Bias, Stereotypes and Trust

How biases and stereotypes impact trust and how we can help make our workplaces more respectful and diverse.

I am going to share with you an article about some research that was done on middle school kids regarding stereotypes and trust. https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-02/sfri-fyo020117.php
 Kids, and people, notice when they aren’t being treated fairly and if happens repeatedly they lose trust in authority – for good reason.
"Youth of color enter middle school aware that majority groups could view them stereotypically," notes Valerie Purdie-Vaughns, associate professor of psychology at Columbia University, who coauthored the study. "But when teachers surprise them with an early experience that conveys that they are not being seen in terms of stereotypes, but rather respected, it creates trust and may set in motion a positive cycle of expectations."
The actionable intelligence for teachers is that going out of your way to express trust and that you don’t see them as a stereotype goes a LONG way towards establishing trust and that kids who experience social trust, have fewer problems.

The reason this is important to managers in the workplace is because, at some point, these kids grow up and enter the workforce. The same dynamics at play in the classroom exist in the workplace.

The big difference is that the biases are more ingrained at this point. Both on the part of the majority group seeing people stereotypically and on the part of minority groups who have spent their lives dealing with people who don’t respect them as fully human individuals.

It isn’t enough to talk a good talk about diversity.  If it were, we wouldn’t continue to have diversity problems.

In order to overcome these built in biases, we have to be proactive.  We have to go out of our way to recruit a diverse workforce. We have to go out of our way to express trust and respect. We have to go out of our way to build the relationships on which trust is built.

It isn’t enough to recruit in a diverse set of people. If they are not welcomed and respected and trusted, you will have problems in the workplace.

Fortunately, you can take proactive steps. Among those is learning about how implicit bias effects your decision making so that just maybe we can start hiring more truly diverse work forces. And we can also get training in how behaviors and corporate cultures are changed so that all of your staff can do a better job of making people feel like respected members of the team. And finally, training on how to stop harassment and bullying in the workplace, because seriously, there is nothing that screams disrespect more than being targeted by a bully and having your employer not do anything about it.

To learn more about how to help check out these courses:




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