Relying on a gut instinct? An analysis of the career development processes of the Swedish Armed Forces' army officers
Publish date: 2021-06-17
Report number: FOI-R--5164--SE
Pages: 48
Written in: Swedish
Keywords:
- Swedish Armed Forces
- army
- officer
- personnel supply
- career
- equality
- gender
- bias
Abstract
The aim of this report is to examine if the career development process of the Swedish Armed Forces' army officers leaves room for unconscious bias to influence decisionmaking. Unconscious bias refers to underlying attitudes and stereotypes that people unconsciously attribute to another person or group of people and affect how they understand and engage with that person or group. Research shows that the risk of unconscious bias affecting decision-making tends to increase when a process is hidden, ambiguous and relies on informal channels, intuition and tradition. The report is based on a qualitative analysis of the Swedish Armed Forces' documents and guidelines for career development, as well as data from 24 semi-structured interviews with managers, HR staff and army officers. The results indicate that several parts of the career development processes leave room for unconscious bias to affect decision-making. This means that there is a risk that performance and qualification reviews are based on incorrect or incomplete information, which in turn can give employees wrong incentives, suppress effort and lead to sub-optimal promotion decisions. The concluding chapter of the report provides recommendations to the Swedish Armed Forces on how the organisation can step to reduce unconscious bias and ensure equal treatment in the career development processes.