Discrimination in the workplace is inevitable, whatever type it may be, simply because of human nature.
In the case of colour or ethnicity people will tend towards those of similar ilk, men (or women) may subconsciously favour male or female subordinates depending upon the role and the perception of threat they pose. Now in this morning’s Daily Mail we get “fat discrimination” apparently being an obese woman can seriously hinder your career because bosses assume them to be lazy or dare I say unattractive.
The fact is you cannot change this and any employer faces the possibility of legal action if they put a foot wrong in the selection process whether wittingly or otherwise.
The only solution I can think of is a blind interview process where the selection is based entirely upon skills and experience and the interview is conducted remotely through a voice synthesiser to anonymise the sex.
Ridiculous as this may seem it might mean that the most qualified person gets the job and will certainly ensure fairness in the recruitment process but I cannot see it catching on.
Perhaps we might see CV’s anonymised covering just the last 5 years work experience and containing no reference to sex, age, education or obesity.
