Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Toolkit: Unconscious Bias

The unconscious bias that plagues our police departments is the same unconscious bias that plagues business in the form of employee oppression and burnout, that plagues academia in the form of social promotion and fixed mindset, that plagues law in the form of poetic injustice and that plagues politics in the form of disenfranchisement and voter suppression.

A timely, must-have guide to understanding and overcoming bias in the workplace, from the experts at FranklinCovey. Unconscious bias affects everyone. It can look like the disappointment of an HR professional when a candidate for a new position asks about maternity leave. It can look like preferring the application of an Ivy League graduate over one from a state school. It can look like assuming a man is more entitled to speak in a meeting than his female junior colleague.

To become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive, many companies have turned to unconscious bias (UB) training. By raising awareness of the mental shortcuts that lead to snap judgments—often based on race and gender—about people’s talents or character, it strives to make hiring and promotion fairer and improve interactions with customers and among colleagues. But most UB training is ineffective, research shows. The problem is, increasing awareness is not enough—and can even backfire—because sending the message that bias is involuntary and widespread may make it seem unavoidable. UB training that gets results, in contrast, teaches attendees to manage their biases, practice new behaviors, and track their progress.

Unconscious or implicit biases are universal and detrimental to health care and the learning environment but can be corrected. Historical interventions used the Implicit Association Test (IAT), which may have limitations. We determined the efficacy of an implicit bias training without using the IAT. From April 2019 to June 2020, a 90-minute educational workshop was attended by students, residents, and faculty. The curriculum included an interactive unconscious biases presentation, videoclips using vignettes to demonstrate workplace impact of unconscious biases with strategies to counter, and reflective group discussions.