How to construct a fair chance hiring program

This article is part of our focus on sharing how TA leaders can build a more inclusive recruiting process. To become an active participant, check out the Diversity Hiring page!

Margie Lee-Johnson makes an astute case that in order for a business to champion D&I and bring society as a whole “closer to racial justice,” fair chance hiring must be an imperative of your recruiting mission. In Lee-Johnson’s summarization, “fair chance hiring mandates that employers only assess a candidate’s criminal record after the candidate has been interviewed and is considered qualified for a role.”

Similar to how Morgan Lobb detailed that the three pillars of Hiring Success “present opportunities to truly attract, select, and hire a diverse and inclusive workforce,” Margie Lee-Johnson documented four steps to incorporate while building out a fair chance hiring program:

• Create an intentional hiring plan.
• Connect with local partners to find top fair chance talent.
• Conduct a skills-based interview.
• Fairly assess charges.

These four programmatic additions to your hiring process can not only make an impact in breaking past the barriers to employment for far too many qualified candidates currently burdened to the sidelines due to decades of discrimination, but they can also act as catalysts to for your whole industry’s recruiting strategy if your business starts to demonstrate the positive impact of hiring talent that has been purposefully overlooked.

This article is part of our focus on sharing how TA leaders can build a more inclusive recruiting process. To become an active participant, check out the Diversity Hiring page!