Despite years of focus on gender diversity in the workplace, women are still largely underrepresented in management, boards, and specific industries/functions. A new Harvard study highlights one of the barriers at work in the hiring process. Unconscious bias makes it difficult to address gender diversity. Some thinking indicates that while people do not generally actively discriminate against an individual based on race or gender, they discriminate in favour of those people who they most identify with. The Harvard Study found that people also have a bias around preserving the status quo. Which means that the number of women in your candidate pool materially affects decisions around hiring. When three out of four candidates were women, respondents were more likely to hire a woman. When only one woman was in the candidate pool, the chance of a woman being hired was essentially zero. It seems that the percentage of women in the candidate pool tells the respondents something about status quo. Namely, that the percentage of women is reflective of reality and the status quo. Going against the status quo is deemed risky and when the status quo appears to endorse the idea that women as potential candidates is not typical (i.e. They represent a small % of the pool), respondents want to reinforce not contradict the status quo.