Unpacking Bias
I have been a student of understanding how bias plays out in the workplace, community, families and individual choices for quite a while.
I am fascinated by how bias plays a role in how we see the world. From unconscious or implicit biases that shape perceptions and stereotypes around race, gender, appearance, professionals and social standing, to more explicit biases that are intentional and often supported stereotypes and prejudices.
These implicit or explicit biases are just part of a larger group of cognitive biases that we default to. Like the frequency illusion - when you buy a car and start seeing the same one everywhere you go. Or belief bias, which is the tendency to judge the strength of arguments based on the plausibility of their conclusion rather than how strongly they support that conclusion. How about the IKEA effect, where people place a disproportionately high value on products they partially created? And let us not forget the Dunning-Kruger effect, where people with low ability at a task overestimate their ability.
These biases and the role they play in our decisions and how we navigate life are truly fascinating.
WHAT ARE BIASES?
For this article, I define biases as mental shortcuts shaped by our experiences and environment. They are predetermined stereotypes or prejudices we lean towards to help us navigate the world around us. The impacts of which can be both positive and negative.
Unfortunately, too often in the learning and development space, bias is only seen as something we must fix as opposed to recognising whether it is something that can be used for good too.
Rather than labelling biases as something we should immediately fix so that organisations can avoid litigation or appeasing compliance, I suggest that we should first understand the role they play in human development and existence and explore why as humans we default to them.
In a brilliant article called the Cognitive Bias cheat sheet, the author, Buster Benson, suggests there are four things that bias helps us address.
Information overload
Lack of meaning
The need to act fast, and
How to know what needs to be remembered for later.
As part of our evolutionary process, we have had to rely on those biases to process situations in front of us. For good or for bad. Whether that is using those biases to assume that this food is good, or whether the item we are purchasing is a bargain, or if the person or thing in front of us presents a threat to us or maybe is someone we can trust.
Our individual experiences have shaped our biases. The cultures and environments we live, work and socialise in are massive contributing factors to our outlook on life.
When faced with decisions, we will draw down on those experiences to fill information gaps.
Based on that person’s appearance, should I trust them?
Do I make a risky decision or follow the path I already know?
What happened the last time I was in this situation?
BECOMING AWARE OF OUR BIASES
So how do we become aware of our biases?
I often ask myself why practitioners and organisations instinctively view biases as something that need fixing. Are they biased towards bias?
Surely we should be investigating our biases and the role they play in the choices we make rather than just seeing them as something to fix? There needs to be a process of learning and exploring how we react when these biases show up, rather than just assuming de facto that it is detrimental to those around us.
For example, if we take some of the implicit biases that show up in our lives.
Body size preference
A particular stance on gender or sexual orientation
Views of a specific racial group
Rather than see it as just a negative, there is an opportunity to explore what lies beneath the kind of bias that we have.
What experiences or information makes me view someone with a different sexual orientation to me through a particular lens?
What is my default reaction to someone outside my racial or ethnic group?
When coaching, there are techniques I apply to help clients address their anxiety and stresses that could easily be applied to exploring biases. One of those techniques is asking a series of open-ended questions. For example:
What thoughts did you have around X?
What feelings did you have around X?
In what ways did the thoughts around X shape the feelings around X?
Where did these feelings show up in your body?
These rudimentary questions start us on a journey (client and coach) to take ownership of their thoughts, feelings and behaviours. Just even noting things like their body language or posture can reveal so much. When we go even deeper still and explore values and beliefs and start to challenge some of those thoughts and feelings, that’s where I see the benefit of this approach to managing bias.
As a Black man, are my thoughts and feelings around my interactions with non-Black people influenced by biases? Of course, they are. I have been followed in shops, had people cross over the road to avoid me and been asked “where are you really from?” on more occasions than I care to remember. And because of these experiences, I have built up bias, which I must actively work to question in future interactions
Am I blowing this out of proportion?
Am I misreading the situation?
Is my position based on fact or a rushed opinion because of a previous experience?
Should I default to that action being deemed as prejudicial or racist or am I leaning into the same stereotype I am accusing others of?
