Anonymous recruitment  

What is anonymous recruitment?

Anonymous recruitment (sometimes known as blind recruitment) is the process of removing identifiable characteristics (for example, name, age, gender, or ethnicity) from a candidate’s application that do not pertain to the job itself or the qualifications or experience necessary for success in the role.

What is the purpose of anonymous recruitment?

Anonymous recruitment practices contribute to a fair hiring process where bias is reduced so that the best possible candidate can be hired. Removing irrelevant details allows recruiters to focus on evaluating which candidates possess the key skills and attributes required for the role.

How do you make the recruitment process anonymous?

To make the recruitment process anonymous, first provide training to members of human resources and hiring managers on diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging and how to reduce bias. Also provide training on how to create and ask questions about candidate skills, knowledge, and behaviour.

Before you post the job, assign a candidate anonymizer. As applications come in, the candidate anonymizer removes identifiable information like age, name, address, and names of educational institutions and assigns a number to each applicant, saving this information in a password-protected file. Once applications have been screened, the candidate anonymizer contacts the selected applicants to set up screening interviews and assessments. If you’re using any skills assessments, be sure to anonymize these as well and evaluate the results against predetermined criteria.

Once HR and the hiring manager have conducted the first round of interviews, the anonymizer is no longer needed (unless skills assessments take place after the interviews).

What is a candidate anonymizer?

A candidate anonymizer is a person responsible for removing identifiable characteristics from candidate applications before they are reviewed by the people responsible for hiring. The candidate anonymizer is not involved in making or influencing hiring decisions and must not pose a conflict of interest.

For expert strategies on employee recruiting, check out our blog, The Best Recruitment Strategies to Hire Effectively.