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Barriers to Advancement

Best Practices for Reducing Bias

Best Practices for Individuals

How can individuals reduce bias and support the advancement of women and people of color in Utah’s legal profession?

Discrimination represents the failure of organizational policies and practices to limit the role of bias in shaping outcomes and opportunities.[84] While systematically restructuring organizational policies and practices is vital, we all have a responsibility to support women and people of color at work. Each of us can and should serve as bias interrupters.[85] Bias interrupters are aware of common ways bias shapes everyday interactions and committed to disrupting it when it occurs. Bias interrupters raise the bar in their organizations by holding peers and colleagues accountable and by signaling to their women and minority colleagues that they are committed to supporting their success.

In this section we provide some tools to help guide your efforts to:

  • Gain awareness of bias
  • Engage productively with colleagues to minimize bias
  • Intervene productively to disrupt bias

Step 1: Gain Awareness of Bias

Scholars have identified several common patterns of workplace bias. These patterns are discussed earlier in the report and defined in Appendix 3. We include them here as well:

  • Prove-it-Again Bias
  • Tightrope Bias/Agency Penalties
  • Motherhood Penalties
  • Lack of Fit Bias
  • Distancing from Colleagues
  • Flexibility Stigma

These biases are often implicit or subtle. Without awareness of these patterns, you may be unaware of them even when they occur.[86] There are many resources to help guide your effort to become more aware of the ways in which gender and racial bias shape our views, assumptions, stereotypes and interactions. These include books, online resources and online tools to help you gain a better understanding of how bias shapes the climate of your own organization.[87]

Another important way of gaining awareness is to build trusting relationships with your women and minority colleagues. As you develop these relationships, avoid asking your colleagues to educate you on gender or racial bias generally. Instead, seek to develop relationships that allow open communication about their personal experiences and challenges. The most important role for allies is to listen to others’ experiences with focus, sincerity, empathy and humility. When colleagues share their experiences of bias, believe them and do not attempt to minimize or dismiss their lived experience. Do not assume that because you have not experienced bias personally that bias is not a problem for others. Research finds that effective allies are aware of the personal experiences of their colleagues and bring a strong sense of fairness to bear on their actions and priorities.[88]

Step 2: Engage Productively to Minimize Bias

As you seek productive engagement with colleagues on issues of workplace bias, remember that true allyship is about partnership and collaboration.[89] Allyship is also on a continuum from awareness to advocacy. Before you can intervene productively to disrupt bias, you must first learn to engage productively with colleagues who may be experiencing bias.

There are several strategies to engage productively with colleagues. Productive engagement means knowing the range of opportunities and challenges your colleagues are experiencing and communicating those challenges to others. Here we offer three critical ways that you can begin your engagement efforts:

Support Inclusive Policies

By learning about the challenges your colleagues face, you can lend your support to policies that work. These include flexible work policies, inclusive recruitment strategies and other equity initiatives. Make sure there are always talented women and minority candidates in the pool of candidates being considered for jobs, bonuses and leadership roles. Be open about your commitment to inclusion and the benefits to your organization of equitable practices. When it comes to policies that support work-life balance, be clear that these policies benefit all workers and publicly prioritize your own commitment to flexibility. Fathers and non-parents can help relieve some of the stigma associated with motherhood by taking advantage of any policies that support workplace flexibility and/or work-life balance.[90]

Mentor & Sponsor Talented Colleagues

Mentors and sponsors have a critical role to play in supporting the careers of women and people of color.[91] Good mentors and sponsors advocate for opportunities, highlight accomplishments, recommend colleagues for high quality assignments and privately and publicly recognize colleagues’ contributions. Good mentors and sponsors do not assume which opportunities their colleagues desire, they ask. And they encourage their senior colleagues to do this important work as well. Remember that your job is not to speak for your colleagues but to amplify their voices, talents and leadership. Ask good questions, seek feedback and admit mistakes.

Seek Partnerships

As you gain awareness of the challenges your colleagues face, seek to form partnerships with colleagues so as to stimulate creative problem solving. Host informal meetings, workshops and luncheons, attend meetings of women and/or minority lawyers, engage with women and minority industry leaders and participate in women and minority law school groups. In each setting, seek to form diverse and inclusive partnerships to support your efforts to reduce bias. Share influence, knowledge, information and resources across these groups to better inform yourself about and arm your organization with best practices.

Step 3: Intervene Productively to Interrupt Bias

All of us have a vital role to play in disrupting bias though men may be particularly influential in these efforts. Research finds that men’s active engagement in bias reduction is viewed as more legitimate and credible and tends to legitimize the experiences of underrepresented colleagues.[92] And while women and people of color tend to incur penalties for advocating for equity and inclusion, White men do not.[93]

There are several common strategies for disrupting bias in everyday interactions, from meetings about hiring and performance evaluations to discussions about assignments and compensation. Armed with an awareness about common patterns of bias and strong productive relationships with colleagues, we are all better able to: (1) recognize subtle bias when it occurs; and (2) intervene productively so as to minimize bias in the moment. Below we offer a handful of common scenarios of everyday bias and simple suggestions for how to disrupt bias effectively.

