Nyra Jordan: 4 steps to hiring fairly -- and supporting criminal justice reform | TED

Transcriber:

Over the last few years,

corporations have made a major push

to prioritize diversity, equity and inclusion

in all aspects of their organizations.

But DEI is left incomplete if you don't consider individuals

that have been involved in the criminal justice system.

Involvement in the criminal justice system can impact someone's life,

someone's work status, someone's experience at work.

It can even impact someone's mental health,

just as much, if not more than other factors we think about,

like race, age, gender and sexuality.

It's not like we willingly ignored this topic in corporations,

it's just a massive blind spot.

I mean, one of the reasons is nobody really openly talks about this.

You, your own wife or son, could be in jail right now.

You could spend every night missing them,

every weekend in a visitation room

and never mention it to your coworkers.

The other reason this topic isn't really touched on in corporations

is because we're just uninformed.

When we hear that someone is involved in the criminal justice system,

our first thoughts might be "murderer" or "violent criminal,"

and that's just not the case for the 2.3 million people

involved in the US criminal justice system right now.

And the fact that we focus on the worst of the worst

is why nearly 75 percent of justice-involved individuals

are unemployed a year after release.

So the question for us to consider is:

"As corporations, what can we do about this?"

I've served in leadership roles across American Family,

including overseeing our corporate social responsibility strategy, or CSR.

Like many companies,

we partner with local and national nonprofits,

we organize employee volunteer opportunities,

and we donate to meaningful causes.

In 2018, we launched the American Family Institute for Corporate and Social Impact,

to drive change and to close equity gaps across America.

And within that mission,

we're partnering with experts and organizations

that are working to support families and individuals

that have been impacted by incarceration.

So the more and more we talked to these partners,

and we heard about criminal justice reform,

the more I started to think.

What are we doing internally about this issue?

Maybe we need to think about getting our own house in order.

And the most obvious place for us to start was hiring.

95 percent of individuals serving time in jail and prison right now

will be released,

and finding employment is difficult,

particularly if you have a criminal record.

Some companies will just flat out refuse to hire you,

and even if you have the skills and the qualifications,

once they find out you have a record, it's over.

And this is a huge problem,

because we know that one of the best ways to prevent someone returning to prison

is employment.

And in some cases,

employment is a condition of someone's parole.

A colleague of mine told me about a man she'd met,

who was released from prison on parole.

The garage where he'd been working was closing,

and he was unable to find another job,

which meant he would have to go back to jail for violating his parole.

He shared with her that he would prefer to commit suicide than go back to jail.

She spoke with him for about 45 minutes,

and she's not really sure if anything that she said changed his perspective.

Hiring justice-involved individuals is not just the kind thing to do,

an act of charity.

It could quite literally be a matter of life or death.

So for us, the fastest, easiest way to improve our hiring practices

was remove any up-front questions about criminal history

on our job applications.

We got rid of anything that said

"Check here if you have a criminal record."

We then updated our public-facing job postings

to indicate that we consider qualified candidates

with criminal histories.

These two interventions were simple.

They required minimal effort on our part,

and I believe that other employers should follow suit.

But then, we took things a step further,

and we created intentional partnerships

to make sure justice-involved individuals were included in our talent pipeline.

Many companies -- and we're no different --

have partnerships with colleges and universities.

You know, we recruit from a pool of graduating seniors,

knowing they’ll have the talent and the skills to perform a job.

But what we also know is that today,

many prisons offer advanced professional training

on skills like coding.

As corporations,

we can form relationships with these programs as well

and include them in our talent pipeline.

For example, we have an employee,

after serving time in jail,

that joined us through one of these talent partners, in our claims area.

We'll call him David.

David joined us earlier this year,

and with the support of his manager,

he is outperforming his peers.

He is on a path to higher opportunities and promotional roles.

By providing a positive work experience for justice-involved individuals,

we can change what’s possible for them and their families.

Financial stability can have an incredible impact

on our day-to-day life,

and the support of a manager

can instill the confidence in someone, for the first time,

to see themselves in a career.

Now, some people worry.

They ask us,

"Aren't you sacrificing the quality of your candidate pool

by including justice-involved individuals?"

Just to be clear --

fair-chance hiring is about increasing equity,

not about reducing our hiring standards.

In fact, the Society for Human Resource Management

has conducted extensive research in this space,

and they've found that 82 percent of hiring managers

and 67 percent of HR professionals

find that the quality of fair-chance talent

is the same or higher than employees without records.

