Title VII is unchanged
Disparate-impact provisions are written into statute. An executive order can redirect an agency's priorities; it does not repeal a law.
Selection and assessment
Hiring Assessment Audit
Something confusing happened to US hiring compliance in 2025, and most of what you will read about it is wrong in one of two opposite directions. Here is what actually changed, what did not, and what a defensible hiring process looks like either way.
- MSc I/O Psychology
- Not legal advice
- Validity, measured
- AI screening reviewed
- Written record
MScI/O Psychology
1978UGESP still stands
2025When priorities shifted
0Change to the statute
What changed and what did not
The part everyone is getting wrong
Private plaintiffs can still sue
Enforcement priorities are about what federal agencies pursue. They are not the only route by which a selection procedure gets tested.
Federal priorities did shift
Executive Order 14281 of 23 April 2025 directs agencies to de-prioritise disparate-impact enforcement, and the EEOC withdrew its AI technical-assistance documents in 2025.
You own your vendor's tool
Employers remain responsible for adverse impact produced by automated screening, including tools built by somebody else. Buying it does not outsource the consequence.
The validation framework still stands
The uniform guidelines on employee selection procedures (1978) remains the recognised approach for showing a selection procedure is job related.
Structure beats instinct, measurably
A structured interview with job-relevant behavioural questions and standardised scoring predicts performance better than an unstructured conversation, and it produces a record.
The detail
What a defensible hiring process actually looks like
Selection is the oldest subject in Industrial and Organizational Psychology and one of the best evidenced. Which methods predict job performance, by how much, and which produce demographic gaps that are not about ability, are measured questions with a large literature behind them.
Almost none of that literature reaches the average hiring process, which is still a conversation between two people who have not agreed in advance what they are listening for.
Say clearly what changed in 2025
Two things happened. Executive Order 14281 of 23 April 2025 directed federal agencies to de-prioritise disparate-impact enforcement, and the EEOC withdrew its technical-assistance material on AI in hiring.
Two things did not happen. Title VII was not amended, and its disparate-impact provisions remain codified and enforceable. And private plaintiffs, who are not federal agencies, retain the ability to bring claims.
Both of the confident readings are wrong
"Disparate impact is over, stop worrying" is wrong: the statute is untouched and agencies are not the only route to a courtroom. "Nothing changed, panic as before" is also wrong: federal enforcement posture genuinely did shift. The accurate version is less comfortable than either and it is the one worth planning against.
I am a psychologist and not an employment lawyer, and nothing here is legal advice. What I can tell you is whether your selection procedure is measuring what you think it measures, and whether you could show that if asked.
What the audit looks at
- Job relevance. Does each question, test and criterion connect to something the job actually requires, in writing?
- Structure. Are candidates asked the same things and scored against the same defined anchors, or does each interviewer improvise?
- Scoring. Is there a rubric with behavioural anchors, or a one-to-five scale with nothing under it?
- Automated screening. What is your vendor's tool actually filtering on, and can they tell you? You carry the outcome either way.
- Record keeping. Could you reconstruct why a specific candidate was rejected, eighteen months later?
- Adverse impact. Whether your own numbers show a gap, and whether anybody has ever looked.
Why structure is the whole answer
The unstructured interview is the most popular selection method and among the weakest predictors of performance. It also produces the least defensible record, because there is nothing to point at afterwards except an impression.
A structured interview fixes both problems at once. The same job-relevant questions, asked in the same order, scored against defined anchors, predicts better and leaves a record. Combining it with a work sample and a job-relevant skills test improves validity further and narrows the demographic gap that any single method produces on its own.
This is the rare case where the fair thing and the accurate thing are the same
Structure is not a compliance tax paid at the cost of hiring quality. It is the thing that improves hiring quality, and the defensibility comes free with it. That is why it is worth doing regardless of what any agency is currently prioritising.
What you get
- Every stage of your process mapped and assessed for job relevance
- Your interview questions rewritten as structured, behaviourally anchored ones
- A scoring rubric your interviewers can actually use
- A written view on what your automated screening is doing
- A record-keeping recommendation you can implement this month
- An explicit statement of what was not examined
Or start with the written kit
The Structured Interview Kit in the shop is the same method as a document: how to build job-relevant questions, how to write anchors that interviewers apply consistently, and how to score without the numbers drifting. It reproduces no licensed instrument, and it says on the first page what it cannot do.
The Structured Interview Kit is a written document you can read and apply without hiring anybody.
Run the free audit toolWhat it costs
Selection engagements
Contracted through Shahzeb Speaks LLC, Denver, Colorado. Fixed scope, fixed price.
The Structured Interview Kit
$39 /one-off
The method, as a document
- Job-relevant question design
- Behavioural anchors that hold up
- Scoring without drift
- No licensed instrument reproduced
- Delivered as a PDF immediately
Hiring process audit
$999 /process
Your process, examined
- Every stage mapped for job relevance
- Interview questions restructured and anchored
- A rubric your team can actually apply
- A written view on your automated screening
- 45-minute session with whoever hires
- 3 weeks
Audit and rebuild
$1,999 /project
Examined and replaced
- Everything in the process audit
- The new interview and scoring materials written
- Interviewer training session
- 30 days of follow-up questions
FAQs
Hiring Questions
Is disparate impact still a risk in 2026?
Title VII's provisions are codified by statute and were not amended, and private plaintiffs can still bring claims. What changed is federal agency enforcement priorities, following Executive Order 14281 of 23 April 2025. Those are different things. I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice — for your own exposure, ask one.
We use an AI screening tool from a vendor. Is that their problem?
No. Employers remain responsible for adverse impact produced by automated screening, including tools built by third parties. If your vendor cannot tell you what the tool filters on, that is itself the finding.
Do we have to run an adverse impact analysis every time we hire?
That is a legal question and the answer depends on your size and situation. What I can say as a psychologist is that most employers have never looked at their own numbers at all, and looking is cheap.
Are structured interviews really better?
Yes, and it is one of the better-established findings in the field. Same job-relevant questions, same order, scored against defined anchors: it predicts performance better than an unstructured conversation and it leaves a record. Adding a work sample improves it further.
Can you validate our existing test?
I can assess whether it is job relevant, whether it is being used consistently, and what your own data shows. A formal criterion validation study needs sample sizes most employers do not have, and I will tell you that rather than sell you one that cannot reach significance.
Are you a lawyer?
No. I am an Industrial and Organizational Psychologist. I measure and design selection procedures. For legal exposure you want an employment lawyer, and having this audit first makes that conversation much cheaper.
Free tools
Free calculators before you brief me
Hire better, and be able to explain how
Structure improves the hiring and produces the record. Those are the same piece of work.