From individual to organisational bias

A norm-critical proposition for unconscious bias intervention in organizations

Abstract

It is generally accepted in organisation and management studies that individuals are implicitly biased, and that biased behaviour has organisational consequences for diversity, equality and inclusion. Existing bias interventions are found not to lead to significant changes in terms of eliminating individual bias, reducing discrimination or increasing the numbers of underrepresented minorities in organisations. This article links that absence of positive change to a lack of engagement with the structural-organisational contexts, processes and practices that reproduce bias. We identify three concrete shortcomings in the literature: that interventions are 1) largely ignorant of broader societal power structures, 2) detached from specific organisational contexts and 3) decoupled from concrete organisational action. By combining insights from unconscious bias research with norm critique and design thinking, we develop a proposition for a new intervention model that forgoes the individualisation of unconscious bias and extends to a structural understanding of bias as embedded in organisational norms. The article draws on data from an action research project which included a workshop series developed and organised in three Scandinavian countries over the course of one year. The data provides the basis for an empirically grounded conceptualisation of the organisational bias intervention advanced by the authors.