Even if the justification is reasonable, it is quite exclusionary to candidates outside of the required time zone. Think of a company who wants to hire a data analyst, but instead of the job posting listing ‘skilled at data analytics’ it instead lists ‘MA in data analytics.’ It is excluding a lot of people that might be skilled but which don’t have the degree.
I think the broader idea I’m trying to get at is when X is needed, but Y is listed as the requirement, and they are two distinct things. Maybe I need someone that speaks German as a native language for a job, but on the job describing I write that I need someone who grew up in Germany; those are distinct things. I’d reject all the German expats that grew up abroad, as well as the native-German speakers who grew up in Switzerland or Austria.
There might also be something here related to the non-central fallacy: applying the characteristics of an archetypical category member to a non-typical category member. Most people in distant time zones probably wouldn’t be able to manage an abnormal working schedule, but that doesn’t mean we should assume that no people in distant time zones can handle it.
Of course, the tradeoffs are always an issue. If I would get 5 additional candidates who would be good and 95 additional candidates who are poor fits, then maybe it wouldn’t be worth it. But something about the exclusion that I can’t quite put my finger on strikes me as unjust/unfair.
Meandering and exploratory follow-up.
Even if the justification is reasonable, it is quite exclusionary to candidates outside of the required time zone. Think of a company who wants to hire a data analyst, but instead of the job posting listing ‘skilled at data analytics’ it instead lists ‘MA in data analytics.’ It is excluding a lot of people that might be skilled but which don’t have the degree.
I think the broader idea I’m trying to get at is when X is needed, but Y is listed as the requirement, and they are two distinct things. Maybe I need someone that speaks German as a native language for a job, but on the job describing I write that I need someone who grew up in Germany; those are distinct things. I’d reject all the German expats that grew up abroad, as well as the native-German speakers who grew up in Switzerland or Austria.
There might also be something here related to the non-central fallacy: applying the characteristics of an archetypical category member to a non-typical category member. Most people in distant time zones probably wouldn’t be able to manage an abnormal working schedule, but that doesn’t mean we should assume that no people in distant time zones can handle it.
Of course, the tradeoffs are always an issue. If I would get 5 additional candidates who would be good and 95 additional candidates who are poor fits, then maybe it wouldn’t be worth it. But something about the exclusion that I can’t quite put my finger on strikes me as unjust/unfair.