Principle 01
A human reads every serious application.
If a candidate clears a baseline, a person sees them. No black-box rejection. No silence.
The Manifesto
Six principles to put humanity back into hiring.
Not a platform. Not a product. A standard. Adopt them inside your company. Demand them from the ones you apply to. Share this page.
Principle 02
Ban fake and evergreen listings.
Every posted role is a real, funded, open req. If it’s not, take it down.
Principle 03
No algorithmic age, gender, or name filters — ever.
Identity-correlated features have no place in the screen. Audit the models. Publish the audit.
Principle 04
Domain experts screen, not generalist HR.
The first human to read a senior engineer’s résumé should be a senior engineer.
Principle 05
Transparent rejection with a reason.
Every rejection comes with a sentence. Not a template. The candidate gave their time — give them yours.
Principle 06
Direct candidate ↔ hiring-manager channels.
Once a candidate is in the door, they can talk to the person who will hire them. Not a gauntlet of intermediaries.
Principle 07
Salary transparency.
Every listing shows the real pay band. No “competitive.” No “DOE.” If you can’t say the number, you don’t know the role.
Principle 08
No ghosting. Ever.
A response is owed within a stated window. Silence is a policy failure, not a default.
Principle 09
One application. Not a résumé and a 40-field form.
If you have the résumé, parse it. Stop asking candidates to retype their lives into your portal. Solve this.
Principle 10
“Overqualified” is not a reason.
If someone applied, they want the job. Ask why before you assume. Their reason is none of your guesswork.
Sign it
Put your name behind it.
Signatures are private — we use them to count, not to publish. The standard only matters if enough people stand behind it.
See the full picture this came from.
The Hiring Black Box