New monthly CEH Training blog
CEH Trainer Eman will share with you her perspective and tips about CEH’s cultural competence and health literacy training.
The first article is on unconscious bias.
Unconcious bias – let’s get comfortable with being uncomfortable
Our minds are like a ‘garden’. Among the plants we nurture there are weeds that keep popping up.
What do we do? We pull out the weeds, but we know they’ll pop up again.
Unconscious bias is like this garden. We all have our conscious views that we nurture. But we also have weeds that are unwelcome sneaky views that we receive from mass media, culture and unconscious automatic short cuts our brains make.
Our conscious views fit our values, the unconscious ones often don’t. They pop up like weeds, fed by the narratives we are exposed to everyday. Narratives that are often at odd with our values.
What does this mean? We’re all in danger of thinking we treat people as individuals based on our values BUT the research tells we don’t suceed a significant amount of time.
Our human brains are wired to make quick decisions about people we meet for survival purposes! We’re here today because our ancestors could make these quick automatic decisions. But those mental shortcuts such as stereotypes can mislead us as we aim for fairness and equity.
Most people in health, government services & education are dedicated to fair outcomes. Despite this we still see discrepancies in outcomes for people from marginalised groups. “But Eman! I’m an advocate and all for social justice on a personal and professional level, admitting that I have unconscious bias feels uncomfortable!”
Exactly! Unconscious bias is NOT your conscious rational views. And it is uncomfortable to realise you may be doing harm without intending to. But it’s time to get comfortable with that discomfort.
We can help you identify and reduce bias at your work, both individually and through your organisational processes. We can help you get comfortable with being uncomfortable. We don’t need perfection, just to connect better with our clients from other backgrounds. Let us show you how.
Join our free members page and watch our webinar on unconscious bias here.
Ask for a quote for an unconscious bias workshop by contacting Siri 03 9418 9912 or sirig@ceh.org.au