Increasing Workplace Diversity: Evidence from a Recruiting Experiment at a Fortune 500 Company

Abstract

While many firms have set ambitious goals to increase diversity in their ranks, there is a dearth of empirical evidence on effective ways to reach them. We use a natural field experiment to test several hypotheses on effective means to attract minority candidates for top professional careers. By randomly varying the content in recruiting materials of a major financial services corporation with over 10,000 employees, we find that signaling explicit interest in employee diversity more than doubles the interest in openings among racial minority candidates, the likelihood that they apply and are selected. Impacts on gender diversity are less sharp, and generally not significant.