Addressing Unconscious Bias in the Workplace: Shared Experiences

Unconscious bias isn’t always loud. It’s often quiet, polite, and invisible — until someone has the courage to name it. At our company, we used to pride ourselves on being a “merit-first” workplace. But that assumption was exactly what kept us from noticing the subtle ways bias showed up in hiring, meetings, and promotion decisions. It wasn’t until we faced a hard truth, raised internally by one of our own team members, that we realized merit alone doesn’t create equity — awareness does.

The shift began during a post-mortem on a hiring process for a leadership role. A junior team member respectfully questioned why all the final candidates looked and sounded the same — despite a diverse applicant pool. At first, it was uncomfortable. The hiring manager felt defensive. But instead of shutting down the conversation, our leadership chose to lean in. We brought in a third-party DEI consultant to review the interview process, anonymized resumes for early-stage evaluations, and conducted a retroactive review of who was being promoted — and who wasn’t.

We discovered that certain “leadership traits” we valued — like being outspoken in meetings or “client-facing polish” — were coded preferences that subtly favored extroverted, male-presenting, and culturally dominant communication styles. These weren’t conscious decisions. They were patterns we inherited and never questioned.

One clear outcome of this awareness came when we restructured our promotion criteria. A high-performing analyst, Salma, who had repeatedly been told she needed to “speak up more” in meetings to be considered for leadership, was finally evaluated on her outcomes, not her style. With that shift, Salma became one of our youngest team leads — bringing quiet focus, exceptional project delivery, and a completely different leadership voice to the table. She has since mentored others who also felt unseen in traditional performance conversations.

Addressing unconscious bias starts with humility. It requires making room for discomfort, inviting challenge without retaliation, and rethinking the systems that shape how we define talent. What we learned is that bias doesn’t always look like discrimination — it often looks like tradition. But once you learn to see it, you gain the power to change it. And when you do, the entire workplace becomes more equitable, more honest, and ultimately, more human.

In one instance, a situation revealed that certain colleagues were repeatedly overlooked for workshop-facilitator roles on the assumption that less experienced team members wouldn’t command room presence. A deeper look showed that many team members from non-traditional training backgrounds were being stereotyped as “junior,” regardless of their actual facilitation aptitude or learner feedback.

Rather than assigning roles based purely on tenure, a decision was made to anonymize facilitator applications for a pilot run. Names, prior roles and years with the organization were removed; only delivery samples and peer feedback were considered. The results were striking: several newer or less-visible team members emerged, delivered strong sessions and received outstanding feedback from participants.

The key lessons:

• Unconscious bias often hides in “standard practices” — here, assumption-based role assignments. The blind-review step disrupted it.

• Representation matters: giving a fair chance to all raises the collective standard and energy of the team.

• Awareness plus action = change: recognizing the bias wasn’t enough; a concrete process change made the difference.

This experience reinforced the belief that a learning culture grows strongest when all voices have an equal platform.

In the early days of scaling teams across multiple geographies, it became clear that project-lead assignments tended to favor familiar names and networks rather than objective metrics. An internal review flagged a pattern: team members from newer locations or less visible functions were less likely to be considered for leadership, even though their performance matched or exceeded peers.

A decision was made to introduce a transparent rotation mechanism: every quarter, project leads would be selected from a broader pool, based on a published matrix of key criteria (delivery track record, team feedback, readiness assessment). Alongside, a short peer-led session on “hidden patterns in decision-making” raised awareness about unconscious preferences for familiarity and “culture fit.”

Within six months, leadership representation from previously under-represented sites increased by roughly 30%, and the incidence of formal feedback citing “lack of exposure” dropped significantly. More importantly, people started to speak up when “that person we all know” was automatically being shortlisted again — creating a useful check on bias.

What this taught:

• Awareness alone isn’t enough — systemic change (in process) is required.

• Transparency builds trust, which in turn surfaces less-visible talent.

• Bias shows up in everyday choices — not just big recruitment decisions — and needs continuous vigilance.

One moment that really shifted how I think about unconscious bias happened during a hiring process a couple of years ago. It wasn’t dramatic — no blow-ups, no big moral “gotchas” — just an uncomfortable realization that blindsided me.

We were reviewing candidates for a product role, and we had two finalists. On paper they were equally strong, but every time we talked about Candidate A, the team (myself included) would say things like, “They just feel like a better fit,” or “I can picture them working with us.” It all sounded perfectly reasonable…until one of our quieter team members piped up and said, almost apologetically, “Does anyone else feel like the only reason Candidate B seems less ‘natural’ is because none of us have worked with someone with their background before?”

