The Great Reshuffle Presents a Massive Opportunity for Employers to Improve Representation
A lot of organizations talk about the need for better representation on our staffs, but don’t talk about how exactly to do that. If we don’t change the way we hire, we won’t see lasting change on our teams.
With the Great Resignation and Great Reshuffle, many people say it’s a job seekers’ market. But with more jobs than ever to fill, there lies a massive opportunity for employers to create stronger hiring practices that ensure we fill each open role with the best people possible from the full spectrum of talent available. This is good news for arts organizations.
Ten years ago, I began a new role as a department head, leading a team of 17 for the first time. No one ever discussed how to properly hire people — not then, not before that when I managed an intern earlier in my career, and not after that when I became Executive Director of an entire organization.
I saw a lot of hiring mistakes made by others and myself. That set me on a journey to learn what the research says is the best way to hire fairly, equitably, and without bias — all so I can build the strongest, most representative team. Here’s some what I’ve learned.
Job Descriptions
Don’t just dig up the old job description from a few years ago when you filled the role last time and tweak it for what you think has changed since then. Instead, the first step is to start with a list of qualifications. What are the actual skills and abilities needed for the job? Make a checklist of those skills. Maybe you need somebody who knows how to make budget forecasts with a high degree of accuracy. Maybe you need somebody who knows how to negotiate a contract.
Now take your list of qualifications and skills and flow that into the new description. Then check for and remove unnecessary standards. Is seven years experience in a supervisory role actually necessary to do the job well? Hint: The answer is no. Doing something for a while, whatever period of time that is, does not prove somebody is actually good at that thing. It just means they’ve done it before. If a candidate has the necessary skills, and if we’re following a process and asking questions that elicit if they have those skills (more on asking the right interview questions below), it’s not about how many years they have under their belt. It’s about if they have the chops to do the work ahead.
Next, remove gendered language. True confession: I’ve had to work on this one a lot. I used to say things like, “I need a real copywriting rockstar for this role,” or “I need a digital marketing ninja who knows analytics.” I thought I was so clever and would put those things in the job description. But those words are very gendered it turns out. We have to take a step back and think, is there another way? Can we say “superstar,” for instance? I’m not saying don’t be clever (boring, clinical job descriptions are a total snoozefest). I’m saying we really check ourselves — myself included — on the language we’re using and not inadvertently suggest what type of person should apply for that position.
“Don’t just dig up the old job description from a few years ago when you filled the role last time and tweak it for what you think has changed since then.”
Lastly, include the salary range. More organizations are doing this now — the narrative is changing here — but definitely not all companies are. Here’s why we need to include the salary range:
1) It eliminates people who don’t want that salary. It sounds obvious, I know, but given that a lot of companies still don’t list the range, let’s be clear: It is a waste of everyone’s time to not be up front about this. If anybody’s thinking we’re going to woo them later and convince them to take the job, or pitch passion for the art, just knock it off. Or sometimes organizations are embarrassed to publish the salary range because they think it’s not competitive. Just stop…the range is what it is. Do we need to be more competitive with our salaries (especially in the arts and nonprofit sector)? Yes. But if it is what it is, don’t try to hide it is the point here.
2) Publishing a salary range prevents us from low-balling. This happens more often to underrepresented groups, period. So keep things fair, and remember a range is fine. In fact, a range actually helps the employer when it comes time to make the offer, which goes right into the third reason.
3) During the recruitment process, if we’re doing all of these steps — creating the best job description possible, and then doing the interview the best way possible (again, we’ll get to the actual interviewing steps in a moment), then it becomes very clear during all of that to both the interviewer and the interviewee whether the candidate has the skills or not. I love this because then I get to use it when I come out with the offer. For example, say we have found a candidate who is definitely the right person, but it’s come out in this process that they need a little more training or mentoring in one particular area of the job. You can say that when making the offer: “You know, you are absolutely the person for this job, but I noticed we’re going to have to focus on xyz as you ramp up here. And that’s why I’m coming in at the middle of this range.” That’s a very honest offer to make as well as very clear about setting that person up for how they’re going to come in and enter that role. Another scenario is maybe they are that superstar and they’re amazing. Then you get to make the offer and say, “You’re the one. You are everything that we’re looking for. That’s why I’m coming in at the very top of this range, putting out the best offer I can for you.” What candidate doesn’t want to hear that?!
Reviewing Resumes
The list for what to do when reviewing resumes is fairly straightforward, but more important than what we should do is what not to do:
Don’t overweight where they worked before. I promise if they can hack it, it’s not about what organizations they previously served. Similar to the unnecessary standards in the job description, just because someone worked at a Well Known organization doesn’t mean they were good at their job. Instead look for a reasonable employment timeline and quantifiable impact they made in those prior roles.
Don’t require a music degree (or insert specific degree related to your field). If the job is off stage, don’t require an onstage credential. There are a lot of administrative roles in classical music — most roles even — where not knowing the difference between the Romantic period and Baroque period is just fine. Go back to that skills checklist and instead see if the resume suggests they have the minimum skills required via your list.
Don’t weed them out if they haven’t held that exact role before. I see this a lot, and see a lot of good talent being sidelined because of it. Having the same title doesn’t mean what? Wait for it… Doesn’t mean somebody’s good at it. If they’ve had the title before, it just means they’ve had the title before, not that they have all the right skills.
“I promise if they can hack it, it’s not about what organizations they previously worked for.”
Don’t look at their name. Seriously, have you heard of the Heidi vs Howard study or Black-sounding name research? We infer so much from somebody’s name subconsciously. I try, especially when I’m doing the first pass looking at the resume stack, whether that’s printed or in the email inbox in front of me, to not pay much attention to the name when I’m doing that first round screen.
