Candidates with 'non-English' names less likely to get job application responses

Many of your candidates will say it’s hard getting a job in today’s market – but for those with certain names, the struggle is even worse.

A new study from StandOut CV and reported in HR News has found that those who do not have typically ‘English’ names get fewer callbacks from recruiters after submitting their CV.

The researchers created two identical CVs – the only difference being the names the CV supposedly belonged to. ‘Adam Smith’ and ‘Ravindra Thalwal’ sent their resumes to 50 similar jobs in the same field and experience level, with care taken to match location and salary expectations each time. They then recorded which CVs generated interest among recruiters.

From our magazine

Cover Feature | Facebook's diversity notification

Immediately a difference appeared. In the sales and administrative fields in particular, the non-British named CV received less than half the amount of responses than the British twin. In finance, Adam’s CV received 34 responses out of 50 applications, whilst Ravindra’s only getting 21 out of 50.