If you have interviewed a candidate for a software engineer/developer role, chances are you have asked or been asked: “Is this candidate a good culture fit?”
It’s important to be aware of how we may unconsciously apply biases and discriminate against candidates under the guise of “Culture Fit.” Here are some seemingly innocent but dangerously wrong explanations of “Culture Fit” that people might use:
- Would I want to be friends with this person?
- Would I want to have a beer with this person?
- Is this person fun to work with?
When laid out like this, you can see how someone who is asked, “Is this candidate a good culture fit?” might unconsciously be discriminating. A step to help eliminate this unconscious bias is to ask about culture fit in a more specific way:
- “Does this candidate fit in with our culture of continual learning?”
- “Does this candidate fit in with our culture of collaboration?”
- “Does this candidate fit in with our culture of simplicity?”
- “Does this candidate fit in with our culture of ownership?”
- “Does this candidate fit in with our culture of (insert your shared team value here)?”