According to a memo, Wells Fargo is resuming a hiring practise that it put on hold earlier this year after a former worker disclosed that it was leading managers to interview nonwhite candidates for jobs that had already been filled. The practise led managers to interview nonwhite candidates for jobs that had already been filled.
The policy of the bank, which is referred to as its “diversity slate” approach, stipulates that at least half of the individuals who apply for particular roles must be people of colour or women. In addition to this, it stipulates that the panel of persons who will be interviewing applicants for certain occupations must be “diverse.” According to the document that was sent to the bank’s management on Monday, the practise will be reinstated beginning on August 19 for specific professions, and additional safeguards will be put into place to avoid misuse of the system.
In the document, the bank admitted that its standards may need some revisions. The executives reportedly concluded that “our principles and procedures may be unnecessarily rigid,” which is one of the problems listed in the document.
The most significant adjustments will be an expanded training programme for supervisors as well as a simplified authorization procedure for exemptions from the diverse slate requirement.
In addition, there will be changes made to the criteria that must be met by available positions. In a previous iteration of the policy, it was stipulated that interviews with a diverse pool of applicants were to be carried out prior to the filling of any position that carried a salary of one hundred thousand dollars or more.
According to the message, “instead of the prior criterion of being focused on remuneration, positions that are in-scope will now be based on job level rather than income.” It did not clarify which employment levels would be considered acceptable in order to meet the criterion.
The policy was suspended on June 6 by Wells Fargo after it was reported in The Times that a former employee in the bank’s wealth management business had complained. he complaint led to the suspension of the policy by Wells Fargo. The practise of conducting false job interviews was confirmed by a total of 12 current and former workers who spoke to The Times and said that they had either taken part in the process themselves or were aware of it.
According to an article published by The Times on June 9, federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York were looking into whether or not Wells Fargo had violated the civil rights of those applying for jobs at the company.
When they decided to pause the policy, the officials of the bank promised that they would spend the next weeks consulting with staff members in order to get insight into how they might enhance the programme.
In a statement that was emailed to news outlets on Monday to announce the revival of the policy, Bei Ling, the head of human resources for Wells Fargo, said that the bank had compared its policies to those of other banks and large companies and determined that the concept of requiring “diverse slates” of job candidates was a “common, good practise.”