Scenario #1: Disrupting Agency Penalties

Your colleague Maria is frequently interrupted by men colleagues when she speaks in meetings and/or she is accused of being too “passionate” or “assertive” about her ideas.[94]

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Never interrupt women. If you need clarification, wait until the speaker has finished before asking for it and immediately turn the floor back to the speaker.
  • Ask the interrupter to wait until your colleague is done speaking.
  • Redirect discussions about Maria’s style to focus on her ideas and performance.
  • Advocate for decision making by consensus to ensure that all members of the team are able to contribute equally.[95]

Scenario #2: Disrupting Motherhood Bias

A colleague suggests not giving a high-quality opportunity to your colleague Maya because she recently had a baby and may not want the extra responsibility.

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Ask your colleague if they have discussed Maya’s goals and preferences. If the answer is no, make it clear that the group should not base decisions on subjective and potentially incorrect assessments of Maya’s preferences.
  • Remind your colleagues that Maya is competent and committed and has earned this opportunity.
  • Ensure that Maya—and all colleagues—receive assignments they deserve irrespective of family status.

Scenario #3: Disrupting Social & Network Bias

Your colleagues plan a meeting/lunch/dinner/golf/ski outing but do not invite your women colleagues.[96]

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Invite your women colleagues to participate in (and help organize[97]) any and all work-related functions, including functions with clients, customers or colleagues.
  • If women colleagues are not welcome, cancel the event or let your colleagues know why you will not attend.
  • If the event is not inclusive of your women colleagues, suggest another type of event or ask if the event can be rescheduled.
  • Express a desire that your women colleagues attend and suggest alternative times or ways to socialize so as to maximize their participation.

Scenario #4: Disrupting Subjective Assessment Bias

When evaluating job candidates, your colleague Elizabeth questions whether Jasmine, one of the only women of color applicants, is a “good fit” for the organization.

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Let Elizabeth know you think Jasmine is an excellent candidate and ask her which specific criteria required for the job is lacking in Jasmine’s record.
  • Ensure that the hiring committee includes women and people of color.
  • Ask Elizabeth and other members of the committee how your organization needs to change so that excellence candidates like Jasmine could be a “good fit.”
  • Encourage Elizabeth to use only objective criteria included in the job advertisement and to apply that criteria to all candidates equally.

Scenario #5: Disrupting Distancing Bias

Your colleague Jim avoids close mentoring or sponsorship relationships with women so as to “protect” them and himself from gossip.

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Encourage all of your peers, including Jim, to mentor and sponsor women.
  • Frequently discuss the benefits of mentorship for your own career and how valuable women and people of color are to your organization.
  • Let Jim know that avoiding women colleagues is harmful to women’s advancement and violates your organization’s goals of equity.
  • Suggest specific promising candidates to Jim and offer to facilitate an introduction for the purposes of mentoring or sponsorship.

Scenario #6: Disrupting Hostile Workplace Bias

Your colleague Bill makes a racist joke about immigrants. Your colleague Maria asks him to avoid such humor and Bill accuses her of being “too serious” or lacking a sense of humor.

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Don’t wait for your women or minority colleagues to correct this type of behavior. Be the first to speak up to let Bill know you are uncomfortable with racist or sexist humor and anecdotes.
  • Let Bill know that maintaining a respectful atmosphere in the workplace has nothing to do with one’s sense of humor.
  • Follow up with Maria privately to make sure she is okay and strategize together about how you will address such incidents in the future.

Scenario #7: Disrupting Lack-of-Fit Bias

You arrive in court with your co-counsel Gabrielle and opposing counsel mistakes her for your paralegal or clerk.

Bias interruption strategies:

  • Pre-empt assumptions by introducing Gabrielle as your co-counsel.
  • Don’t wait for Gabrielle to correct this error; speak up and let opposing counsel know that Gabrielle is a talented and valued member of the legal team.
  • Ask opposing counsel why they assumed Gabrielle was not co-counsel.
  • Let Gabrielle take the lead in ways that demonstrate her talent and capability.

These scenarios offer but a few examples of how we can all disrupt bias in the workplace when and where it occurs. While there is no substitute for organizational change and reducing the token pressures women and people of color face, everyday forms of bias can and should be disrupted. Gaining an understanding of common patterns, engaging productively with colleagues and disrupting bias when it occurs will make our organizations more inclusive and supportive of the careers of talented women and minority colleagues.

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