Equal Opportunity

The major contributions of equal employment opportunity to the selection process is to require that consistent and job relevant criteria are used to assess applicants.  naturally, all applicants should be considered against the same criteria, and no assumptions should be made about the working patterns of individuals or groups that may exclude them from selection and consideration.

Those participating in the selection process must agree on and utilise the same selection criteria.

The USQ has determined that members of both genders should be involved in staff selection processes, therefore, both genders are to be represented on every panel and all persons must have undertaken the formal recruitment and selection in-house training.

Particularly during interview procedures, care should be taken to provide information about the position in a similar way to all applicants and to avoid implying unfair or partial attitudes to race, colour, gender and irrelevant job qualifications and the like.

As part of the USQ's commitment to equity, the following procedures are recommended each time a position requires a selection decision:

• current and accurate position descriptions
• objective selection criteria
• planned structured interviews
• training of interviewers
• use of rating forms
• thorough documentation
• review of conclusions by several people
• thorough referees' reports
• appropriate use of valid tests

As would be logically expected, these are the same procedures that contribute to equal employment opportunity and selection on merit.

The University's policy C2 Anti-Discrimination and Freedom from Harassment outlines additional information relating to anti-discrimination, equal opportunity and freedom from harassment.