Online Unconscious Bias Training: Promoting a Diverse and Inclusive Workplace

Researchers have found that diverse workplaces boost employee morale, increase customer satisfaction, improve workplace culture, and improve profit margins.  Promoting a diverse and inclusive work environment, however, requires more than just eliminating intentional acts of harassment and discrimination.  Instead, we must also attempt to understand how unconscious bias and implicit bias can impact the decisions we make and our interactions with others in the workplace.

Unconscious bias happens when people make decisions that are implicitly based upon characteristics of another without even realizing or intending to do so. When unconscious bias occurs in the workplace, employers are at risk from a legal and human resources standpoint. Effective inclusion training can help employees understand that unconscious biases exist and help them take steps to reduce the likelihood that such biases will impact their decisions and interactions with others in the workplace. An inclusion training course can provide employees practical guidance and help foster a diverse and inclusive workplace.

Unconscious biases are stereotypes or assumptions that a person makes about a certain group of individuals outside of their own conscious awareness. Unconscious biases can include all types of bias, like gender bias, racial bias, LGBTQ bias, age bias, disability bias, religious bias, and over 150 more types of unconscious bias. Clear Law Institute’s CEO, Michael Johnson, recently published an article on Why Unconscious Bias Training for Employees is Essential.  You can read the article here.

What is unconscious bias and why does it occur?

• Intentional vs. unintentional discrimination
• Why our brains create schemas and generalizations to process information
• How our brains often make quick “gut instinct” decisions and then rationalize our decisions afterwards
• Why we exhibit implicit biases

Types of Unconscious Bias

• Implicit biases based on individual characteristics such as race, gender, national origin, age, disability, gender identity, height, weight, and attractiveness
• How to measure your level of bias with the Implicit Association Test (IAT)
• How everyone exhibits some type or types of bias
• Why people can exhibit bias against their own personal characteristics

Unconscious Bias and the Workplace

• How implicit bias can impact the workplace
• Examples of bias relating to gender, race, sexual orientation, and gender identity

How do we “interrupt” unconscious bias from impacting our workplace decisions and behavior?

• Why is it difficult to eliminate implicit bias
• How to become aware of which particular biases you may exhibit
• How to question our automatic assumptions
• Avoiding labels
• Allyship: How to become an ally in the effort to reduce the impact of implicit bias in the workplace
• Bystander Intervention: What to do if you experience or witness bias in the workplace
• How to speak up
• Interactions with co-workers and others in the workplace
• Meetings
• Assignments
• Promotions
• Performance evaluations

Recruiting and Hiring (Manager Version)

• How to minimize the impact of implicit bias in the recruitment and hiring process
• Job descriptions
• Use of word-of-mouth recruiting
• Reviewing resumes
• Interviews

Assignments, Performance Assessment, and Promotions (Manager Version)

• Work assignments
• Task assignment assessments
• Performance assessments
• Promotion decisions
• Expanding the promotion pool of candidates

Diversity and Inclusion

• Impact of bias on organizational effectiveness
• Strategic benefits of diverse and inclusive workplaces
• Financial benefits of diverse and inclusive workplaces