Hiring

The City of Madison has established a priority objective to promote equal employment opportunity and to eliminate discriminatory preferences in the hiring process. The “Red-Flag” process is an Affirmative Action procedure adopted by the City in its General Ordinances and its Affirmative Action Plan to minimize cultural, racial, gender and disability differences between interviewers and interviewees. It also provides a more thorough evaluation of candidates’ application materials and interview responses.

View an outline of the Red-Flag Process.

Guidance Documents for Hiring Managers

• Red-Flag Process for Hiring Managers
  This document outlines steps that a hiring manager should take during the interview panel and hiring process when a position is red-flagged. Although all of these items are things a hiring manager should do regardless if a position is red-flagged, these steps are particularly important when a hiring manager is utilizing volunteers from the Interview Panelist Database.

• Job Family Availability / Red Flag Hiring Charts, August 30, 2024

  This document contains Job Family Availability, meaning the goals and current data for women and people of color for each department, as well as job classification with distinct data for hourly versus permanent staff. This document should be used when hiring managers want to check to see if their department is meeting goals for women and people of color, and at the beginning of every recruitment.

  Prior Charts:

• Job Availability, August 6, 2024
• Job Family Availability, March 9, 2024
• Job Family Availability, Nov. 17, 2023
• Job Family Availability, August 1, 2023
• Job Family Availability, May 5, 2023
• Job Family Availability, Jan. 25, 2023
• Job Family Availability, Oct. 21, 2022
• Job Family Availability, Jul 27, 2022
• Job Family Availability, Apr. 27, 2022
• Job Family Availability, Jan. 31, 2022
• Job Family Availability, Oct. 28, 2021
• Job Family Availability, Jul. 30, 2021
• Job Family Availability, Apr. 29, 2021
• Job Family Availability, Jan. 28, 2021
• Job Family Availability, Nov. 5, 2020
• Job Family Availability, Aug. 1, 2020
• Job Family Availability, Apr. 29, 2020
• Job Family Availability, Feb. 17, 2020
• Job Family Availability, Oct. 3, 2019
• Job Family Availability, Apr. 18, 2019
• A Manager’s Guide to Interviews and Background Checks
  This guide goes in-depth about topics such as screening, interview questions, benchmarking, reference-checking, and background checking. This document is the thorough version of the Interview Basics document. See also the Hiring Checklist Snapshot.

Guidance Documents for Interview Panel Members

• Red-Flag Process Handout
  This document is a quick overview of what red-flagging and balanced interviews are. These are intended as quick summaries for interviewers who have little background knowledge about the City’s hiring practices.
• Interview Tips
  This document is a short resource that gives some important overview points of an interview. These include topics such as benchmarking, interview questions, and types of biases. This document serves as a quick reminder for hiring managers, but it is predominantly designed for panel members who do not have in-depth training about interview standards and best practices.