Blind Community Transparency Report 2023

Blind Community Transparency Report 2023

Blind is a trusted community of more than 8 million verified professionals. Professionals anonymously share advice, discuss company culture and gain exclusive insights about their workplace or industry.

Blind’s community team helps to keep the professional community safe and productive, reviewing thousands of comments, company reviews, salary submissions, and more every month.

What’s more: Every day, professionals help moderate the Blind community when they flag potentially inappropriate content. In the last 60 days, thousands of verified professionals, or about 2% of Blind users, helped keep the community safe. Blind hopes to more than double this to at least 5% of the community soon.

Blind Community Transparency Report

Blind surveyed more than 3,800 verified professionals in the U.S. in March 2023 to understand how they perceived the social “health” of the Blind professional community.

The inaugural 2023 Blind Community Transparency Report found U.S. professionals were primarily concerned with the prevalence of misinformation or bullying on Blind. A desire for inclusivity online was also common among survey respondents.

Bullying

The Blind Community Transparency Report found that 34% of U.S. professionals are concerned about bullying or harassment.

Bullying is a personal issue for many Americans. Forty-one percent of Americans have personally experienced harassment online, according to a 2021 Pew Research Center survey.

U.S. professionals expressed interest in preventing or mitigating bullying and harassment on the internet. More than one in three verified U.S. professionals (34%) were “somewhat” or “very” concerned about bullying on Blind, according to the 2023 Blind Community Transparency Report, the second-largest concern among those polled.

Online community members and social media platform users have a vital role in preventing bullying. Blind invests in community and technology-based methods to keep its professional community safe, including encouraging community members to flag instances of bullying more proactively and regularly. Additionally, Blind continues to make improvements to identify any bullying as it happens and remove any offending content or users.

Misinformation

The Blind Community Transparency Report found that 39% of U.S. professionals are concerned about misinformation on Blind.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, U.S. professionals were most concerned about misinformation. A 2021 Pearson Institute/AP-NORC poll found that 95% of Americans believe that the spread of misinformation online is a problem.

About two in five verified professionals in the U.S. (39%) said they were “somewhat” or “very” concerned about misinformation on Blind, according to the 2023 Blind Community Transparency Report.

In response, Blind will soon release tools to make it easier for concerned users to flag possible misinformation. Blind community members will also soon be able to identify potentially false information that other users have flagged more easily. The goal is to help professionals make more informed decisions as members of the Blind community.

Inclusivity

The Blind Community Transaprency Report found that 31% of U.S. professionals were concerned about women's inclusion.

People generally seek online communities and social media platforms to find a sense of belonging. Correspondingly, a sense of inclusivity across identities, geographies or more is paramount.

Notably, U.S. professionals surveyed by Blind expressed discomfort with a so-called “bro” culture in the male-dominated industries of technology, finance, and management consulting, which are among the most represented industries in Blind’s professional community.

About one in three U.S. verified professionals (31%) said they were concerned about women’s inclusion on Blind, according to the 2023 Blind Community Transparency Report.

Nearly half (48%) of the women surveyed indicated that they were “very” or “somewhat” concerned about the inclusivity of Blind.

The Blind Community Transparency Report found that attitudes toward inclusivity differed among men and women.

Blind aims to create a more inclusive environment for all professionals—no matter their identity or community. We believe that by addressing bullying or harassment on our platform and ensuring that those who are not inclusive towards others are not empowered on Blind, we can reduce hate on the platform.

Blind will make it easier for community members to report abusive content and adapt our policies to ensure that we empower women and other socioeconomically disadvantaged users. We understand that our policies need to work for them, and we will take action to address their concerns.

Perhaps interestingly, U.S. professionals were not as concerned about “not-safe-for-work” or professionally inappropriate content or violence on Blind. Violence and so-called “NSFW” content are rare on Blind. Over 60% of survey respondents reported being “not concerned at all” about this content appearing on Blind.

Methodology

Blind conducted an online survey of 3,837 verified professionals in the U.S. on its platform from March 2 to 9, 2023, to understand how professionals perceive the social health of the Blind professional community.

Available survey responses included strongly disagree, disagree, neutral (i.e., neither agree nor disagree), agree or strongly agree. Respondents also ranked their level of concern for issues, including racism or the prevalence of so-called “not-safe-for-work” or professionally inappropriate content on Blind, on the following five-point scale: not concerned at all, somewhat unconcerned, neutral (i.e., neither unconcerned nor concerned), somewhat concerned and very concerned.