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Job advertisements can convey clichés - even if they are supposedly formulated neutrally
Photo: Mia Takahara / plainpicture
Anyone who advertises a position must not discriminate against anyone, for example on the basis of age, disability or gender - this is what the General Equal Treatment Act (AGG) provides.
In a survey by the Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency, only two percent of those examined violated
Job advertisements clearly against the AGG, mostly because of gender discrimination.
But: over 20 percent of the tenders harbored a risk of discrimination.
How come
Often the problem starts with the title.
Speaker, junior consultant, project manager: Many employers solve the obligation of equal treatment by simply specifying »m / f / d«, the job description itself is in the so-called generic masculine form.
The masculine grammatical form is certainly not the cause of the discrimination against women, but it has a reinforcing function.
Many women and non-binary people do not feel addressed by this, a study by the Institute for Applied Economic Research already showed in 2006: 88 percent of those surveyed found women insufficiently considered if the text (in this case: legal text) was written in the generic masculine.
Gender stereotypes, which have been adequately documented in psychology and linguistics, are equally important for thinking and language behavior.
They help determine our choice of words and have a decisive influence on the images that appear in our heads.
The choice of words in job advertisements also conveys stereotypes.
And that doesn't just apply to the job descriptions in the title.
Adjectives that describe the required characteristics (»analytical«, »team-oriented«) or the corporate culture (»young, modern work environment«) can also convey clichés - even if they are supposedly gender-neutral.
As part of a study by the Technical University of Munich, the participants had to classify the adjectives used in job advertisements according to "male" and "female".
For example, while they classified words such as analytical, decisive and assertive as "male", they thought committed, team-minded and reliable were more likely to be "female".
Competence vs. communication skills
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The ideas of how a man or a woman should be, and what qualities we ascribe to them with words, are based on centuries-old schemes that have developed socially.
(Technical) competence is seen as part of the male stereotype.
Communication skills, on the other hand, count as a typically female trait.
Characteristics that are typically ascribed to men often correspond to so-called hard skills, whereas typically female ones correspond to so-called soft skills.
In this context, psycholinguistics also speaks of agentic and communal words.
And these words influence behavior.
We found out in a study ourselves: significantly fewer women apply to job advertisements that contain too many "masculine" (agentic) words because they do not find themselves in them.
After adjusting the word profile, up to 33 percent more women applied for the position in our study.
Men, on the other hand, were not put off by job advertisements formulated as "female" - they applied equally.
Why is that?
This is where another psychological phenomenon comes into play: women are prone to downgrading.
They tend to regard every requirement in a job as indispensable and are less confident.
Men, on the other hand, tend to overestimate themselves.
We humans are not aware of these phenomena, which is why many women cannot state why they did not apply for a job.
Language processing is largely unconscious.
Uncovering downgrading traps
But anyone who knows about these mechanisms can work with them.
For example like this:
Anyone writing an application should
pick up
the
buzzwords from the job advertisement
- this is a tip that is often repeated.
But what if you don't identify with the personality requirements that are required there?
Then you can ask yourself: Do other descriptions from the tender apply?
If so: don't hesitate and apply!
Strong communication skills, team-oriented, loyal - these are qualities that are typically rated as »female« and belong to the soft skills.
Soft skills
are often wrongly not taken seriously as skills.
They should not be underestimated as a skill in everyday working life and
should be emphasized as such in an application.
Agent (male read) and communal (female read) characteristics often mean the same thing, only female characteristics refer to an expected social component.
So if you feel that one quality doesn't apply to you, ask yourself: is that really true, or was the
job posting just written with a male bias?
Here is a little translation aid that works in both directions:
Instead of your own abilities, it is better to
downgrade typical tender phrases.
If "ideally first work experience" is required, this means: work experience is not expected and you can apply without it.
By the way:
Yes, internships also count as work experience!
And another tip: You should state an expected salary in your application and have no idea?
There are a number of portals in which salaries that are customary in the industry are compared.
In addition to such research, it is worthwhile to exchange ideas with other people and thereby break the old taboo »you don't talk about money«.
Because knowledge is power and ignorance promotes downgrading.