Candidates notice who is doing and leading the hiring. Researchers from the University of Houston, Louisiana State University Shreveport and the University of Sheffield analysed data from 13,750 job applications for 156 faculty positions that were available from 2015 to 2018 at a large US research university. They found that when a woman led a search committee, 23% more women applied for the job than when the committee chair was a man. Applicants of colour are especially more likely to apply when other people of colour with power actively recruit them. Data showed that the applications of candidates from underrepresented backgrounds — which the researchers defined in this US study as including Black, Latinx, Pacific Islander, Alaskan Native and Native American candidates – went up by 118% when the search chair was also from an underrepresented background.