So how do we move forward once we are aware of the biases that shape our decisions and thinking?
MANAGING BIAS
Managing biases is not a quick and easy exercise by any stretch of the imagination. It takes time, good intention and a willingness to know you will make some mistakes along the way.
This leads me to why I despair at many of the interventions people use as part of diversity, equity and inclusion programmes in the workplace and community.
The challenge I have with singular training methods, like implicit bias workshops, is that way too often the inquiry around such behaviours come from a deficit basis. The inquiry only sees bias as a negative view of the world. A preference, shaped by our experiences, is positioned as wrong without full exploration as to why we make choices based on biases and how we can manage them - as opposed to just “being aware”.
While I may be oversimplifying the current approach to managing bias, the fact remains that it’s an approach that leaves people feeling like they are being attacked or accused. Which results in limited buy-in. So you get awareness but no behaviour change.
How do you align the expected behaviours or even educate people on how they can approach the vast range of biases we have if we just focus on one approach?
Developing an inclusive culture requires staff to explore why they think the way they do and consider the impact of that thinking on decision making, problem-solving, recruitment etc.
I prefer to approach bias from an asset-based framework. One where we can lead with positive language and create a space for people to explore said biases outside of the lens of guilt or shame, but still ensure we take collective responsibility for when lack of awareness of our biases create problems. For many organisations, this is revealed in how your corporate values show up day-to-day. More importantly, how these values align with the individual values of those who work or represent your organisation.
Here are some approaches that I have seen work with clients in my role as a coach and/or facilitator.
Understand how you make decisions
Exploring how we make decisions is important.
What are the factors that shape how we come to conclusions?
Which of those are in our control and which ones outside of our control?
Can you explain how those decisions are made?
Are you ok being challenged on them and exploring blockers or issues that you may have missed?
As I mentioned earlier, a lot of our biases kick in because of a lack of understanding or the need to act fast. Taking time out, more so as teams than individuals, to explore decision making is a great start to managing the impact of our biases.
Seek Second Opinions
One way to mitigate bias is to seek a second opinion.
If you are in an echo chamber, or if people don’t feel they have the agency to tackle your opinion, then of course this can be problematic. But being able to seek some second opinions can be valuable.
I have seen this kind of feedback have an impact on hiring decisions, on widening the pool of talent for internal promotions and even on product design.
Always ask yourself, “If I was to present this idea to A, what kind of questions would they ask me around my decision-making process?”
Don’t rush your decision making
Many forced errors around people or processes can come about because people feel time-constrained. A hurry to hire staff or complete a project can make a bias kick in a lot quicker than if more time was given to weigh up all the options before coming to a decision.
In an ideal world, we would all have the time to make decisions about our behaviour, but this is not how it plays out in the real world. What I would suggest here is to build in a bit of margin for testing your hypotheses or scenarios.
Eliminate what reinforces your bias
In the 1970s and 80s, orchestras started holding “blind auditions” for new members. Musicians would play behind a screen, hiding their gender and any other physical attributes. This change in the orchestra’s audition process was responsible for an increase of women members from 5% in 1970 to 40% in the 2000s. Eliminating the visual element of auditions reduced gender bias. The quality of the musician became the focus, rather than whether they looked like a good fit.
Similarly, companies who have structured job interviews have found this has helped to eliminate bias - in some cases more than blind CVs. Where there are a set of predetermined questions, rather than more unstructured interviews, it made interviewers take more time out to think about the questions they would ask. The interviewer is now forced to think about questions only in the context of the role and what it demands. Of course, these kinds of interviews can take longer than usual and need to be designed with other inclusive factors, e.g. the talent pool your hiring from, the diversity of the hiring team and even the software you are using.
These are just a few of a host of interventions that practitioners can use to help workforces mitigate or manage bias.
However, too many organisations go for a quick fix. Only ever seeing bias as a negative and not exploring the root causes will not yield the results organisations need. Surely if there is evidence that the short, limited training does not work, it’s time to unpack how we see bias in order to get the results so many seem to want.
