Fair chance hiring disclosure without a rationale could turn off job seekers

The language employers use around fair chance hiring can impact how prospective job seekers view them and how likely they are to apply to their jobs, according to new research in the Journal of Management.

Some 37 states, including New York, Arizona, and Hawaii, have fair chance hiring policies to provide employment access to formerly incarcerated people. However, how companies frame these policies can affect how they are perceived by applicants.

The research examined the language used by companies in job descriptions to disclose fair chance hiring. Some offered no rationale for the policy, while others presented a moral or business case.

“We were curious to see if companies who might be interested in hiring these people [people with criminal backgrounds] might not want to advertise that, because they might be afraid of what other people might be thinking,” Francisco Moreno, assistant professor of management at Michigan State University and lead author of the study, told HR Brew.

Fair chance hiring, the research found, can turn off prospective applicants. Job descriptions that touted the moral case, “appeals to moral duties of ‘the right thing to do’” and establishes “equal access, fair treatment, and inclusive workplace environments” or the business case were more likely to elicit a positive response, whereas those that didn’t have a corresponding justification were more likely to elicit a negative response. Using legal compliance reasoning did not limit negative views of fair chance hiring, but that bias shifted when applicants saw the policy along with a moral or business justification, researchers found.

Job applicants were also found to be more likely to apply to a job that included the moral case for the fair chance hiring policy.

“You’re [employers are] going to get better results if you say, again, the moral reasons of why you are doing it,” Moreno said. “Every single time companies who use that moral language were significantly less stigmatized, and also received significantly more job pursuit intentions.”