Part 2: Bias Isn’t a Character Flaw — It’s a System Strain

 Implicit Bias is what the human brain falls back on when it’s trying to take shortcuts under stress. We start making assumptions about our cubicle-mate during time crunches, relying on stereotypes when juggling too many tasks.  Resentment builds and miscommunication becomes the norm.

Bias is a tough subject in today’s world…. one of those subjects we’d all like to stay 100 feet away from. And that’s reasonable, work is hard enough, why add tackling systemic, or program interventions to an already overwhelmed workload, or a conflict-ridden office floor? Because how you prepare for and respond to bias in your workplace will impact your budget’s bottom line! $300 billion a year, in fact, is lost annually by American Businesses to environmental risk factors and its related stress reaction (UML, accessed 10/2025)  You, as a business owner and employer, cannot solve bias in your employees, but you can craft a workplace that is insulated against the damaging effects of environmental risk factors and bias can have.

Not to be discouraging, but bias is inescapable. There’s evidence that bias begins forming in humans as early as age 3 (Flanigan, 2025). This is not a terminal diagnosis for the human individual, as humans do, generally, become more egalitarian as we age, and the outward expressions of our inner perspectives become well-metered and well-managed. That is, until we experience System Strain.

Biases are those negative evaluations individuals have of others (most commonly when those others are part of a different group) (Flanigan, 2025). Your workplace most likely does not allow open discrimination and threats between staff, most of us have a Zero Tolerance Policy when it comes to hurting others.   Implicit Bias, however, is an internal, unconscious attitude and/or opinion that impacts how individuals interpret others’ behavior, this dramatically impacts how you and your employees work together.

    In the previous blog we talked about how environmental risk factors triple the risk of injury, workplace conflict, violence, and individual illness (Burton, 2007). We can understand the risk of injury and illness on a body as it’s related to stress. But how do Environmental Risk Factors triple the risk of workplace conflict? How do these Factors lead to workplace violence? The differences that make us the perfect team, can trigger our Implicit Bias when our environment becomes more stressful. Differences like age, education level, disabilities or chronic disease, obesity, race, criminal history, etc.. become sticking points for over-loaded individuals to focus on and begin to blame and resent when the environment feels out of control (Flanigan, 2025 & NCSC, accessed 10/2025). Implicit Bias is what the human brain falls back on when it’s trying to take shortcuts under stress. We start making assumptions about our cubicle-mate during time crunches, relying on stereotypes when juggling too many tasks.  Resentment builds and miscommunication becomes the norm.

     When the perfect team becomes intellectually isolated from each other favoritism becomes a common accusation, teams begin to miss opportunities, and small behaviors of resentment have huge ripple effects throughout the organization.

     We can’t eliminate stress, and we cannot solve for bias in our employees—but we can build systems that protect people from Bias’s worst effects. Next, we’ll explore how Policy (i.e. SOPs and Employee Handbooks) protects your people from Environmental Risk Factors, saving your team and your bank account from losing to Bias.

References

Flanagan, A.Y. (2025) Cultural Competence: An Overview. Course #77431. NetCE www.NetCE.com.

National Center for States Courts (NCSC). Helping Courts Address Implicit Bias: Strategies to Reduce the Influence of Implicit Bias. Available at https://horsley.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/IB_Strategies_033012.pdf. Last accessed October 24, 2025

University of Massachusetts, Lowell (UML). Financial Costs of Job Stress: The Financial Burden of Job Stress. Available at https://www.uml.edu/research/cph-new/worker/stress-at-work/financial-costs.aspx. Last Accessed October 24, 2025.