How We Recruit Starts With Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Catchafire’s commitment to advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion is mission critical to building our business and realizing our potential for impact. While hiring is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to strengthening a diverse organization and inclusive culture, Catchafire’s recruiting team has been working to deeply embed these core concepts in how we grow our team.

Here are some of the ways Catchafire has crafted a thoughtful recruiting process that centers around an inclusive and equitable candidate experience, and helps applicants get matched with a role they love:

We strive to run structured, replicable, and equitable interviews.

• We train our interviewers to be as prepared as our candidates are in each interview round they run. We arrive at interviews prepared with information on the candidate, along with a standardized template of questions. Standard templates are a key tool for creating as consistent, objective, and inclusive a process as possible while mitigating bias.
  
  
• Our Recruiting and Hiring Managers work together to build awareness about unconscious bias in the hiring process. We specifically train our interviewers on how to mitigate bias and uphold inclusive interview practices through how they interview and assess candidates.
  
  
• We evaluate candidates against the same criteria across the board and use a standard scorecard to help guide decisions.
  
  
• Rather than having one individual make a hiring decision, we continuously collaborate across interviewers on the hiring team to gain the most holistic and complete picture possible.
  
  We are thoughtful about inclusive language in our job descriptions.
  
  
• Any prerequisites that would not directly apply to doing the job successfully are omitted from all job descriptions.
  
  
• We do not have education requirements for any of our open roles, and are always welcoming toward unconventional resume items. Fun fact: one of our current team members exemplified their public speaking abilities by sharing a video of them leading a dance class!
  
  
• Gendered language is avoided in the hopes that people of all gender identities will be encouraged to apply.
  
  
• We recognize and acknowledge the barriers to employment many justice-involved individuals face. While we conduct reference checks with candidates’ former employers and colleagues at the very end of our process, we do not conduct background checks.
  
  We survey all candidates for feedback on our process.
  
  As best practices in hiring are always evolving, we are committed to continued investment in improving our processes and to being a champion for all of our candidates.There’s no big secret to our hiring process; our recruiting team and the wider Catchafire team are always here to help!
  
  
  Here are some tips for how you can prepare for a successful interview with Catchafire:

1. After scheduling your interview with Catchafire, you will receive a confirmation email with the time and date of your interview along with your interviewers’ names and what the interview will cover. Our Team Page shares brief bios of our Catchafire teammates. It might be helpful to read your interviewer’s bio ahead of time so you have an idea of who they are.
   
   
2. Read our 2020 Impact Report , explore Catchafire.org, and bring your thoughts, questions, and feedback to your interview. At Catchafire, we value feedback and appreciate curious questions.
   
   
3. Come with specific examples of how you have demonstrated impact in your career. We want to understand your journey and learn about your process and approach to challenges.
   
   
4. If you have any questions ahead of your interview or need to reschedule, you can reach out to [email protected] anytime. We are very welcoming of any accommodations or suggestions for how we might make our process more manageable for you.
   
   

To view our current job openings, visit our Careers page. Please do not hesitate to reach out to us for advice or guidance during your hiring process -- we’re rooting for you!