How to Avoid Groupthink When Hiring

When it comes to hiring, democratic decisions lead to better outcomes. But a hiring-by-committee approach carries its own unique pitfalls. Without careful orchestration, groups can make bad decisions too. Indeed, the dominant approach to hiring today–in which the hiring manager convenes a huddle and goes around the room hearing opinions on each candidate is particularly prone to groupthink.  In order to make true group decisions about candidates, I advise hiring managers to follow a rigorous process, to ensure that your interviewers maintain a healthy level of independence: First, make it clear to interviewers that they should not share their interview experiences with each other before the final group huddle. Next, ask each interviewer to perform a few steps before the group huddle:distill their interview rating to a single numerical score; write down their main arguments for and against hiring this person and their final conclusion. This will help them stay true to their beliefs once the discussion starts, which leads to less biased predictions. Finally, the hiring managers should take note of the average score for a candidate. I’m not suggesting that she should then follow it blindly; the process is not an anonymous ballot. Instead, it’s meant to lead to richer, unbiased and uncensored discussions to help decision makers take note of information they might have missed otherwise.