It landed like a thud.

She wasn’t accusing anyone; she was just noticing the room.

And once she said it, I couldn’t unsee it. Candidate B communicated differently, approached problems with a different thought structure, and honestly intimidated us a little because they challenged assumptions instead of nodding along. The irony is that this “difference” was exactly what we claimed we wanted in a product team: someone who disrupts groupthink instead of blending into it.

So we did something strange — we paused the hiring discussion and spent 30 minutes unpacking not the candidates, but our reactions to the candidates.

That conversation changed the outcome. We hired Candidate B. And it turned out to be one of the best hiring decisions we’ve made. They brought in perspectives we didn’t even know we were missing, and our product strategy took on this new sharpness because someone was finally in the room who wasn’t subconsciously playing by our script.

The biggest lesson for me was that unconscious bias often hides inside the things that feel “reasonable.” Bias doesn’t announce itself — it disguises itself as comfort. And if comfort becomes a hiring heuristic, you end up building a team of mirrors instead of a team of minds.

What I learned is that addressing bias isn’t about memorizing a DEI framework; it’s about slowing down the moment you feel certainty. Certainty is where bias likes to nap. If you interrupt that — by naming what feels familiar, by interrogating “fit,” by inviting the quietest person in the room to speak — you get a more honest decision, and a stronger team.

At one point, I realized we had an unconscious bias: assuming that younger team members would adapt faster to new tools and projects. It wasn’t something we discussed openly, but it subtly influenced our hiring and task assignments.

To challenge that, we started mixing experience levels within project teams and measuring performance purely by outcomes, not by assumptions about speed or adaptability. What we found surprised us: some of our most efficient and innovative solutions came from more experienced employees who combined technical skill with deep context and patience.

That experience taught me that bias often hides in what seems like “common sense.” The key isn’t just awareness but actively testing our assumptions with real data and giving everyone equal room to prove their strengths.

I noticed this firsthand as a founder: our managers favored talkative team members during meetings, assuming that confidence was equivalent to performance; they would often overlook the true executors in our organization — the ones who achieved results without making much noise.

As a remedy to this problem, I suggested written recaps recapping every meeting where we summarize action items and share written updates on follow-up results. With this tweak, we improved the visibility: performance replaced speech, enabling us to identify results, not just the rhetoric; it also made it easier to distinguish quiet contributors through their work, not through their volume.

For example, we had a strategist who never seemed to contribute during our brainstorming meetings, yet always submitted the best-performing campaigns. After we implemented the written recaps, her contribution was HARD to miss.

In my role as an Anger Management & Conflict Resolution professional, I was called to mediate a situation in a workplace where unconscious bias was affecting team dynamics.

A diverse team was struggling with communication breakdowns and a lack of collaboration.

After conducting one-on-one interviews with team members, it became evident that unconscious bias — particularly related to gender and cultural differences — was subtly influencing the way team members interacted and made decisions.

One key example involved a female team member who, despite her strong qualifications and ideas, was frequently overlooked during meetings in favor of male colleagues, even though her suggestions were often more in line with the project’s goals.

To address this, I initiated a two-phase approach:

1. Unconscious Bias Training and Awareness: The first step was to educate the team on unconscious bias. I facilitated a workshop focusing on recognizing biases, how they manifest in the workplace, and the long-term impact they have on morale and productivity.

2. Creating a Safe Dialogue for Feedback: The second phase involved structured discussions where employees could express their experiences with bias and suggest solutions. This was done in small, cross-functional groups to promote trust and open dialogue.

The impact was noticeable almost immediately. The previously overlooked female team member began to feel heard, and her ideas were increasingly integrated into team discussions. Team members from diverse backgrounds expressed feeling more included and valued.

Over time, we also saw a significant improvement in collaboration and problem-solving, as the team became more aware of their biases and actively worked to counteract them.

This experience reinforced a few key lessons:

• Awareness is the first step.

• Creating a safe space for dialogue is essential.

• Bias is not just an “HR issue” — it’s a team issue.

As Anger Management & Conflict Resolution professionals, we often focus on repairing relationships, but addressing unconscious bias requires us to shift from mediation to proactive education and awareness-building.

By promoting open discussions and encouraging self-reflection, we can create work environments where everyone feels respected.

The key takeaway is that addressing unconscious bias is not a one-time event but an ongoing process of reflection, education, and commitment to change.