To assume that because someone has a criminal record,

they're not qualified,

is just not a correct assumption.

In fact, for so many reasons,

for so many reasons,

they can become your most dedicated, your most motivated,

your most hardworking employee,

because for them, the stakes are so much higher.

But we knew, for this program to succeed,

we had to take a look at our internal culture as well.

We had to provide training for our leaders and our employees

on the realities of the criminal justice system.

Individuals involved in the criminal justice system

are subjected to a broad range of dehumanizing labels

that are meant to marginalize and stigmatize them.

Instead, we use language that reflects their full identity

and acknowledges their future, not just their past.

So we say “justice-involved” or “returning citizen,”

which allows individuals to reclaim their full selves, as people first.

And so what's funny,

the more and more we started talking about this internally,

the more people started coming out of the woodwork,

sharing their own experience

and impact of the criminal justice system.

For example, one of our leaders in our claims area --

I'll call him Michael --

he came out in one of our internal fair-chance hiring webinars

about the story of his daughter,

who struggled with addiction

and was subsequently convicted with a felony charge.

Michael was so moved by his daughter's experience

that he supports ongoing education for justice-involved individuals.

His wife volunteers in jails and prisons,

because they both realize the importance of support

in someone's reentry success.

And Michael, he believes in investing in whole people.

He doesn’t think that it’s right

that society would make decisions for someone

based on perception, or how they look.

And he has become one of our biggest champions in our organization

in hiring fair-chance talent.

Our fair-chance hires are anonymous.

It's up to them if they want to share their experiences

with their coworkers or their managers.

But it's my hope for the future that we shift our culture

from one of ignorance and blindness towards the formerly incarcerated

towards one of possibility and reconciliation,

and that this is no longer a taboo subject --

that coworkers will speak openly about their experiences

and their family's experiences,

and we can support each other fully, as individuals.

There are 1.8 million people in jail right now.

And you may be thinking:

"Is anybody in my corporation affected by the criminal justice system?"

There's a very good chance that they are.

And you may also think,

"Well, I don't know anybody

that's been impacted by the criminal justice system."

Well, at the very least, you know me.

I have a loved one that was incarcerated for over 14 years,

and that was a struggle for my family,

trying to support him and stay close to him,

but also move on with our day-to-day lives.

And for 14 years,

I didn't say a word to my coworkers.

And that was a secret that took a toll.

When he was finally released,

he was so motivated to find employment near his home,

near his family.

But he couldn't find anybody that would employ him.

Eventually, he did find an employer

that saw past the worst thing he'd ever done

and gave him a fair chance.

He had to move across the country,

but I'm happy to say that, 12 years later, he's thriving,

all because someone took a chance on him.

And what's true for me and my family is so true for so many Americans.

For current employees and future employees,

criminal justice involvement must be included in DEI strategies.

So based off of what we've learned,

here are some steps to help you implement fair-chance hiring in your organization.

First of all ...

consider the qualifications for a candidate

based on the role that they're applying for.

It sounds obvious when I say it --

hire someone for the skills needed for a job.

But the fact of the matter

is justice-involved individuals are excluded from opportunities

for trivial reasons.

For example,

if you're hiring somebody in an IT role that calls for coding experience ...

isn't the most important qualification coding experience?

It matters less that they have a criminal history

or a gap in their résumé for the time they were incarcerated.

Ask yourself:

Do they have the skills and qualifications to perform the job?

If yes, consider hiring them.

Toss out antiquated criteria and methods,

and consider a strengths-based approach instead.

Second,

make sure that there is a path for career growth and promotion

for your justice-involved employees.

Now the insurance industry is highly regulated,

and there are certain roles due to licenses

that may be off limits for certain past offenses.

We don’t want to hire someone in an entry level

only to find out that they can't be promoted later.

So make sure that there is a clear path for growth and success

in your company.

Third ...

realize that justice-involved employees may need help adjusting

to your corporate culture.

You want someone that’s self-motivated and self-directed and autonomous,

and that's the opposite from what they've experienced in prison.

Some managers have told me that their justice-involved employees

didn't even realize that they didn't have to ask

their supervisor's permission to take a bathroom break.

So it's a big culture shift,

but just know, with patience and grace,

you can help your employees thrive.

And then finally,

just make sure that education and training in your DEI strategies

include human-centered language

and antibias training.

At the end of the day ...

justice-involved jobseekers are human beings first,

and jobseekers second.

If you nurture that human being,

just imagine the impact that you will have on their life,

their families, the community

and your organization.

Thank you.

(Cheers and applause)