system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: Diversity in the workplace is important but it should not trump the most qualified person for the job.

For this hypothetical example I will lay out two assumptions and an outcome. 

When interviewing people, let’s say (1) there is always a diverse group of people (age, race, and gender) interviewing. Let’s then say (2) the people interviewing have no idea what the people look like or their age. 

If, in this scenario, the same type of person (age, race, and gender) is selected every time because they were the most qualified person being interviewed at the time. Is there anything wrong with the outcome? Or is the workplace affected in any way?
gpt
The problem with this view is that it paints diversity as an oppositional force to hiring the most qualified employee, when that isn't really the case.

A well-studied effect is "similarity bias" or "affinity bias"; basically, people like others who are similar to them. This effect is very pronounced in hiring; employers tend to artificially favor employees similar to them (less diverse) even if they are equally or less qualified. Promoting diversity initiatives can actually *counteract* this similarity bias and lead to better hiring and more diverse hiring at the same time.

Further, the idea of a "most qualified person for the job" is extremely nebulous and basically impossible to determine. Quality as an employee is subjective and employers are terrible at hiring; for instance, the silicon valley trend of "lateral thinking puzzle" style interviews was huge and popularized and turned out to be *awful* and only good for weeding out candidates who did not think exactly like the interviewer, limiting both diversity and quality of employees. At best, the "most qualified person for the job" is extremely fuzzy and there are probably multiple candidates who could be most qualified, which means interviewers *always* have the option to pick for reasons beyond "objective" quality.