Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) and Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Data

The hiring landscape worldwide is now putting more emphasis on equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) when it comes to selecting candidates for a position. A lot of countries now require the collection of anonymous data around any factors that may potentially influence or impact the hiring process.

As a result some countries now have governing bodies, such as the EEO Commission in the USA, that routinely request hiring statistics from larger companies in order to build a data set on hiring practices and to detect any possible patterns of bias or unfair hiring practices.

We have been asked by some of our integration partners to begin collecting anonymous data from applicants to comply with legislation in some areas.

At this stage the EEO data collection is limited to our US based customers with 50+ employees. It is entirely optional at present and not enforced by HR Partner.

Choosing to collect EEO data

Companies that meet the above criteria can now opt to collect EEO information. When editing a new job listing, there is an option at the very bottom of the edit screen that lets you add the EEO questions to the end of your application form.

What happens if I turn this on?

Enabling this option will display the 4 questions shown in the below screenshot. They will be placed in between your own custom application form and the file upload area. Please be aware that your selection panel will purposely be unable to see the answers to the EEO questions at any point during the hiring process.

IMPORTANT: Your applicants do not have to fill in these questions if they do not want to. We have made this clear in the header of the section so that your applicants feel confident that they can submit a job application without disclosing too much private information if they do not wish to.

What if I do not turn EEO Questions on?

Even customers who fit the EEOC criteria do not have to turn the EEO questions on. However without them turned on this data would need to be compiled manually by your team, should the EEOC request it.

Why can't I see the option to turn them on?

This option will ONLY be shown to customers who have 'United States of America' as their company location under Setup > Company Info, and who have 50 or more active employees.

The future of EEO data collection in HR Partner

We continue to liaise with the EEOC in regard to allowing our customers to generate an EEO report that satisfies the EEOC reporting requirements. We envisage that the company owner will be the only person able to extract this data.

We are currently working with governing bodies in countries across our install base, learning how we can meet the requirements of other jurisdictions. As such we anticipate that our EEO data collection will continue to evolve over time. We are doing all we can to reduce the impact on our customer (and your applicants) as much as possible.

If you have questions on EEO or EDI please reach out to our Customer Success team on support@hrpartner.io