In today’s complex talent landscape, Talent Acquisition Operations leaders face a dual challenge: efficiently scaling hiring while ensuring robust data collection for compliance and strategic insights. This friction becomes clear when evaluating the collection of federally mandated information from applicants, such as EEO form data.
At Datapeople, we understand that comprehensive, accurate demographic data isn’t just about compliance; it’s about building equitable processes, making informed decisions, and communicating your organizational values with confidence. That’s why we’re thrilled to announce the launch of our new Demographic Survey Report. This new report provides Talent Acquisition Operations leaders with unprecedented visibility into their EEO data collection to identify gaps in their collection.
What is the Demographic Survey Report?
The Datapeople Demographic Survey Report provides a visual, role-level representation of your EEOC Survey data collection. It seamlessly imports candidate-submitted demographic data directly from your Applicant Tracking System (ATS), organizing it into three critical categories:
- Submitted: Candidates who completed the survey and selected a demographic category.
- Declined: Candidates who completed the survey but chose options like “Declined to report.”
- Not Submitted: Candidates who did not complete the survey at all. (While we can’t definitively know if they chose not to submit or didn’t receive the survey, this category helps you make informed assumptions about potential distribution gaps.)
This report intelligently maps your organization’s survey collection to the standard EEO classifications (e.g., “Black” responses will be standardized under “Black or African American”).
The report is intentionally designed to go beyond traditional EEO collection reporting to pinpoint specific sources and requisitions where missing data is highly prevalent and systemically prevalent, then offers actionable insights to reduce these gaps among your applicants.
The report also provides visual representations of your candidate-submitted data to help understand your applicant pool demographics and monitor shifts throughout your pipeline. Trend lines provide a visual display of the change in representation percentages for each category from the initial application to the hired stage. Small fluctuations are normal, but large shifts should be immediately flagged as worthy of deeper investigation.
Why does EEO collection reporting matter?
The Demographic Survey Report isn’t just another dashboard; it’s a strategic tool designed to help you identify and address systemic issues within your hiring processes.
Uncovering Hidden Gaps & Reducing Risk
Unreported EEO data can dangerously skew your perception of applicant pool demographics. Relying on incomplete data to represent your entire candidate population can lead to incorrect assumptions that undermine inclusivity goals and may expose your organization to potential legal scrutiny. The more complete your data, the less risk you incur.
Driving Strategic Communication
Applicant pool reporting has become crucial for both internal and external stakeholders. This report equips you to provide clear, data-backed updates to internal and external demographic and impact reports.
Navigating Compliance with Confidence
For federal contractors and subcontractors who meet specific company and contract size thresholds, tracking applicant demographic data is a strict requirement. The OFCCP (Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs) is responsible for ensuring compliance with these nondiscrimination laws.
While the OFCCP does not mandate a specific point in the selection process for data solicitation, it is always required that providing this information is voluntary. For non-federal contractors, collecting applicant demographic data is not required, nor is failure to provide illegal. However, if your organization chooses to collect this data for its own demographic initiatives, it is paramount to apply best practices to mitigate risk and avoid discrimination cases:
- Data Segregation: Keep applicant demographic information entirely separate from other applicant data.
- Access Control: Ensure that anyone involved in making or assisting in hiring decisions never has access to this sensitive information.
- Data Security: Implement robust measures to secure this data.
- Anonymity & Aggregation: Always present data in an aggregated and anonymized manner.
- Voluntary & Consistent: Surveys must always be voluntary and applied consistently across all applicant pools.
How does the Demographic Survey Report complement Datapeople’s gender report?
Many of you already rely on our existing Datapeople Gender Report, which provides a comprehensive picture of your applicant pool’s gender using a powerful and proven inference model. (Learn more about its methodology: How Does Datapeople Determine Gender? An Algorithm Why).
While the Gender Report offers broad, inferred insights, it does not reflect what candidates explicitly provide during the application process. This is where the new Demographic Survey Report becomes indispensable for TA Operations.
Understanding a comprehensive picture of your candidate’s gender is important yet complex. The new Demographic Survey Report helps businesses measure the collection of and report on the results of candidate-submitted data. This allows you to identify precise collection gaps and ensure your demographic data solicitation is comprehensively aligned with your organizational and regulatory standards. Meanwhile, your Gender Report will continue to serve its unique purpose, helping you fill in data gaps where explicit collection isn’t required or desired, such as for roles hired outside the USA. Together, these two reports provide a holistic and actionable view of your applicant pool’s demographics.
Ready to see your candidates in a whole new light?
The Datapeople Demographic Survey Report empowers your TA Operations team to ensure compliance, reduce risk, and drive meaningful fairness initiatives with unparalleled clarity.
If you’re an existing Datapeople customer, it’s time to take control of your demographic data. Reach out to your Customer Success Manager to discuss how to turn on this report.
Not yet a Datapeople customer? Get in touch with our team to see your data in a whole new light and discover how Datapeople can empower your TA operations with the intelligence you need to succeed.