A father and son are in a car accident. The father is killed outright and the son is very badly injured. The son is rushed to hospital and prepped for surgery. When the surgeon looks down at the boy the surgeon says I can't operate on this boy - he's my son.
What's going on in this scenario? The answer of course is that the surgeon is his mother. However, many people don't automatically reach this conclusion when hearing the story as they associate a surgeon with being male. This is a good example of how unconscious bias affects our thought processes.
So exactly what is unconscious bias? ACAS has a very helpful definition:
"Everyone has unconscious biases. The brain receives information all the time from our own experiences and what we read, hear or see in the media and from others. The brain uses shortcuts to speed up decision making and unconscious bias is a by-product. There are times when this sort of quick decision making is useful, for example if faced with a dangerous situation, however it is not a good way to make decisions when dealing with recruiting or promoting staff."
Unconscious bias is developed over a lifetime of being exposed to more data than our conscious brain can manage. To deal with all of this data, our unconscious brain processes a lot of it without us even realising it has happened.
The information our brain receives is connected together by creating links and patterns and over time the links and patterns get stronger. When we meet a person for the first time, our brain processes information about their characteristics very quickly and usually without us being aware of it. Our unconscious brain links also that person to all the supposed knowledge of the category we have put them in and this creates stereotypes.
There are lots of characteristics that might elicit unconscious biases. It could be someone's gender, their age, their accent, body piercings or tattoos or even which university they went to.
In a workplace context, the operation of unconscious bias can have a significant impact, for example:
Chambers may not be recruiting the most talented individuals because unconscious bias is influencing the recruitment process.
Decisions about which individuals to promote may not be based purely on merit but on unconscious biases toward certain individuals.
Chambers may be missing out on the recognised benefits of diverse thinking and may not be helping to address wider imbalances within the profession. For example, statistics produced by the Bar Standards Board for 2016 show that there were 1,376 male self-employed Queen's Counsels compared with 226 female self-employed Queen's Counsel.
It could expose Chambers to the risk of employment tribunal claims if it can be established that the operation of unconscious bias also amounts to discrimination on the grounds of one of the protected characteristics contained with The Equality Act 2010, namely age, sex, race, religious or belief, sexual orientation, marital status or disability.
So, how can these unconscious biases be countered in the workplace? Chambers should consider ways in which it can encourage Barristers and employees to develop an awareness of unconscious bias and how it can affect decision making. There is a section on the Bar Council's Ethics Hub which provides guidance for barristers and chambers on subconscious bias.
Training is also a really effective way to do this and there is advice on training from the Bar Council. Email [email protected] In conjunction with this, consideration needs to be given to reviewing and designing policies and processes to help ensure that decisions can be made objectively and free of bias.
Narrow Quay HR, an HR Consultancy that has been set up by Veale Wasbrough Vizards LLP, has been appointed as a Bar Council service partner to make available their provision of comprehensive HR services to chambers as required.