Entelo, a recruiting technology company, recently launched a product called Entelo Diversity.
To be honest, I had to look up what Entelo actually did. I had heard the name, but I couldn’t have told you if they were an employee engagement company or an ATS – and it turns out they’re neither! They’re a recruiting play, inasmuch, you have needs that are hard to find, their product claims to help you find those needs (I’ve never used it, so I not telling you it works or doesn’t).
This new product, apparently, helps you find Black People! Or Women. Or Black Women. Or a half Black-Asian Woman, who used to be a man. I’m not sure, for sure, because I haven’t used it; I’m just going on their press release.
The ability to find diverse candidates
Here’s what I know, that most Talent and HR people lose their freaking minds over: It’s not a bad thing to have a product or service that can specifically find you a certain kind of diversity.
I know. I know. That makes you really uncomfortable!
“TIM! People will use those products to discriminate!”
They might. I can’t stop that at your organization, but I can stop that at my organization!
These products just help you find what you want:
- If you need more female recruits for your hiring pool. Bam! A product like this will help you.
- If you need more shades of color within your organization. Bam! A product like this could help you build a rainbow in your organization.
- If you have a hiring manager who only wants to hire young white guys in your organization. You need to address that! But don’t blame a recruiting product. You own that one!
Running away from the tools shows ignorance
I hear the same criticism every time I show a new group how to recruit on Facebook. There are really cool options where you could search on females, 22 to 28 years old, who graduated with an engineering degree from Stanford.
That’s is awesome, right!? I need more young female engineers from Stanford in my engineering department! But I can also search 31-45 year old white male engineers from Stanford as well.
Oh well, that’s not so good, right? Wrong. What if your entire staff was black female engineers! While highly unlikely, you would still need to add some diversity to that staff.
This isn’t about tools getting more powerful and precise for what you are looking for. This is about the people using those tools, usually Talent and HR Pros, ensuring that their organization is doing the right thing to get the best hiring pool possible.
Too many Talent and HR Pros run away from using these tools, and it only shows their own ignorance for what true diversity and inclusion is.
Looking for the right balance for your organization
Smart Talent and HR Pros know what their organizations are lacking, and they’ll work to fill those needs with the best available talent.
Sometimes that means you need to get very specific on the diversity side. Sometimes it means you don’t.
Great HR and Talent Management Pros work to always have the correct balance for their organization, their demographic and their stakeholders.
(Editor’s Note: Ha! That’s funny; you all know I don’t have an editor. Just so we are clear, Entelo did not compensate me for this post, but if they want to send me Diet Mt. Dew, I never turn that down.)
This was originally published on Tim Sackett’s blog, The Tim Sackett Project.