Job application - not come across this before - Blind recruitment?

[Preparedforjobnottolast]

Hi,

Just looking to apply for a job direct with an Employer in the private sector and I notice this message I've never come across before, just above where you go in to fill in personal details such as name, address etc:
"We screen candidates anonymously. We will not see your personal information before your application has been moved forward in the process."

What are the company trying to convey, they don't know your name until you maybe are offered an interview? or, is it just they will keep your details secure under GDPR terms.

How might this work if you are an ex. employee from a long time ago although the company is still listed on your CV.

Many thanks for any insight. I don't really understand how blind recruitment works.

It just means your application is anonymised so you are not unfairly treated due to any biases the recruiter might have. Fairly standard practice for a number of years with large employers

It is so the person doing the shortlisting can't see your name, dob or any of the equal opportunities information when shortlisting so there is no chance for unconscious bias. Obviously HR or whoever arranges the interviews can see your name and details

It's just a way to try and minimise the impact of bias in the recruitment process.

They hide your name and age. This is because if you have a name that people view as 'foreign' / you are less likely to be invited for interview.

It means they will see your personal statement, qualifications and experience but not your name or other personal details. It's so that they can't work out your 'profile' and unconsciously discriminate based on that (eg. They might infer from a name if you're a woman or from an ethnic group)

Yeah the people reviewing or interviewing won't have any details that don't specifically relate to your work or education. They don't know your name, sex, age etc

I’ve received anonymised CVs that also don’t name the institution/s where you achieved your qualifications.

The nhs do this. Each part of the application is separate and recruitment tick what parts the shortlisted panel see. So babe, age, address etc are not seen. Of course age can usually be worked out by qualifications and if you indicate gaps in service for looking after children then they might guess you are female but on the other whole it is anonymised.

Yes my workplace (university) does this-when I shortlist, I only see their experience and responses to each criteria. If you know of someone internal applying you can usually guess who it is though! I really like it. Once you’ve selected your candidates to interview you see their names

Done in NHS applications

My workplace has this. It means that those who are scoring the applications do so based on the merits of the application. Whilst it's a bit of apin to score them as a hiring manager/someone on the panel it does mean that the candidates who can showcase their relevant experiences get through. I really like it as it means that our team is likely more diverse.

As PP said, you can sometimes work out who someone is if they are internal, or you have worked with them previously. This has happened twice to me, and I declared that I was pretty sure I knew a non-internal candidate that I had worked with previously (and asked the hiring manager whether they would prefer me to step away, though I was fairly sure I could remain objective. The hiring manager said no, and, in the event, we all scored the candidates similarly and it made no difference!)

It's a way for them to screen out anybody who has gaps in their employment history due to disability - because you have to disclose the gap but they can't take the fact you are disabled into account because that would be giving you an unfair advantage. Also means that time out raising a family looks bad compared to a bloke who hasn't been a single parent unable to keep a role due to an absence of affordable childcare or had to take a lower responsibility part time role to fit in with school hours. Not knowing somebody is female/a bloke doesn't change the facts of employment, it just takes away the perfectly reasonable explanation for them.

Bloody shit idea from the point of view of the people who face those barriers to employment. But it sounds good and probably does do some good in reducing the opportunities for discriminating against people on the grounds of their name, even if the qualifications still reveal the location they studied and their approximate age.

The reason I say more diverse, btw, is that it avoids the uncinscious bias that most people have to hire 'people like me'.

We all have unconscious bias even if we think we're open minded. Eg even women think a candidate is less able if they know she's female. It's been shown that businesses make better decisions with a diverse team (so they don't all think alike and have the same life experiences) but we tend to want to appoint people who share our own characteristics.

you have to disclose the gap but they can't take the fact you are disabled into account because that would be giving you an unfair advantage.

That's not how the Equality Act works, so if that's how your workplace is applying it that's a problem.

It's neither unfair nor an advantage for disability absence to be disregarded.

No, gaps of employment reasons have to be disclosed for safeguarding reasons. We are trying to find people who are hiding jobs, perhaps criminal activity etc. it is not and never been about disability- I've worked in recruitment in both the NHS and the Education sector and I have never, ever heard this reason.

The ability to filter out those other categories is a happy side effect of blind recruitment. I have no issues with accounting for gaps if it is possible for the employer to see that it is due to, for example, being unwell - the issue with blind recruiting is that they aren't party to the information that allows them to see the reason for the gaps, so have to treat a disabled person exactly the same as somebody who is just leaving gaps because they've been fired.

Many thanks again, certainly interesting and good to have opinions and views.