Georgia Institute of Technology Equity, Diversity, and Excellence Initiative

Best Practices for Search Committees

Talk to committee about being conscious of assumptions and biases.

Committee members may review and take tests at the following site to assess for implicit bias: Implicit Bias    https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/

Develop clear selection criteria in advance (e.g., research ability; references; ability to interact with colleagues at GT). Note that neither age nor personal circumstances are appropriate criteria.

Make evaluation criteria explicit. Design organized evaluations and use a Candidate Evaluation Tool.

Spend considerable time and attention on applications to evaluate candidates fairly and adequately.

Ensure that criteria are applied consistently for all candidates.

Guard against the “moving target” syndrome: changing the requirements as the search proceeds in order to include or exclude particular candidates.

Critically analyze supporting materials. Know that supporting materials, such as letters of recommendation are subject to race and gender stereotypes. Teaching evaluations are also subject to gender bias.

Develop a consistent process for checking references.

Include all search committee members in the evaluation process.

Ensure consistency between attributes of candidates being recruited and faculty’s “shared” vision.