Building an inclusive workplace begins with your hiring strategies
Updated September 2026
Most businesses that want a more inclusive workplace start with the culture: values, training, networks, a statement on the careers page. All useful, none of it much help if the hiring process is quietly filtering out the people the statement says you want. Inclusion starts at the job advert. Here's what an inclusive hiring process looks like in practice, what UK law allows and doesn't, and how to tell whether yours is working. It's general commentary, not legal advice.
The adjustments that make a process work for neurodivergent candidates are in is your recruitment process losing one in six?
Why it's worth the effort
Teams with a range of backgrounds and ways of thinking make better decisions, because someone in the room questions the assumption everyone else shares. People who feel they belong stay longer and do better work. And candidates notice: our own research with Personnel Today found a visible commitment to diversity rated important by around 46% of Gen Z and 40% of Millennials when choosing an employer, against 8% of Baby Boomers. The business case is real. So is the risk of getting it wrong, which is why the process matters more than the poster.
1. Audit the process you actually have
Before changing anything, look at where people drop out. Applications, shortlist, interview, offer, acceptance, broken down by whatever characteristics you can lawfully and voluntarily collect, and compared with the pool you're recruiting from. A stage where one group's conversion falls sharply is a specific problem with a specific cause: an advert, a screening rule, an interviewer. Set measurable goals against that data, not against a feeling, and train everyone who interviews on how bias shows up in the room.
2. Write adverts that don't filter people out
The advert is the first cut, and most of them cut people you wanted. Language coded towards one gender or age group puts others off before they've read the role; free tools will flag it. Long lists of "essential" requirements deter the candidates who'd meet most of them and learn the rest, and the evidence is that they deter some groups more than others, so separate what's truly essential from what's merely nice. Say plainly what flexibility the role offers, what adjustments you'll make in the process, and how to ask for them. If you want candidates to believe the diversity statement, put it next to a real example rather than a logo.
3. Screen blind, but know what it fixes
Removing names, addresses, dates and photographs before CVs are reviewed widens shortlists, and it's cheap to do. It doesn't touch the interview, which is where most bias lives, and it can hide context a fair process would want, such as a career break that explains a gap. Use it for what it does, and add a skills-based task for roles where a work sample tells you more than a CV.
4. Interview structured, with a panel that isn't all one kind of person
The same questions for every candidate, tied to the brief, scored against agreed criteria, by more than one interviewer. This is the single change that does most for fairness, and it's also the change that does most for quality of hire, because it replaces "would I have a pint with them" with evidence. Hiring for fit rather than headcount explains how to define fit as behaviours you can test, which is the opposite of hiring people like yourself. Where you can, mix the panel; where you can't, make sure the scoring, not the room, decides.
5. Know what the law allows
Choosing a candidate because of a protected characteristic is unlawful under the Equality Act 2010, however good the intention. What the Act allows is positive action: targeted outreach, mentoring, work experience and other steps that help under-represented groups apply and compete on equal terms, and in a genuine tie-break between equally qualified candidates, a narrow provision to prefer the under-represented one. The Act also requires reasonable adjustments for disabled candidates throughout the process, from the application format to the interview itself. Take advice before designing any scheme; the line between positive action and positive discrimination is where good intentions go wrong.
6. Keep going after the offer
Inclusive hiring that ends at the offer letter produces diverse intakes and homogeneous teams two years later. Onboarding, the first manager, access to development and who gets the visible projects decide whether people stay. Measure retention by group at ninety days and twelve months; it's the number that tells you whether the hiring was inclusive or merely looked it.
Where Vermelo comes in
HR teams and hiring managers are already stretched, and a fairer process is more work to build than an unfair one. Our RPO and embedded teams build it into how hiring runs: adverts reviewed for language and requirements, structured assessment designed and scored consistently, screening and checks done the same way for every candidate, and funnel reporting by group so you can see where the process leaks and whether the fixes are working. The outcome we're after is the same one you are: the best person for the role, found through a process that gives everyone the same chance of being that person.
Want to know where your hiring process is filtering people out? Get in touch and we'll look at the funnel with you. 01892 553360 | info@vermelorpo.com
Inclusive hiring, answered
No. Choosing a candidate because of a protected characteristic is unlawful under the Equality Act 2010, however good the intention. What the Act does allow is positive action: steps to encourage or support people from under-represented groups to apply and compete, such as targeted outreach, mentoring or work experience, and, in a genuine tie-break between equally qualified candidates, preferring the one from the under-represented group where that group is at a disadvantage in the workforce. The tie-break provision is narrow and needs care. This is general commentary, not legal advice; take advice before designing any positive action scheme.
It removes some bias at the screening stage, and the evidence for that is reasonable: take names, addresses, dates and photographs off CVs and shortlists tend to widen. It does nothing for the interview, where most of the bias lives, and it can hide context a fair process would want, such as a career break that explains a gap. So use it for what it does, as part of screening, and put the real effort into the stage after: structured interviews with the same questions for every candidate, scored against the brief, by a panel that isn't all one kind of person. Blind screening without a structured interview just moves the bias downstream.
Look at the funnel by group, not the headline. Who applies, who is shortlisted, who is interviewed, who is offered and who accepts, broken down by the characteristics you can lawfully and voluntarily collect, and compared with the pool you're recruiting from. A stage where one group's conversion drops sharply is where the problem is, and it's usually a specific one: a job advert, a screening criterion, an interviewer. Add ninety-day and twelve-month retention by group, because hiring people you then lose is not inclusion. And ask candidates, including the unsuccessful ones, what the process felt like.