Five minutes with Tara Shenoy, Senior Solicitor, Department of Communities and Justice 

I am a Senior Solicitor in the Waruugama Barrmarrany team in Child Law. I am also the Chair of the Legal Inclusion Team, a volunteer-run committee with the mandate of driving intersectional and inclusive workplace practices. 

I regularly consult across DCJ on cultural safety issues and am passionate about supporting people to feel safe at work.

I was approached by Anti-Discrimination NSW to participate in the Inclusive Recruitment project as they had heard about the work I was doing in this space. 

Being involved in this co-designed project was a wonderful opportunity – I enjoyed connecting with passionate colleagues from across DCJ and other NSW Government agencies and I am really proud of how the videos turned out. 

When you’re planning recruitment, how do you ensure it is inclusive and appropriate for culturally diverse candidates?

There are many ways to incorporate inclusive and culturally appropriate recruitment practices when planning your recruitment. 

In Part 1 – Thinking ahead we highlight several strategies in planning recruitment to be inclusive of culturally diverse candidates. Some of these strategies include:

• Pre-recruitment consultation and research with networks specific to the role you are hiring for, including familiarising yourself with internal policies, reasonable adjustments (and being creative about it!) and unconscious bias (including doing the Harvard Implicit Association test)
• Advertising the role broadly (not just on Seek and I Work for NSW but also on platforms like Ethical Jobs and Toozly) and adapting the ad and targeted questions to be culturally safe and encouraging of people from all backgrounds to apply
• Forming a culturally diverse panel (including gender-diverse and intersectionality in the approach)
• Proactive shortlisting – e.g., involving the whole panel in short-listing to mitigate the risk of unconscious bias (you may also wish to consider anonymous recruitment)
• Ensuring all assessments are culturally safe and neuro-diverse friendly. For instance, there is no need for presentations and group tasks if the job isn’t going to require this. Also, ensure you give people the same amount of time to complete a task as you would in real life. Remember, this about evaluating capabilities, not giving candidates an exam to perform under pressure!
• Being culturally safe in the way you interview – adopting Yarning Circles to encourage free conversation and engage candidates with the capability framework (this is particularly useful when interviewing non-government applicants who are unfamiliar with our requirements).

ADNSW’s Inclusive Recruitment tip sheet  highlights the importance of being welcoming and encouraging – and suggests that Yarning Circles may be a good approach. Can you tell us about your use of Yarning Circles in interviews?

My team has run several Yarning Circle recruitments. We’ve found that it’s useful to have some standard questions on stand-by, but also to allow the flexibility to probe answers in a more natural way. 

Yarning Circles are culturally-grounded interview styles designed to create a safe space for candidates and to foster respect between an interviewer and interviewee. Entering a Yarning Circle should be viewed and recognised as a privilege for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Peoples. Sitting in a circle allows conversation and sharing to flow naturally, allowing all members of the group to be seen clearly, facing each other, and placed equally around the circle.

There are several advantages of using a Yarning Circle, including that it: 

• allows the panel to get to know the candidate on a more personal level and in turn, determine whether a candidate will be a good cultural fit 
• is more comfortable and approachable for candidates and allows them to perform at their best 
• is more flexible as questions can be adapted and changed depending on the candidates’ answers. 

As long as there is a broad structure, and some back up questions, it is fairly easy to ensure that all candidates have the opportunity to address the capabilities to their best ability.