On February 16, 2023, Indeed published its results from a recent study about Black job seekers and employees.  Keep reading to understand what Indeed found and how these results may impact your recruitment efforts.

Close to Half of All Black Employees Are Considering Leaving their Jobs

In a shocking statistic, Indeed found that 49 percent of Black workers aren’t satisfied with their current job for two primary reasons:

• 43 percent of Black workers feel like they’re working in a hostile environment where they experience microaggressions from coworkers and leadership
• Employers and Black employees have a disconnect regarding diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) efforts. In other words, Black workers want employers to prioritize DEIB initiatives while employers think they are prioritizing them. Clearly, there is a gap

Indeed noted that Black workers want to work for organizations that are transparent about salary (78 percent), where personal and organizational values align (63 percent), and that support a diverse leadership team (60 percent) while prioritizing their DEIB initiatives to the same level as Black employees’ expectations. Doing so would not only attract more Black talent, but it would also increase retention rates – something that’s not happening now.

DEIB Policies, Procedures, and Training Are in Need of Continue Improvement

While we’re definitely not implying that DEIB policies, procedures, and training haven’t been effective – in fact, the statistics prove that Black workers believe most DEIB initiatives are effective –  we do agree with Indeed that improvement is needed.

For example, here’s an issue. Black workers generally believe that their employers are “implementing DEIB initiatives with ulterior motives.” Further, 24 percent of respondents believe that DEIB efforts are “performative in nature.”

While this is concerning, the inverse is true. Just over 75 percent of respondents believe that their organization’s DEIB initiatives are effective and perhaps even more important, genuine.

So, How Do Black Employee Demands and Employer Actions Line Up?

With these baselines established, what are Black employees demanding from their employers?  Here are some DEIB demands identified by Indeed:

• 58% want pay transparency and equity
• 52% are looking for more worker flexibility to improve work-life balance
• 44% would like increased representation

On the other hand, the top three DEIB initiatives implemented by employers are:

• 64% of employers implemented diverse hiring practices
• 44% noted diversity committees
• 40% cited DEIB employee awareness events

The Cost of Not Prioritizing DEIB Initiatives

So, what is the cost of not prioritizing DEIB initiatives?  Indeed found that employers who fail to prioritize diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging among all demographics are not only hurting their employees, but they’re hurting themselves – and their futures.

Fifty-eight percent of Indeed respondents “skipped applying to a job they would have otherwise been interested in because the company did not appear inclusive and/or diverse.”  Of those employees, 45 percent said they “experienced discrimination in the job interview process.”

But it’s not just Black employees that demand a DEIB-forward workplace culture. According to an Indeed & Glassdoor’s Hiring and Workplace Trends Report 2023, 62 percent of all U.S. employees – across all different demographics – would consider turning down a job offer or changing employers if their company – especially their manager – did not support DEIB initiatives.

DEIB initiatives are continually essential to attracting and retaining top talent. However, employers should take survey results – like these from Indeed – to tailor and tweak their current DEIB efforts, ensuring that they still positively impact Black employees now and in the future.

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The Numbers

Here’s the raw data for September. According to the DOL’s September Jobs Report, the US economy added 261,000 jobs in October while the unemployment rate rose to 3.7%. That’s up a tic from September’s 3.5% – the lowest rate in 50 years – and still considered historically low. Economists had expected a smaller rise in the unemployment rate, to only 3.6%.

In recent months, job growth has downshifted from a robust average monthly pace of more than 400,000 for most of this year to about 290,000 the past three months. The unemployment rate has been kept low by persistent worker shortages. (That, and a recruitment market that often feels like a game of whack-a-mole, one where the moles can turn into ghosts the moment you make contact with them). This, in turn, has led companies to avoid layoffs on fears they won’t be able to fill openings when the economy bounces back.

That may be changing. New job creation is at the lowest in a year-and-a-half. Layoffs are starting to become hip again. And we’re hearing reports that interview processes are being deliberately slowed by hiring managers who, just a scant few months ago, were willing to accept “can fog a mirror with breath” as an acceptable minimum qualification.

This is where it gets a bit weird. While there are rumbles of slowing job creation, and a loosening labor market: we’re still dealing with historic numbers in both categories. Critical skill-shortages will continue to keep labor shortages in the news, side-by-side with layoff reports. Talent acquisition leaders will find themselves with whiplash.

into the storm

Consider Forrester’s Predictions 2023: Future of Work report. The research and advisory firm envisions a coming hurricane for talent professionals as we enter into what looks to be a  “a perplexing, talent-constrained recession” in 2023. Forrester VP and principal analyst Katy Tynan adds:

“The demographic changes that underpinned the “great resignation“ and the ongoing impact of COVID-19-related absenteeism will continue to constrain the talent market in a tight economy. The outcome is a bullwhip effect in the talent market: Actions that respond to a constraint create an overcorrection in the other direction, keeping the market out of balance. We are navigating uncharted waters. Some of the things that organizations would expect to do and get good results out of will actually have the opposite effect.”

What this means, team, is that we never got around to really addressing skills. Skills needed for roles that are mushrooming to address an economy that is radically different than the one we had just a few years ago – and part of that radical change is the ability to keep changing geometrically. Lacking a more nimble approach to how we find the skills we need when we need them, we find ourselves with some pretty damn dry talent pools. Ones where we’re all fighting each other for the remaining fish. It’s not sustainable – somebody has to starve for somebody else to eat.

To address this, employers, talent acquisition leaders, product firms, heck, the government have to start to move together in lockstep to discover solutions. Because we aren’t there yet – and that’s going to keep hurting us as this new weird economy moves along. If we don’t, we face a sort of near-term dystopia: one where a small group with the right skills continues to thrive, and a majority move into a limbo of gig work, unemployment, seasonal roles, etc to survive.

Employers dig talent with skills

Understandably, companies cannot be expected to function as charities – they will continue to need appropriate talent. That said, we do need to manage through the near-term. Labor unbalances, with people who find themselves

We recommend forward-leaning talent acquisition leaders across sectors connect into working groups with actionable items as outcomes. Work out the steps to take to move past the theoretical to the practical. Answering questions around how to manage skills transformations where possible, while understanding that some communities and locations simply cannot shift rapidly to new industries. How do we develop the former, while finding solutions that provide meaningful labor to the latter? What should our education system look like in the future? Is the current skills development model broken? And, what does a balanced labor force truly look like – how do we measure success?

For a long, long time, talent leaders have requested to have their voices heard – and now, we have much to say, and a little time to say it. 2023 looks to be wildly complex series of storms around talent and hiring. We will  need to manage to continue to keep our fleet afloat, concurrently steering our ships to new harbors in search of more navigable waters.

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