job advertisements
Job offers – these formulations ensure that women do not even apply
Some employers subconsciously discourage female applicants
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Many companies would like to have more female applicants. But sometimes they subconsciously torpedo this goal themselves, analyzes the Stepstone job platform.
Finding suitable staff is not that easy. Many companies are currently complaining that they cannot fill vacancies, and in some industries there is a real shortage of skilled workers. But instead of complaining, many employers could do more themselves to remedy the deficiency, suggests an evaluation by the Stepstone job portal.
Accordingly, in the fight for talent, companies are criminally neglecting a – not entirely insignificant – group: women. A survey by the platform among 500 recruiting managers reveals a dilemma: On the one hand, more than every second recruiter says that the company strives for a balanced gender ratio. At the same time, many of the HR managers have found that significantly more men than women apply to them. And many have no idea how to change this. “While many employers have the clear goal of forming diverse teams, many have a lot of catching up to do to set the course during recruiting,” says Stepstone expert Tobias Zimmermann.
The employers themselves would have at least one means in their own hands: If hardly any women apply for a job advertisement, this may also have something to do with the way it is formulated, according to Stepstone. For the analysis, female employees were also asked how they viewed job advertisements. After all, three out of ten women stated that they had already refrained from applying because they had the impression that a man was more likely to be sought.
The right keywords
Employers can also subconsciously create this impression, according to Stepstone, by using certain keywords in the job advertisement that have a more masculine connotation. These include the experts often named in advertisements such as “independent” and “individual”, “challenging” and “career-oriented”. Stepstone also uses “hierarchical”, “analyzing”, “powerful” or “passionate” as male-coded terms. On the other hand, there is also a list of attributes with which women are more likely to identify: committed, reliable, responsible, motivating, creative, familiar, friendly, careful or customer-oriented.
Companies that want to address more female applicants should therefore pay more attention to the subtleties of their language, according to the analysis. The phrase, which is more appealing to men, “We are looking for an ambitious and high-performing team member” could, for example, easily be changed to: “We are looking for a committed and talented team member.”
Female job titles or a specifically female selection of images also ensure that female applicants feel more addressed. In addition, companies can also put more effort into the content of job advertisements in recruiting female candidates. The survey shows that women would like to see more specific information in job advertisements than men. This includes information on flexible working hours, but also on the corporate culture and the values of the employer.