Types of Unconscious Bias in the Workplace
Most of us want a fair and equitable workplace.
But how can we achieve it? Especially when a lot of the bad habits stopping us are locked behind the proverbial door of our unconscious minds.
Like all complicated things in life, fighting unconscious bias can become a lot less daunting when you break it down into manageable and actionable steps. And first up, as always, is educating yourself.
So join us as we give you a rundown of what unconscious bias is, as well as the different types that are common in today’s workplace.
What is Unconscious Bias?
Unconscious bias refers to the attitudes, beliefs, and stereotypes that affect our perception of everything around us - without us even noticing it.
Think of your unconscious mind as a vast and mysterious ocean, with hidden depths that contain all sorts of treasures and secrets. Just as the ocean is chock-full of life below the murky depths, our unconscious is full of thoughts, emotions, and memories that lie beneath our awareness.
These unseen factors can influence our thoughts and behaviours in unexpected ways. Sometimes positively, and other times… not so much. And this is what we call unconscious bias.
These biases can have negative consequences, especially in the workplace, leading to discrimination, unequal opportunities, exclusion, and can even impact the psychological safety of your employees.
10 Common Types of Unconscious Bias
Some common types of unconscious biases found in the workplace include:
1. Affinity Bias
Affinity bias, which can be both conscious and unconscious, is when you give preferential treatment to individuals who are similar to you. This can manifest in terms of race, ethnicity, sexuality, class, gender identity or religion.
Some examples of this are:
Giving an unfair advantage to an employee or co-worker simply because you share a key characteristic.
Ignoring or discounting contributions of peers who are considered “other”.
Preferring an employee because they share a common background and have like-minded hobbies or interests.
Affinity bias will often lead to a lack of diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace. It can create an environment where individuals from minority groups feel less valued, leading to missed opportunities for talented individuals from all walks of life.
2. Stereotyping
One of the more famous, or should I say infamous, types of unconscious bias is stereotyping. As you would assume, it’s when we make assumptions about people based on their membership in a particular social group or category.
These assumptions can often be wildly offensive and unfortunately lead to inequitable treatment for individuals from minority groups.
In the workplace, stereotyping can manifest in a variety of ways, including:
Believing that aspiring BAME, LGBTQ+ and Neurodivergent employees are not suited for leadership roles.
Assuming younger employees are inexperienced or older employees are out of touch and not giving them chances to showcase their skills.
Believing that women are less capable and that gender diversity has no benefits in the workplace.
3. Halo Effect
The halo effect is an unconscious bias where a positive impression of someone in one area can lead you to assume they’re perfect everywhere else. Even without any evidence to back this up.
This can result in overestimating their abilities based on unrelated features, such as their physical appearance or personality.
Examples of the halo effect in the workplace include:
Assuming physically attractive co-workers must also be intelligent and competent.
Giving low-performing employees glowing reviews just because they’re charismatic or well-liked by their teams or manager.
Making assumptions about an employee's potential for growth and promotion based on their personality, rather than their actual job performance.
4. Horn Effect
The horn effect, sometimes called the devil effect, is essentially the opposite of the halo effect. Just replace the word positive with negative in the above section, and you’re good to go.
But to save you some mental legwork: it’s a bias where your overall negative impression of a person leads you to assume that they have negative traits or abilities in other areas as well.
Examples of this in the workplace include:
Failing to recognize or acknowledge the contributions of employees who are introverted or less charismatic, even if their work output is superb.
Basing your entire perception of a co-worker on one single negative interaction or mistake.
Prejudice can play a huge part in this form of unconscious bias, especially if the person making the sweeping judgements holds racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, or religiophobic beliefs.
5. Name Bias
Name bias is simple and refers to the tendency to form opinions or make assumptions about a person based entirely on their name alone, often without thinking about it. This bias can affect your organisation’s hiring process, performance evaluations, and even interpersonal interactions.
Name bias can take many forms, including:
Assuming that a person with a foreign-sounding name is not fluent in English.
Believing a person with a traditionally male name is better suited for a leadership role than a person with a traditionally female name.
Giving preference to job candidates with Anglo-sounding or “upper class” names.
Depressingly, research from 2019 found that “applicants from minority ethnic backgrounds had to send 60% more applications to get a positive response from an employer than a white person of British origin”.
