{"id":5792,"date":"2019-06-22T13:32:53","date_gmt":"2019-06-22T12:32:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/?p=5792"},"modified":"2019-06-22T13:32:53","modified_gmt":"2019-06-22T12:32:53","slug":"unconscious-bias-training-isnt-a-magic-wand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/2019\/06\/22\/unconscious-bias-training-isnt-a-magic-wand\/","title":{"rendered":"Unconscious Bias Training Isn’t a Magic Wand"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week saw a sober assessment<\/a> of the impact \u2013 both positive but also depressingly negative \u2013 of schemes to improve gender equality. As the Athena Swan Review Group<\/a> wrestles with how to improve their own awards, it is important to learn from mistakes as well as successes. In years gone by I spoke up for Athena Swan pointing out it wasn\u2019t a \u2018tickbox\u2019 exercise<\/a>, but as time has passed its bureaucracy and heavy requirements on data acquisition leave, as many equality champions have spelled out, insufficient space to provide a narrative on the application forms let alone the time to carry out the well-intentioned action plans. Hence the need for an overhaul.<\/p>\n

One \u2018easy\u2019 step many institutions have adopted is unconscious bias<\/a> (also known as implicit bias) training.\u00a0 The aim of this is straightforward: make people aware of their biases and then they won\u2019t be biased any more. Unfortunately, it doesn\u2019t work like that<\/a>. Pointing out biases to folk can actually make them more biased because they assume they know it all so it is no longer an issue for them. Furthermore, a brief online training programme may allow people to get the right answer in the end of session \u2018test\u2019, yet not have changed their mind-set or actions one iota. It is an easy way for organisations to demonstrate that they have taken their responsibilities seriously yet without it doing much good in actually affecting outcomes.<\/p>\n

My own university required me to attend a session of a couple of hours\u2019 discussion with a trainer and a bunch of other academics. This enabled some serious dialogue around examples of (in some cases frankly astonishing) bad behaviour as well as what might constitute best practice. Better than merely doing something online, but still probably insufficient. \u00a0The crucial question is how do you know if it has changed the behaviour of attendees. The best-intentioned may just end up on tenterhooks in future situations in case they get it wrong; the less self-aware may continue blindly on asking inappropriate questions at interview (at least an obvious failing others may be able to jump on) or simply harbouring the same old prejudices that mean they are liable always to vote for the person who looks most like them. I wrote previously<\/a> about well-intentioned but hopelessly blind senior types in universities who can perpetuate injustices while still proclaiming themselves as champions of diversity. Nothing makes me think unconscious bias training would dent their self-belief.<\/p>\n

I think it is time institutions started to look at the impact and consequences of training they offer, not simply offer more of the same. I am less clear how this should be done! Measuring the uptake of training offered is easy, just another metric to add to the burden of the Athena Swan lead perhaps. Quantifying any consequent changes in behaviour is much harder. I am convinced that good intentions are not enough and if senior leadership doesn\u2019t \u2018get it\u2019 nothing will change. It simply doesn\u2019t suffice for leaders to require unconscious bias training to be rolled out, if they also look the other way when manifest unfairnesses appear or assume that HR are on top of everything when, my experience tells me, the professionals may choose not to look very hard at alleged misbehaviour of senior members of staff (think Geoff Marcy<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Because of course, although it is easy to consider unconscious bias is most important in interviews or promotion panels, the actions that render a department or larger unit an unpleasant place to work relate to day-to-day interactions at least as much if not more than the set-piece situations. If a parent feels looked down upon because they work part-time, if comments alluding to the fact that \u2018oh you missed the staff meeting on Friday; of course that\u2019s the day you\u2019re at home with the kids; it\u2019s a problem when you\u2019re not full-time\u2019 are tolerated by a head of department, we can be sure there are problems lurking. If a head of department is so insensitive that they ask the Athena Swan lead \u2013 who they know (at least if they stopped to think for more than a second) is themselves a victim of the nasty culture so engendered, where casual bullying and denigration is rife \u2013 to arrange a session of training to improve the culture, what hope is there for the department? Yet, the PVC whose responsibility it is to ensure overall equity and that appropriate training is rolled out can look at that same department and assume the department is doing really well because, gosh, the head of department has taken the trouble to arrange such a session. What should the Athena Swan lead do in that situation? Should they stamp their feet at the head of department and refuse? Or should they assume that running a session might actually improve things so they had better swallow their own hurt and anger and do as asked?<\/p>\n

Take this same parent who is criticised for being part-time (and I won\u2019t assume it\u2019s a woman, although statistically it is likely to be), they are not likely to turn up to this session \u2013 assuming it isn\u2019t anyhow arranged for a Friday \u2013 and speak up about their experiences because that would require them to have sufficient confidence to believe that speaking up won\u2019t subsequently lead to worse, if nevertheless hidden, consequences. Expecting victims to discuss their horrible experiences publicly, probably in front of their denigrators, in the hope that it will educate others is likely to be a forlorn hope. Safe-spaces are needed for that, and these are hard to construct.<\/p>\n

Organisations such as universities are large and varied. It is hard to be prescriptive about what might or might not work. But what will never work is rolling out training without thought and then assuming everything has been cured. Nothing will change if the head of department is stupid, blind let alone actively making life difficult for some members because they don\u2019t fit the norm. Senior leadership should be ever vigilant for pockets of \u2018resistance\u2019 and bad behaviour and constantly aware they themselves may be guilty of it. It is too easy to assume the problems lie elsewhere and too easy not to look for where that might be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week saw a sober assessment of the impact \u2013 both positive but also depressingly negative \u2013 of schemes to improve gender equality. As the Athena Swan Review Group wrestles with how to improve their own awards, it is important … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[60,691,1330,140],"class_list":["post-5792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-equality","category-science-culture","tag-athena-swan","tag-bullying","tag-implicit-bias","tag-training"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5792\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occamstypewriter.org\/athenedonald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}