Life in Science

Statement and Question: Recruitment is often said to be based on merit and interview performance. However, it has been shown/argued that these are inherently biased in favour of people that ‘fit in’ instead of ‘stand out’ (e.g., biases exist in student evaluations for teaching staff in higher education), and minorities ‘are less likely to be viewed as future leaders, in part because they may be perceived to not have traditional qualities we associate with leadership (e.g., decisiveness, competitiveness)’. How should we change recruitment to be more inclusive?