6. Anchoring Bias
Anchoring bias is all about the power of first impressions. Specifically, it refers to our tendency to place too much emphasis on the initial information we receive when making decisions or judgments in the workplace. This bias can have implications on a wide range of workplace decisions, including setting goals, making budget decisions, evaluating job candidates, and negotiating salaries.
For example, an employer may set a salary range for a position based on the salary of the previous person who held the position, rather than considering the market rate for the role or the qualifications of the new candidate. This can lead to the underpayment of qualified candidates or the overpayment of less qualified candidates.
Anchoring bias can also affect performance evaluations, as a manager may base their assessment of an employee's performance on the first few weeks or months of their tenure, rather than considering their entire body of work. This can lead to unfair or inaccurate evaluations that fail to take into account improvements or setbacks that occurred later on.
7. Availability Bias
A memory or piece of information which is vivid or readily available – the first thing that pops into your head – may affect your future choices with oversized effect. This is known as availability bias, and it can affect decision-making processes and lead to inaccurate assessments of risks and opportunities.
Basically, your brain is being lazy. Rather than going the extra mile, it likes to rely on the first thing that comes to mind.
Here are some instances of availability bias in the workplace:
Hiring a candidate just because they come from a well-known or recognisable company compared to other more qualified candidates.
Overestimating the importance of a recent event, such as a customer complaint, and allocating too many resources to address it.
Making a busines decision based on a personal recollection, rather than real-world data.
8. Confirmation Bias
Confirmation bias refers to the inclination to seek out information that confirms our pre-existing beliefs, while kicking everything else that suggests otherwise to the curb. This bias can wreak havoc on our decision-making skills and hinder innovation and progress in the workplace.
For example, a manager may have a preconceived notion that employees from minority backgrounds are less committed and less productive. As a result, they may only pay attention to examples of BAME employees who arrive late or make mistakes, while overlooking instances where they excel or contribute positively to the workplace. This can reinforce the manager's initial bias and lead them to make unfair or inaccurate judgments about these employees.
This can lead to a workplace culture devoid of diverse and inclusive ideas, as staff may only seek out and listen to opinions that align with their own.
9. Attribution Bias
Attribution bias is a cognitive bias that can lead you to incorrectly assess the outcome of a situation without necessarily considering all the facts. You’re essentially connecting dots that aren’t there, thanks to your own biases and assumptions. These might relate to a person’s characteristics or circumstances, or even your own perception of reality.
For example, this type of bias can affect the way you view successes and failures, whether they’re your own or your co-workers’.
Have you ever noticed how some people attribute their successes to internal factors like talent or hard work, but blame their failures on external factors like bad luck or unfair treatment? That’s attribution bias!
Some examples of attribution bias in the workplace are:
Concluding that an outspoken employee provided more value in a team meeting while other employees did not, without considering they brainstormed these ideas beforehand.
Believing a colleague who appears distant or unapproachable is unfriendly, without considering they might be dealing with personal problems or simply have a different approach to communicating.
10. Privilege
Now this one is debatable, as privilege can contribute to unconscious bias, but it is not necessarily a form of unconscious bias in and of itself.
For example, a person who grew up in a wealthy family may have had access to better educational opportunities, healthcare, and social networks than someone who grew up without them. This person may unconsciously assume that everyone has the same advantages they do, and fail to recognize the systemic barriers and disadvantages faced by those from marginalized communities.
This means privilege can contribute to unconscious bias by reinforcing a person's existing beliefs and assumptions about the world, and shaping how they perceive and interact with others.
Unconscious Bias Training For Your Workplace
At Michael Mauro, we provide unconscious bias and inclusive leadership training that helps organisations address their biases, change their behaviour, and track their progress.
We promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) through leadership skills training and a non-judgmental approach to understanding your business needs, aiming to eliminate all types of prejudice and create an inclusive work environment.
Our goal is to equip you with the necessary resources to implement systematic changes that establish a workplace where leaders can step up to create an environment of acceptance and recognition with everyone around them.
If you want to know more, then check out our unconscious bias training for employees page.
Written by Michael
Michael Mauro is the founder of a forward-thinking organisation specialising in leadership, HR and employee development. With over a decade of global experience, Michael has become a leading voice on topics such as culture, inclusion, wellbeing, and the future of leadership.
