How Unconscious Bias Training Can Be Made Better

by Tom Evans Writer

Unconscious bias training has become the go-to solution for companies that find themselves in trouble on issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Training alone, however, is an unreliable strategy for fixing systemic implicit bias and the inevitable discrimination that results. It is only when comprehensive bias training is combined with fundamental re-structuring that effective change can hope to be reached.

Dr. Janice Gassam Asare is an author and founder of BWG Business Solutions, LLC, a consultancy that helps organizations be more inclusive and sparks important dialogue about workplace equity. Dr. Asare believes, “In order to maximize the impact of unconscious bias training, it's important to reassess other company practices, hold upper management accountable for enacting change, and include job- or industry-specific scenarios in the training.”

There are multiple unconscious bias training examples in the news of companies who responded to negative publicity by instituting unconscious bias training but didn’t necessarily institute fundamental change to accompany the training.

Dr. Asare outlines three broader approaches that companies can initiate in order to enhance unconscious bias training activities and better ensure positive change:

1. Examine Company Practices

“A lack of objectivity in corporate practices can create cracks in your company's structure. Go through the different practices your organization has adopted and evaluate whether objective criteria are utilized. Rubrics or scorecards should be used when assessing job prospects, as well as during a performance evaluation. Also examine the knowledge, skills, and abilities required for different roles. Adjust degree and certification requirements. In some cases, certain criteria may unintentionally filter out different populations of job candidates. Determine and reevaluate degree requirements and consider hiring based on specific job-related abilities, rather than hiring solely based on degrees and certifications.”

2. Manager Accountability is Needed

“Toxicity, as well as inequities and imbalances within the corporate structure all, trickle down from upper management. Assess how organizational leaders are being evaluated, and ensure there are accountability measures set up. DEI is everyone's responsibility and not just the job of the chief diversity officer — this is important to emphasize. Managers should be involved with implementing unconscious bias training, whether they are the ones sourcing outside vendors, or they are giving trainers input regarding what is needed to increase training effectiveness. Linking manager performance evaluations to DEI program effectiveness will make the training more successful, and may also create more manager accountability.”

3. Include Relevant Scenarios in Unconscious Bias Training

“If you do decide to implement unconscious bias training into the workplace, you want to include several job-relevant scenarios to increase the training effectiveness. According to one study, including job-relevant scenarios into unconscious bias trainings allowed employees to make concrete commitments to activities and behaviors in the workplace. Rather than training solely on concepts and terminology (which is important for a baseline understanding), efforts should be put into creating trainings that encompass workplace practices where bias is more likely to creep in. Employees should be provided with actionable steps to prevent bias from impacting decision-making processes. This is likely to increase employee commitment to goals and objectives set forth in the unconscious bias training, thus increasing the overall effectiveness of the training.

Overall, unconscious bias training has the potential to transform workplaces and impact corporate DEI efforts. Including job-related scenarios in the training session will increase training effectiveness. One important factor to consider: More often than not, unconscious bias training fails to address the structural and systemic issues that are plaguing an organization. Unconscious bias training should be accompanied by policy and practice change.

It's also important to hold managers accountable for culture change. Manager buy-in will solidify the employee committee to culture change.”