faculty recruitment the search committee prepared by: dr. sara-jane finlay office of the vice...

Faculty RecruitmentThe Search Committee

Prepared by:Dr. Sara-Jane Finlay

Office of the Vice President and Provost

…‘over the next ten years new faculty appointments at the University of Toronto should attain a level of

diversity […] that meets and ultimately exceeds that found in the Canadian

pool of PhD graduates’.

‘Walking the walk of equity, non-discrimination and true engagement

with cultural and intellectual diversity in a setting defined and underpinned by the concept of academic freedom demands thoughtfulness married to tolerance, academic rigor married to

stern self-scrutiny, the tough-mindedness to survive lively debate married to an alert sensibility to the

values of others.’

Equity: equal access to opportunity for all. Prohibits discrimination on the grounds of race, ethnicity, aboriginal status, gender, religion, sexual orientation, or disability. Through the Equal Opportunities Act it is a requirement.

Diversity: term used to describe the many national, racial, and ethnic groups that have brought their cultures and their belief systems to North America. It is a term that has grown to include the representation of both men and women in contexts of employment and study, to include persons who are disabled, and to include persons of various sexual orientations.

Outline

• Recognising Discrimination

• Avoiding Discrimination– Advertising– Searching– Evaluating the candidate– Some guidelines for success

Recognising Discrimination

Recognising Discrimination towards Women

• 44% of PhD’s in 2001 were women yet:-– They remain in lower ranks (80% of full professors are

men)– Are less likely to be tenured (60% of full-time male

faculty; 42% of full-time female faculty)– Are more likely to be employed part-time (women are

45% of part-timers)– Are more often employed at institutions of lower

prestige (women comprise 23% of the total full-time faculty at public research universities).

– Under-represented in science and engineering (10% of the full professors are women.

Excerpted from Trower, C. (2003). Leveling the Field. The Academic Workplace, 14(2): 1-15.


• Academic women are:-– Excluded from social networks in graduate school and

the formal/informal networks in the academic workplace;– Are less likely to get a post-doc position or be included

in ongoing funded research;– Have fewer mentors who are connected to networks,

leaders, and the power structure;– Are normed against males and trapped by sex-role

stereotypes where masculine traits are valued over feminine.

– Teach more, serve on more committees, and spend more time with students – doing academic ‘women’s work’;


• Academic women:-– Have less time for research;– Publish less, in part as a consequence of sex-role

stereotyping and in part as a matter of personal style, values and socialization; but are cited more;

– Have lower self-confidence about their place in the academy, due in part to isolation and exclusion;

– Are more likely to experience the negative consequences of tokenism, by virtue of being the only woman in a department or program;


• Academic women:-– Experience bias in hiring, peer review, pay, and other

rewards;– Are more adversely affected by dual careers when choices

have to be made;– Bear more familiar responsibility, which can affect

scholarly productivity and conflict with the tenure clock;– Feel more stressed;– Experience lower self-efficacy – less control over career

and outcomes which, in tur, affects motivation, morale and productivity;

– Are less satisfied in the academic workplace and ultimately are more apt to leave the academy.

Recognising Discrimination towards Visible Minorities

• 16% of PhD’s in 2001 were visible minorities yet:-– Minorities remain in the lower ranks (89% of full

professors are white; approx 30% of minorities are lecturers or instructors)

– Are less likely to be tenured (45% of full-time faculty are white)

– Are more likely to be employed at institutions of lesser prestige (only 5% of the full-time faculty at public research institutions are visible minorities)

– Are under-represented in science and engineering (6% of full profs are visible minorities)


• Minority faculty:-– Experience overt and/or covert racism including being

stereotyped and pigeon-holed– Have a heavier teaching and service load than white

males.– Experience isolation and exclusion and the resultant

lack of colleagueship, networks, and mentors, leaving them less attuned to the rules that affect academic work life, including promotion and tenure;

– Are marginalised and find that their research is discredited, especially if it concerns minority issues.


• Minority faculty:-– Bear a tremendous burden of tokenism, including

feeling like they must be an exemplar of their entire race, and feeling they have to work twice as hard

– Are more ‘culturally taxed’, that is, feel more obligated to show good citizenship by representing one’s race or ethnicity on multiple committees, through mentoring and advising same-race students.

– Place greater emphasis than whites on the affective, moral, and civic development of students, and are much more likely to enter the academy because they see an ability to effect social change.


• Minority faculty:-– Suffer from negative, unintended consequences of

being perceived as an ‘opportunity’ or ‘target’ hire.– Find that their teaching and scholarship do not

necessarily match what is required for tenure;– Are more apt to hold joint appointments that are

problematic in terms of having multiple chairperson or deans and earning tenure;

– Are less satisfied in their academic careers and more likely to leave academic employment.

