Anyone who knows me well knows that I lack the sporting gene. It is not that I never enjoy playing sport, but I almost never watch it, and I tend to follow only the people or events that make the front page. So how did Godliman come to model its ‘Godliman Rule’ for diversity hiring on America’s National Football League?
The ‘Godliman Rule’ is a commitment we ask our clients to make, to promote diversity and inclusion in the Search process. It requires that, from every shortlist we present, the client interviews at least two diversity candidates: one from an ethnic minority and one woman.
It takes its name from the Rooney Rule, named after the late Dan Rooney, former owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers and chair of the NFL’s diversity committee. The Rooney Rule requires NFL teams to interview ethnic-minority or female candidates for head coaching and senior football operations roles. Notably, it confers no hiring preference; it requires only that teams interview a certain number of such candidates.
The thinking behind the ‘Godliman Rule’ is to give diversity candidates the chance to present themselves to an interview panel even where they might not otherwise have made the cut, for example because their skills or track record looked marginally weaker than others on the shortlist. We do this because what actually determines success in a hire is usually not the functional skill set or the specific track record. The evidence is that personality, temperament, coachability, emotional intelligence and motivation matter more; only 11% of failed hires fail on technical competence. So it makes sense to give diversity candidates a seat at the table, and the chance to let their personalities outshine apparently more ‘skilled’ rivals.
This mirrors a point made by Andrew Haldane, then Chief Economist at the Bank of England, in a November 2016 speech at the launch of the Investment Association’s Diversity Project. He argued that the filters built into many standard recruitment procedures are themselves a barrier to a diverse workforce. Filters based on academic record, work experience and ‘social skills’, he said, ‘sound perfectly sensible. Yet these filters may, inadvertently but unhelpfully, disadvantage certain cohorts of society’.
The logic is hard to escape. Select only on skills and track record, and you discriminate against candidates whose family circumstances, and so whose schooling, may have held back their grades and early work experience. The same applies to women whose careers, for a range of reasons, may not have offered the opportunities open to men. It is also why a shortlist needs more than one woman to make a real difference.
So the ‘Godliman Rule’ is our way of trying to redress the balance: a form of positive action that lets candidates show their fit in the interview itself. Because, while experience and capability matter, it is the fit between a candidate’s behaviours and personal style and the culture of the organisation that most influences long-term success.
If you would like to discuss how the ‘Godliman Rule’ could help you build a more diverse shortlist for your next senior hire, please contact us at hello@godliman.com.
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