Welcome to Back To Work Connect’s Reignite, Reskill & Recruit Audio Series. In this episode, Sarah Healy of Tools for Better is discussing combatting bias.
Let’s be honest — bias isn’t the problem, unexamined bias is.
Every single one of us has bias. It’s how our brains are wired. We categorise, we filter, we lean towards what feels familiar.
Because what feels “familiar” is often just a reflection of our own world.
The people we grew up around, the environments we’ve worked in, the experiences we’ve had and if we’re not careful, we end up hiring more of the same — not because it’s the best talent, but because it feels like the safest choice.
This shows up everywhere in recruitment:
• How we read a CV with a career gap
• Who we feel is a “good fit”
• The assumptions we make in interviews
• The candidates we unconsciously filter out
And here’s the challenge:
You can’t fix bias by telling people “don’t be biased.”
You fix it by building awareness and changing behaviour — consistently, across the entire hiring process. That’s exactly why we built our Returner Friendly Recruitment Training at Back to Work Connect. Because Returners often sit outside what feels “familiar” in hiring. And unless teams are equipped to recognise and challenge their own assumptions, incredible talent gets missed.
What we focus on is simple (but not easy):
• Helping teams understand how bias actually works
• Creating space to challenge assumptions safely
• Giving practical tools to assess candidates more fairly
• Aligning everyone involved in hiring — not just HR
Because inclusive hiring isn’t about removing bias completely, it’s about not letting it make your decisions for you and when you get that right, you don’t just build more diverse teams, you make better hiring decisions.
Thank you for listening to Back To Work Connects Reignite, Reskill, and Recruit audio series. If you’d like to get more information, you can reach out to us at info@backtoworkconnect.ie.
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