Recognising Discrimination

• New scholars priorities:-– Open promotion and tenure processes ensure

accountability– Merit should be seen as socially rather than empirically

constructed and contextual.– More is achieved through collaboration than competition.– Serious scholarship concerns important social questions

that are interdisciplinary– Teaching, advising, and citizenship matter along with

research– Personal life matters.

• Further details http://www.nerche.org/Trower_Refs.pdf

http://www.nerche.org/Trower_Refs.pdf

http://www.nerche.org/Trower_Refs.pdf

Avoiding Discrimination


• Avoiding discrimination throughout the search process.– Perceptions of critical mass– Gender/racial schemas – institutional and

systemic discrimination– Evaluation biases – occurring at specific

points in the recruitment process

Adapted from the STRIDE presentation (2004) at the University of Michigan

Perceptions of Critical Mass

• When women make up 30% or more of the applicant pool, they are judged more positively than when they are 25% or less.

• When women make up more than a third of a work group, they are judged more positively.

Heilman & Stopeck (1985) Journal of Applied Psychology, 70, 379-388; Heilman (1980) Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 26, 386-395

Gender/Racial Schemas

• Psychological terms that refer to the cognitive processes which unconsciously distort our judgments about men, women or people of color.

• Perpetuates inequities• Virginia Valian (1998). Why so Slow? The

Advancement of Women?• ‘Our unarticulated beliefs about men and women

– gender schemas – make it harder for women (and easier for men) to accumulate advantage and rise to the top’.


Men Women

Bachelor’s degree +$28,000 + $9,000

Ambitious + $21,900 + $1,700

Lived outside US + $9,200 - $7,700

Second language + $2,600 - $5,100


• NSF (1993)– 3-8 years – women earned 92% of men salaries– 9-13 years – women earned 90% of men’s salaries

• Humanities (1995)– Five years or less – 12% had tenure– 6-15 years – 65% of men with tenure, only 51% of

women• Canada (2002)

– Women are 38% of all tenure stream academics– 26% of tenured staff are women– 17% of full professors are women


• Valian (1998) writes that gender schemas– Schemas are hypotheses that we use to

interpret social events. A schema resembles a stereotype, but is more inclusive and neutral. Gender schemas are hypotheses that we all share […] about what it means to male or female. Schemas assign different psychological traits to males and females. […] In brief, men act; women feel and express their feelings (p. 52).


• When women are less than 25% of the applicant pool they are evaluated more negatively than when they make up 37.5% or more of the pool

• ‘Evaluators may be faced with men and women who are matched on the qualities relevant to success. The evaluators may sincerely believe that they are judging the candidates objectively. Yet they are likely to overestimate the men’s qualifications and underestimate the women’s because of schemas that represent men as more capable than women’ (Valian 1998, p. 53).


• Swedish Medical Research Council– Women 46% of applicant pool but only received 20%

of awards.– ‘Impact index’ used to rate productivity and prestige of

publications– Analysis showed that women with 100+ impact points

were rated as equal in scientific competence to men with 20 impact points.

• Small losses for women lead to accumulation of advantage.

• Listen to Virginia Valian discuss this issue

http://www.rice.edu/webcast/speeches/20010329valian.html



Avoiding Gender/Racial Schemas

• Recognise that gender-blind or merit-neutral policies are impossible to implement because there are no gender-blind (or merit-neutral) evaluators.

• Ensure all procedures during evaluation, interview and the campus visit do not unfairly advantage one group over another.

• Consider a variety of explanations for non-traditional or unusual CV’s – don’t get stuck with one hypothesis.

• Speak to the referees for your candidates early or informally to get a better sense of the individual.

• Ensure that all new candidates receive mentoring.

Evaluation Bias

• Mary Ann Danowitz Sagaria (2002)– 4 ‘filters’ or evaluation biases that can occur in

recruitment process.• Normative• Valuative• Personal• Debasement

Evaluation Bias

• Normative filter– Standardized and (pre)-established criteria– Occurred during review of resumes and after

interview to ‘rank’ candidates– ‘strong commitment to equity and diversity’ with

Chairs trying to eliminate institutional discrimination and personal bias during paper review.

– During second phase additional criteria included with not subject to same commitment.

Evaluation Bias

• Valuative filter:-– Screening for professional behaviour,

leadership style and ‘fit’– “evolved throughout searches as thresholds

were established for all candidates or when one candidate exhibited characteristics or behaviors judged desirable by a search chair or committee member” (p. 367)

Evaluation Bias

• Valuative bias:-– Vague, value-laden, class-, culture-, or ideologically

based.– Accuracy/reliability of perceptions/ observations not

assessed.– Familiarity, fit and image.– “When the valuative filter was applied, either as a

preliminary filter, or later, in tandem with the normative filter, search chairs and committees tended to rely heavily on information from known sources and to make judgements based on personal preferences or biases” (p. 688).

