3 Tips for Creating Inclusive Job Descriptions

Article by: Susanne Nyaga

So your organization wants to hire more diverse talent and you don’t know where to start. While it is crucial that organizations take the steps required to both recruit inclusively and retain diverse talent, most overlook the simple but crucial task of building inclusive job descriptions. 

When a job descriptions fails to take into account the impact of language or formatting, it can work as a barrier for attracting diverse talent rather than a welcoming invite. Here are 3 tips for creating inclusive job descriptions so that your organization can tap into the highly-qualified diverse talent pool that your industry has to offer. 

1. Use Inclusive Language

Inclusive language starts with gender neutrality. It’s important to step away from phrases like “he/she” and simply use the singular “they”. This takes gender out of the conversation and allows you to decribe the details of the role and your ideal candidate, without prescribing a gender. Although some may believe phrases like “he/she” or “his/hers” are inclusive of all genders, it actually works to reinforce a gender binary. Gender is a social contstruct that exists on a spectrum and true inclusivity is about creating a welcoming space where individual candidates can define themselves within the process. 

To take inclusive language to the next level, you can also run job description text through a gender decoder to identify whether specific terns and phrases may be masculine-coded or feminine-coded as coded language can have an impact on the gender diversity of your applicant pool.

2. Assess for Accessibility

It’s important to consider accessibility from the very start of the candidate experience. Start by plotting out all the steps a candidate needs to take in order to find the job description and apply for the role. Think about components like compatibility with screen readers, font size and colour and providing accessible formats of postings.

To further amplify accessibility, think about dedicating a section of your careers website to accessibility and linking it on all job postings. This is the ideal space to display any policies or procedures you have to guide candidates who require accommodations, identify resources such as a ‘common accommodation requests’ guide or identify any timelines associated with accommodations. Dedicating space to effectively communicate your practice, processes, and identify support demonstrates that you have taken the time to intentionally integrate accessibility into your recruitment practices. 

However you decide to communicate the opportunity for candidates to make accommodation requests, it is important that as an organization you are ready to receive them. Have a process and practice in place BEFORE a candidate reaches out. Make sure that all communications are clear about who candidates can specifically contact to place a request, and train the person on the receiving end of accommodation requests. 

3. Include a Clear and Concise EDI Statement

If equity, diversity and inclusion are important to your organization, you should make that clear to all candidates applying for roles. EDI statements signal to diverse talent that the organization is a space where they can authentically be themselves and experience safety and belonging. However, it is important that as an organization you have the processes, policies and practices to back that up. Prematurely placing an EDI statement on job descriptions, without actually doing the systemic work to build out an inclusive organization can end up being more harmful for diverse talent than helpful. It can falsely indicate safety and result in high turnover rates for diverse talent. 

EDI statements should accurately reflect where the organization is within their EDI journey and the commitment to EDI or the future state that the organization seeks to achieve. 

For many candidates the job description is the first step in their candidate journey with your company. These three actions can help you build out more inclusive job descriptions to increase your chances of pulling in the best talent for the role.