The American financial services company, Wells Fargo, has paused a hiring policy that required managers to interview a wide range of individuals before making a job offer.

The suspension comes three weeks after former Wells Fargo employees told the media that they were frequently forced to do "false interviews" with people of colour, even though they had no intention of hiring them. According to some reports, one former employee, Joe Bruno, claimed he was sacked because he spoke out against the bogus interviews.

Charles Scharf, CEO of the bank, said:

"Since The New York Times published a story last month about diverse job candidate slates at Wells Fargo, I've had the opportunity to hear from many of you. In these sessions, you've described in deeply personal terms the career obstacles you've faced because of who you are."

He added, "Wells Fargo will make adjustments to the policy, retrain hiring managers, and then relaunch the policy next month, Scharf said in the memo. The company still plans to interview and hire candidates of colour in the meantime."

The policy was implemented two years ago by Wells Fargo, the nation's third-largest bank, to improve workplace diversity. According to the guidelines, recruiting managers must interview at least one woman and one person of colour for every job opportunity, especially if the salary is $100,000 or more. According to 2020 company data, black individuals made up 13% of Wells Fargo's U.S.-based workforce, while Hispanics made up 17%.

Similar required interview measures have been used by other organisations such as Adobe, Best Buy, and Pinterest to increase staff diversity. Experts, on the other hand, have criticised the strategy, claiming that it often amounts to a meaningless quota that doesn't move the needle. Hiring managers just mark the box for diversity interviews and hire the candidate they've always wanted to hire.

Source: CBS News

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