Evaluation Bias

• Personal filter:-– Screening for personality, character traits,

attitudes, habits, family composition, sexual orientation.

– Evolves throughout search process but most evident during/after campus interview.

– Manifests itself in invasive or offensive questions about personal life and concerns about public demeanor.

Evaluation Bias

• Debasement filter:-– “First, some search chairs doubted the

seriousness or genuineness of black men and women’s interest in a position. A second form of debasement was the chairs’ perceptions of professional invisibility. The third form was the devaluing of experiences and competencies. The fourth form was essentializing being black and expecting blacks to respond to black issues” (p. 697).

Evaluation Bias

• Bonus Criteria:-– Emerges during campus visit– Arises when a candidate appears that has a

particular characteristic or accomplishment which becomes benchmark for others.

– Could include being a ‘super star’, world class scholar or role model

– Becomes the standard by which other candidates are measured.

Reviewing CV’s

• Steinpreis, Anders & Ritzke (1999) – factors that influence outside reviewers and search committee members, particularly gender.– 238 male & female academic psychologists sent on of 4

versions of a CV – female/male job applicant, female/male tenure applicants

– All versions came from one women representing two stages of her career, only name changed to Karen or Brian.

– Both men and women evaluating CV’s were more likely to choose male applicant over female with identical record.

– Male applicants seen as having done adequate teaching, research and service compared with female applicant with an identical record.

Reviewing CV’s

• Steinpreis, Anders & Ritzke (1999) –– More often requested additional information

about female candidates. Comments included:-

• ‘We would have to see her job talk’• ‘It is impossible to make such a judgement without

teaching evaluations’• ‘I would need to see evidence that she had gotten

these grants & publications on her own.

– Same differences were not as prevalent between male and female tenure candidates.

Letters of Reference

• Trix & Psenka (2003) – letters for women were shorter, contained more ‘doubt raisers’, had less ‘standout adjectives’

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Training Teaching Application Research Skills &Abilities

Career

Trix & Psenka (2003) Semantic Realms Following Possessives

Female Applicants

Male Applicants

Letters of Reference

0

5

10

15

20

25

Personal Life Publications CV Patients Colleagues

Trix & Psenka (2003) Distinctive Semantic Realms following Possessives

Female Applicants

Male Applicants

Avoiding Evaluation Bias

• Acknowledge that racism and sexism will enter the search process and be on the look out for it.

• Ensure a diverse search committee• Educate search committee members on evaluation bias.• Be cautious of hiring strategies which try to maintain the

status quo or norm.• When reading letters of reference consider both what is

said and what has not been included.• Recognise the power relations that negatively effect

women and people of colour – both within the search process and in academia more generally.


• Search Committee practices:-– Talk openly about evaluation bias and gender

schemas – make diversity a challenge not a problem– Ensure that your position description does not

discriminate but is open to all qualified candidates.– Make multiple short lists based on different criteria. – Search out women and visible minorities who might

be under-utilised or who are under-placed– Institute a process of constant review of applications

as they arrive so that adaptations to the search process can be made if there are limited numbers of women or visible minorities applying.


• Proactive recruitment:-– Advertise widely in areas that will reach

women and visible minorities– Be proactive in contacting women and visible

minorities at other universities– Use the personal connections that your

colleagues have developed– Personalise the search process


• Campus visits:-– Establish a ‘visiting scholar’ program that

encourages women and visible minorities to speak at the University – they could become future candidates.

– Tailor the search to the individual – show off Toronto’s diversity and multiculturalism

– Arrange for women and visible minorities to speak to a similar colleague in the faculty.

– Arrange a visit to the Family Care Office.


• Dual Career:-– Women academics are more likely to have

partners who are also academics– Provide information on the Dual Career

Connection– Discuss the opportunities for academic

partner employment– If necessary, be prepared to explain the

intricacies of immigration and visas for partners


• Family Friendly policies:-– Inform all candidates about the family friendly

policies at the University– Provide information on maternal/paternal/

family care leaves if necessary– Arrange for the candidates to have a briefing on

benefits.– Direct them to the Health and Well-Being

Program and Services website (http://www.utoronto.ca/hrhome/hwb/index.html)

http://www.utoronto.ca/hrhome/hwb/index.html

http://www.utoronto.ca/hrhome/hwb/index.html


• If you would like more information on any of these subjects or need further advice on proactive recruitment, please contact:-

• Sara-Jane Finlay, Director, Faculty Renewal

• 416 978 1855

• [email protected]

faculty recruitment the search committee prepared by: dr. sara-jane finlay office of the vice...

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