Employers were less likely to hire individuals who identified themselves as “nonbinary” or included preferred pronouns in their resume, according to a recent study from Business.com.
The digital media firm sent two versions of a resume for a fictional employee named “Taylor Johnson” to various companies but only included “they/them” pronouns in some of the submissions. The resumes which included the preferred pronouns received 8% less interest than those without pronouns.
“We measured interest in each applicant based on whether the applicant received any request for additional information, such as a phone screen, interview request, or skills assessment,” the study said. “When analyzing the final results, we attributed a different value to each of these follow-up actions to appropriately weigh the level of interest in the candidate. Our experiment revealed that the resume with nonbinary pronouns received less interest from employers and fewer requests for interviews or phone screens.”
Several hiring managers, some of whom were shown the resume without pronouns and others who were shown the resume with pronouns, were interviewed about what they would improve about the applications. One manager in the agriculture industry said that he was “not interested in the drama that a person who thinks they are a ‘they/them’ brings with them,” while another manager in the manufacturing sector said she would “trash the resume for that resume alone.”
Other managers called the inclusion of preferred pronouns “offputting and unnecessary,” an “attack on women,” and “quite silly in a job description.” Business.com accused the managers of displaying “blatant biases and even bigotry against nonbinary job seekers.”
Andrew Crapuchettes, the chief executive of non-woke job board and talent connection platform RedBalloon, said in comments to The Sentinel that many companies do not desire to avoid applicants perceived as likely to bring controversy and division into the workplace.
“Job seekers eager to scream their political beliefs, as opposed to their skills or value they bring to an employer, send the signal that they are likely to be a divisive force to the workplace culture and a distraction for the entirety of their short career with any business who is so desperate as to hire them,” he said. “Job seekers need to focus on promoting the value they bring to employers, not the potential for toxic divisiveness.”
The study from Business.com added that more than 80% of self-described “nonbinary” individuals, who claim to be neither a man nor a woman, believe that claiming the identity marker in job searches would harm their prospects. Only 6% of respondents to the survey indicated that the self-identification would “somewhat help” or “very much help” the process.
Even as many employers desire to remain politically agnostic and focus on offering value to their customers, many large corporations increased their efforts to hire applicants with various identity markers after the death of George Floyd in the summer of 2020. Job search platform Glassdoor revealed in a study last year that 41% of workplaces offer diversity programs as a benefit, a slight decline from 43% in 2021 but a significant increase from 29% in 2019.
Critics of hiring with respect to diversity contend that the process harms talent procurement as companies decline to hire qualified applicants due to their race or sex.
