than the challenge of inclusion with any other diverse groups who might historically not get along. Ask yourself this question: how would you include both Arabs and Jews into your organization? What about Hindus and Muslims? You wouldn't think twice about encouraging groups to express themselves but at the same time setting clear boundaries on what sorts of behaviours are appropriate. The same standards should apply to LGBT.

It's not always about inclusion, it's often simply about making sure we're not allowing groups to be excluded and anyone who can be victimized on the basis of their race, religion, gender, background or sexual orientation deserves the same level of protection against exclusion.

Friday, March 11, 2011

The TalentOyster Network : a combined approach to diversity talent sourcing

Even though (or perhaps because of) we work in the field, we can tell you that driving diverse candidate traffic is not an easy thing. The short answer as to why is the amount of market fragmentation that exists. There are many, many, many diverse communities and markets in Canada but most of them are, relatively speaking, quite small. It's only in combining them that a candidate flow strategy can really make sense which is one of the reasons we call it Canada's Hidden Talent Pool.

The creation of TalentOyster was based on the principle of funnelling candidates from these fragmented markets into one collective pool from the perspective of companies looking to hire. TalentOyster is different because it is the only diversity related employment portal that was built around a traffic strategy first and the only one deeply connected to the existing multi-cultural media community in Canada.

In this line, right from the start TalentOyster has been connected to diverse cultural communities across Canada through the media partner network of our parent publishing company. This has given us a great start when it comes to candidate flow but as we have learned a strategy more proactive than advertisements and editorial content in newsmedia publications is required. We initially moved on this strategy by being leading edge in leveraging social media with programs like our Tweeting of Jobs and pushing updates to candidates via email, RSS and SMS. But we realized that these aren't always enough either so enter the TalentOyster Network.

The TalentOyster Network is a network of white-label sites built on the TalentOyster platform and sites using the TalentOyster API.

Our White-Label sites leverage the trust candidates have in an existing community/media brand by wrapping a custom branded job-board solution built on TalentOyster and featuring the opportunity and employment content of our site for some of the affinity groups and communities we work with. Without all the buzzwords what does that mean? Well check out EpochJobs.ca, a Chinese language website, managed by a community trusted newsmedia publisher (EpochTimes) that features TalentOyster content. It's just one example of how we are expanding the funnel concept through our white-label network and we're adding more trusted partners in more affinity groups all the time, including Hispanic, South Asian, Aboriginal and LGBT.

The second and even newer way we are being more proactive in increasing our candidate flow is via OCEAN, a REST API for TalentOyster. OCEAN lets anyone interested to embed job search functionality and content from TalentOyster right into their own website. Sites can execute searches for job on TalentOyster, get results and then format and display them, however they like, to their own visitors. In some ways you can think of it is as a White-Label "lite".

Either way we're excited about our new funnel concept. We think by remaining the only diversity job board with a candidate traffic first vision we will continue to improve upon what is already the best streams of diversity candidate flow in the country. Because the more great candidates are connected to great employers the more everyone gains.

Monday, March 7, 2011

Job boards and the problem of metrics

A well known technique of successful businesses is to constantly be collecting, measuring, analyzing and applying data and results. Metrics. They're great and I mean that. If you're not measuring some fundamentals about your business then how do you know what success actually looks like?

When it comes to job boards it's no different, the concept of using metrics to evaluate performance still applies, although over time what is being measured has in some cases changed. Originally it was only the number of applications that was counted and for some organizations this is still all that is measured. For other, highly metric focused organizations, this expanded to measuring number of "quality" or "qualified" candidates and some even further to encompassing "quality of hire". At the same time some organizations have gone the other way and are only counting the actual number of views per job as their job board measuring metric.

So who or what is right?

No doubt the idea behind measuring "quality of hire" is a good one but I don't fundamentally believe it's very fair because there are so many other, far more important factors that come into account. Let's look at the TalentOyster example. A company uses TalentOyster but discovers their rate of quality hires is less than they mainstream sourcing solution they already use. Is that difference really due to TalentOyster or something more? Is the culture of the organization actually diversity friendly? Is the organization actually making diversity hires in the first place? These are pretty vital factors that have nothing to do with the job board itself and yet are reflected in that metric.

Qualified applicants seems like a better measure, and it probably is in most cases although it still can be a victim of bias. And measuring all applications is simply too broad a number to be useful so what can you use?

