merit-based hiring
Ability determines employment
Merit-based hiring is selecting employees based on qualifications, skills, and demonstrated ability rather than personal connections, demographic characteristics, or other factors unrelated to job performance.
The term often appears in debates about affirmative action and diversity initiatives, where critics frame those programs as departures from pure merit: We need to return to merit-based hiring.
Proponents of diversity programs counter that traditional hiring was never truly merit-based.
- job postingAdvertised vacancy description
- interviewsFormal evaluative conversations
- objectivityFreedom from personal bias
- skill assessmentsEvaluations measuring someone's abilities
- anti-discriminationOpposing unfair differential treatment
fairness · meritocracy · level playing field · equal opportunity · equality · efficiency · impartiality · justice · qualifications · track record · skills gap · talent pool · accountability · productivity · reference checks · background check · aptitude tests · competency
- hiringjob, interview, resume, application, candidate
- civil servicecivil servants, bureaucrat, civil servant, administrator, clerk
- Government Reformbudget reform, fiscal reform, government reform, policy reform, regulatory reform
- workplace equityequal opportunity, pay equity, fair employment, fair treatment, workplace diversity
merit-based hiringnepotism
Preferring kin in hiring
cronyism · favoritism · patronage · political appointments · old boys' network
merit-based hiringaffirmative action
Programs boosting marginalized representation
merit, merits, merited, meriting, meritorious, meritoriously, meretricious, base, based