MLB hires firm to help prepare candidates for front office jobs

CHICAGO- Major League Baseball wants to help the top contenders for openings in baseball operations, especially women and minorities.

MLB announced Thursday it had retained a search firm to assist candidates who reach the interview process. It also said it had instructed Korn Ferry to provide special emphasis to help for some of the most underrepresented groups in the baseball hierarchy.

There has never been a female general manager in the sport, and there are very few women and minorities on that side of the organizational structure.

While MLB has had a minority interview requirement for key openings in baseball operations for several years, Commissioner Rob Manfred said the league thinks the search firm ''might be able to improve the effectiveness of the rule by making minority candidates who get an interview more effective in that interview process.''

''These interviews are detailed activities,'' Manfred said. ''It's not just how you present yourself in the interview, and you know that's a skill that can be refined. But it's also substantive packages of material that demonstrate your ability to evaluate personnel, depending on what the job is, or manage, and we think we can help diverse candidates who get interviews make their best possible presentation and hopefully help them get hired.''

Manfred made his remarks at the conclusion of a quiet two days of owners' meetings at a luxurious hotel in downtown Chicago. Billy Bean, MLB's openly gay ambassador for inclusion, made a presentation Thursday on his work, and the owners also listened to a presentation on domestic violence and several committee reports.