I believe the answer, for multiple reasons is to use view as your only real job board measuring metric. I know, I know views are a measurement even more broad than applications, but really I believe the only metric that can be usefully measured. Really what job boards are about is advertising your employment brand and the kinds of jobs your organization has to the widest possible audience. The deeper your candidate pool is the more likely you will be able to hire the best candidates for your positions and so reaching the larges audience you can should be your goal. A job board isn't a replacement for your interview, resume screening and hiring processes; it's simply another medium for you expose your employment message on.

I think that's an important thing to keep in mind. Yes, we all want to measure ROI, but you don't measure the ROI of marketing or advertising campaigns on the basis of what happens today. It's about the brand knowledge and loyalty you build that will influence the customers decision process when it comes to making a purchase. Likewise with job boards you want to "plant the seeds" with prospective candidates, so that they think of what a career with your organization might be like, so that they think of you first when looking for something new and/or better or in the best case scenario so that working at your organization becomes internalized as a career ideal.

It turns out these ideas hold even truer for diversity groups, especially for some specific cultures. For example did you know that 1st and 2nd generation South Asians are 60% more likely to look at job boards at least once a week even when not actively looking for work? It's the kind of demographic that makes you rethink what the term passive candidate really means.

I am not saying don't use metrics. Obviously they help keep many companies on the success vector, but when it comes to job boards I do think you should be carefully evaluating what you are measuring and why.

Sourcing and hiring aren't about "quick fixes", they're about long term success strategies and they should be measured as such. How many more people know about your company as an employment brand and think positively about it? That's what you should be measuring when it comes to job boards. Even if it can be harder to measure than what you are currently it is after all a measurement that's more reflective of the longer term nature of your sourcing and hiring strategies.

Friday, March 4, 2011

B2B, Pan Am Games and Diversity

This past week the 2015 Pan Am Games (to be held in Toronto) organizers announced that bidders for contracts for the games (from construction to concessions and everything in between) will be required to demonstrate that they will involve businesses and employees from traditionally under-represented ethnic communities. Read more about the story in the Globe and Mail here.

This isn't actually a new idea, although extending such a plan to all bidders is new. Following on the trend of such international events requiring bidders and contracts to be awarded with marks for environmental sustainability (such as those for the Vancouver Olympics) the trend of supporting "minorities" or other diverse groups is growing. The London Olympics has a diversity strategy when it comes to supply chain and now the next logical step is being taken by Toronto's Pan Am Games organizers.

But is this a good thing? Will the imposition of "quotas" on contract bidders actually support diversity or simply support less capable vendors/companies?

Ian Troop, CEO of the Toronto Pan Am Games made some comments addressing this which I found striking. He said,

We’re not showing any favouritism to anybody. We’re saying to employers, "Recognize the reality of the marketplace and community we live in... This is a level playing field and a meritocracy. The cream will rise to the top."


Hey, that sounds kind of familiar to me! As I have said many times before, "You should only hire the best candidate. But make sure you are looking at everyone". I am glad to see I am not the only one who thinks this way.

Diversity strategies aren't about doing what is "right" or what is "politically correct", they are about doing what is actually best from a pure business standpoint. Quotas aren't about promoting inferior candidates or in the Pan Am Games example inferior companies, past their competency. Quotas or requirements are about making sure that diverse candidates or organizations aren't being cut out of the process due to inherent biases in it. If all contracts are awarded and hires are made simply on the basis of who has done it before, who is best connected with my network or who I feel I personally relate to the most, you will be leaving large groups of possible candidates and companies out in the cold. The result of that being that what you are ending up with right now is inferior to what you could have.

Companies who "get it" when it comes to diversity already know this. It's why they are committed to a diversity strategy that embraces the full process, from employment branding, to candidate sourcing, to hiring and onboarding. But this story is about an even more immediate reward for companies still on the fence, namely that by increasing the diversity of your organization you can win more business.

As someone as familiar with the sales process as I am I can tell you that any advantage you have over your competition when it comes to selling your company is a good thing. The inverse is also true; lacking an advantage a competitor has can put you at a severe disadvantage. The growing amount of RFPs and bidding outlines with diversity as an integral component of the process mean that if you don't have a diversity strategy for your organization you're being left behind.