Interviewing
From committing to a diverse first round candidate pool to eliminating the Rooney Rule, there are several steps to make the interview process more fair and equitable so that as the employer, you’re able to identify the best talent available with less bias and more accuracy. While I share the full list in this video, there are a few tips I want to highlight here.
First, I promised we would come back to the types of questions we ask in our interview process. There are two main types of questions you need to know about.
1) Behavioral questions. That is, “Tell me about a time when…” You want to try to ask about a time when have they done that skill before. Go back to your checklist, look at the skills, and for each question, design a “tell me about a time when” question.
2) Situational or hypothetical questions. These are more forward looking, “What would you do if…” Use this only when the job introduces novel situations to the candidate.
When you can, use behavioral questions. Always. Why? Because of predictive validity. Going back to the research, the best the way to elicit if somebody has the skills to do the job needed is if they’ve exhibited those skills in their work before. Past behavior is by far the best predictor of future behavior. That’s why behavioral questions are by far the best in terms of eliciting if the candidate has the chops you’re looking for.
Only ask situational or hypothetical type questions if and when you can’t get at a behavioral question. For example, when I was a VP at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, I was hiring for a role that necessitated someone strong at SEO (search engine optimization) as we decided we were going to go hard on that as a strategy within the broader marketing team. But within the arts, very rarely are we focusing on SEO, so my candidate pool wasn’t full of people who had tons of prior SEO experience and therefore I couldn’t ask tons of those behavioral questions. So instead I was able to use hypothetical scenarios because this would be a novel situation for the future employee. “What would you do if you were to come here and had to ramp up and become an expert on SEO? What would that look like?” And it really helped me determine who knew exactly where they were going to look for training and how they were going to become an expert in that subject matter.
“If you say you care about diversity, you need to do it this way says the research.”
Next, make sure to use a rubric. This is what the researchers call “behaviorally anchored ratings.” I’ve had to learn to be better at this. At first it felt almost rudimentary, but the truth is it’s not — it’s actually very disciplined and helps us become more objective in our evaluation. And in the end, it makes the best-qualified candidate much more clear and eliminates our own hemming and hawing over the decision.
Finally when interviewing, every candidate needs to be asked the same questions, in the same order. And every candidate needs to be evaluated by the same rubric. That consistency is critical to making the process more fair and more equitable. Why do it this sytematic, boring (read: not actually boring) way? Twenty years of research shows de facto this process is more fair to diverse candidates and especially candidates from historically underrepresented and marginalized groups. Period. If you say you care about diversity, you need to do it this way says the research.
So Much Work But Not Really
Maybe it is more work up front, but over time it saves time. This is statistically proven. You can use those questions again and again, and you can use those rubrics again and again. Now that over the years I’ve gone through this process many times, it does come quickly — and in fact is more efficient than the old way of digging up the old job description and trying to scratch my head as I think through what’s changed since the last time the role was filled. And as Google’s former Head of People Laszlo Bock says, “The alternative is to waste everyone’s time with a typical process that is either highly subjective or discriminatory or both.”
We have barely scratched the surface on this topic of representation, but I hope there are some applicable takeaways here to help your organization build the strongest teams possible during this Great Reshuffle. The opportunity is ours as both employees and employers. For more research-based tips on hiring, watch this video, which is part of a new 10-episode series:
Interested in more data-backed strategies to grow revenue at your arts organization? Order my book, Run It like a Business: Strategies to Increase Audiences, Remain Relevant, and Multiply Money‑Without Losing the Art.
You’ll learn how to:
- Grow audiences and keep them coming back again
- Make our organizations more inclusive
- Get younger attendees in the seats and on the donor rolls
- Generate millions more dollars in revenue
- Continue to create the art we love — without the stress of figuring out how to afford it
Just because your arts organization is a non-profit, doesn’t mean it shouldn’t make money; it means the money the organization makes goes back to fund the mission — whether that’s music, visual arts, theatre, dance, or one of many other mediums that enrich our lives. www.aubreybergauer.com/book
About the Author
Hailed as “the Steve Jobs of classical music” (Observer) and “Sheryl Sandberg of the symphony” (LA Review of Books), Aubrey Bergauer is known for her results-driven, customer-centric, data-obsessed pursuit of changing the narrative for the performing arts. A “dynamic administrator” with an “unquenchable drive for canny innovation” (San Francisco Chronicle), she’s held offstage roles managing millions in revenue at major institutions including the Seattle Symphony, Seattle Opera, Bumbershoot Music & Arts Festival, and San Francisco Conservatory of Music. As chief executive of the California Symphony, Bergauer propelled the organization to double the size of its audience and nearly quadruple the donor base.
Bergauer helps organizations and individuals transform from scarcity to opportunity, make money, and grow their base of fans and supporters. Her ability to cast and communicate vision moves large teams forward and brings stakeholders together, earning “a reputation for coming up with great ideas and then realizing them” (San Francisco Classical Voice). With a track record for strategically increasing revenue and relevance, leveraging digital content and technology, and prioritizing diversity and inclusion on stage and off, Bergauer sees a better way forward for classical music and knows how to achieve it.
Aubrey’s first book, Run It Like A Business, published in 2024.
A graduate of Rice University, her work and leadership have been covered in the Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur, Thrive Global, and Southwest Airlines magazines, and she is a frequent speaker spanning TEDx, Adobe’s Magento, universities, and industry conferences in the U.S. and abroad.
