Corporate America is spending enormous sums of money on unconscious bias awareness training. But there’s little evidence that these training programs succeed in reducing bias — perhaps because there’s little evidence that unconscious bias correlates with actual biased behavior. And despite the “boom” in bias awareness, women and minorities remain underrepresented in management, especially compared to their educational accomplishments.
When Employees Think the Boss Is Unfair, They’re More Likely to Disengage and Leave
New research from the Center for Talent Innovation indicates that there is a high cost for employees and organizations when individuals perceive bias from their managers. Based on a survey of 3,570 college-educated professionals working full-time in white-collar professions, they discovered how individuals perceived bias in six categories typically used to judge employee potential: ability, ambition, commitment, connections, emotional intelligence, and executive presence. They also tallied those who perceived bias in more than one of these aspects. Across the board, 9.2% of respondents at large companies perceive bias in the way their superiors judge their potential on two or more elements — from all different groups and demographics. Individual findings showed that people of color are more likely to perceive bias in two or more categories than whites, and employees born abroad or those with disabilities are at high risk. Among foreign-born employees, those born in Latin America have an even higher rate of perceiving bias in two or more elements. These perceptions have a high cost. Their research also indicated that perceiving bias on at least two dimensions correlates with more frequent reports of emotional distress, higher employee disengagement, and lower employee retention.