Three Ways Bias Hurts Your Company’s Performance
April 7, 2023
Reducing bias isn’t just a way to improve your company’s public perception. It’s also a means to enhance performance, notes McKinsey.
What can happen if we don’t actively strive to eliminate bias in our organizations?
- Your team can miss out on top talent. Remember that Indian-born candidate that you passed up on because he had an accent? It turns out that he was the best person for the job.
- Great performers may find better opportunities. The woman whose promotion opportunity was foregone when her manager learned she was pregnant started looking for jobs at a workplace that wouldn’t discriminate against her.
- The best ideas can go unheard and unrealized. The Black man who always notices when his white colleagues talk down to him stopped making an effort to contribute to meetings. Little did they know, the marketing idea he’s withholding would grow sales by thirty percent.
Squashing bias in the workplace isn’t just good for employees. It’s good for the company. And it starts with a willingness to accept that we may have biases we don’t even realize.
Remember – it doesn’t make you a bad person if you have some bias. What matters is that you identify it – both in yourself and in your organization as a whole – and take proactive steps to eliminate it.
Are you ready to take your company’s performance to the next level and make it a better place to work along the way?
References
- Why diversity matters. (2015, January 1). McKinsey & Company. Retrieved from https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/people-and-organizational-performance/our-insights/why-diversity-matters
