Uber is Interviewing for Inclusion Like It's a Core Competency (Because It Is)

Just how serious about diversity, equity, and inclusion are you?

Maybe you have a dedicated diversity sourcer. Maybe you’ve instituted a modified “Rooney Rule” wherein offer requests get rejected in the event of unrepresentative interview cohorts.

It’s not enough.

Unless you nailed DE&I early on, odds are you’re going to have some technical debt in the wake of it becoming an important initiative at your organization. The folks over at Uber are sensitive to this, and when I sat down with their Head of Engineering Recruitment Craig Campbell, he walked me through their efforts to address it.

Uber interviews for inclusivity the same way they screen for any other core competency. In short, this involves specific behavioral questions, assigning an individual to monitor each hiring process for inclusion, and logging specific feedback in the ATS. In long, you can listen to our whole conversation below.

Craig goes on to list examples of behavioral questions that assess for inclusion, as well as the “signals” the team looks for in the responses. This verbiage in and of itself has proven to be important as well–when you teach interviewers to identify signals, you are conquering their assumption of what a good or bad answer is. Craig explained that calling an answer good or bad is a value judgment, often carrying an individual’s preconceived notions. Saying an answer was a signal of inclusivity, on the other hand, encourages the interviewer to point to why an answer was specifically indicative of the qualities they’re meant to be assessing. Craig covers all this and much more about interview mechanics at Uber. Stream the entire episode above, and make sure to subscribe via iTunes, Google Play, or anywhere fine podcasts are streamed.