The Ways of Selecting Applicants Diversity Speaks in Favour of Diversity

This article addresses diversity in hiring processes, its reasons and its consequences. Using the French OFER survey on the hiring practices of 3,584 firms in 2005, we investigate how firms organise the selection of job applicants and analyse the outcome of this selection in regard to the profiles of successful applicants. The data analysis reveals four types of screening processes: an informal process (streamlined) and three formalised processes (written-based, testing, and professionalised). The use of a type of screening process depends on the characteristics of the establishments and occupations and is associated with the recruitment channel. Finally, logit regressions show that each recruitment channel and each type of screening process favours and penalises different categories of applicants (e.g., women, unemployed or inactive individuals or individuals with no diploma).