10 ms·

Slack got four of its black female engineers to accept a startup award

77 points by frandroid 11y ago

lomgm 11y ago
You know essentially nothing about the situation, but you're willing to shit on it. That's gross, that's gutless, and that's lame. IOW: it's exactly what passes for 'top comment' on HN. saltman: you're not an asshole. Why do you take steps to enable and perpetuate a culture of assholes?
- dang 11y ago
  Please stop trolling Hacker News. We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11076118 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11076118 and marked it off-topic.
pmilot 11y ago
That is a great move no matter how you look at it. I applaud the Slack team for this! The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. As a society we should try to find more ways to encourage women and minorities of all sorts to get into this industry.
- jsf666 11y ago
  >The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. As a society we should try to find more ways to encourage women and minorities of all sorts to get into this industry. Why? What's the benefit from this? They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers
  - itp 11y ago
    > They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers Even if I interpret that to merely mean actively barred, I still don't think it's true. But women and minorities are certainly passively barred from these kind of careers. By virtue of opportunity, environment, peer group, role model, education, and all sorts of passive mechanisms.
    - jsf666 11y ago
      That's why colleges discriminate against whites and asians? I want to be judged and to judge by merit, not by some leftist agenda of "equality". And you come up with this argument without any proof, only that it's "well-known". I would like to see the numbers, if you may.
      - frign 11y ago
        In Germany, a "study" is often cited saying that men were better paid than women. However, peer review uncovered that the media covering this study omitted the fact that the women also worked less hours than men and thus got less money (obviously). This however does not stop "female-rights-activists" from citing it over and over again. I'm sick of it. I also don't like the notion that women are portraied as victims here. Most women I know don't want to go into tech-jobs because they think it's fucking boring. Live with it, people! I know it's also due to socialization, but do we really want to change the entire society just to shoehorn exactly 50% in our employee statistics? Who benefits from this? I know no woman who is sad because she just can't get hold in a tech job. If a woman is passionate about something, and pursues it, it will work out for her. Same with men of course. Oh, and why don't people go berserk because we have like 96% women as educators (kindergartens, pre-schools, ...). Oh yeah, right, I know, because you can't earn as much money with that.
        deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
        lsgrep 11y ago
        the fact that the women also worked less hours than men Why is that? Could it be that women are still subject to traditional roles, even in advanced countries like Germany? http://ec.europa.eu/justice/gender-equality/files/epo_campaign/country-profile_germany_en.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/justice/gender-equality/files/epo_campai... Or maybe that women of a certain age are discriminated against during the hiring process because of maternity leave? https://books.google.com/books?id=26FB_ny0tVsC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=discrimination+against+women+of+childbearing+age+germany&source=bl&ots=7nQHGaSavK&sig=v-e9AjoKhz7PxHzaUOfwPXD_7zw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiz3IXkqu7KAhUMy2MKHbCWA2gQ6AEINjAD#v=onepage&q=child-bearing&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=26FB_ny0tVsC&pg=PA114&lpg=... Or any of those many other reasons that people talk about that explain the statistic? The issue isn't as black and white as you want to make it. I know it's also due to socialization, but do we really want to change the entire society just to shoehorn exactly 50% in our employee statistics? Diversity increases performance. So yes, yes we do. Most women I know don't want to go into tech-jobs because they think it's fucking boring. Live with it, people! I guess all those programmers who were originally women back when men saw it is as "secretary" work and there wasn't a lot of money in it just absolutely found technology boring. Or all those game-designers/programmers who were women, before it became popular and the market crashed? No, you're right, there can be no other explanations. If a woman is passionate about something, and pursues it, it will work out for her. Just have to navigate all that there discrimination and sexual harassment and it'll be totally fine. Oh, and why don't people go berserk because we have like 96% women as educators Perhaps we can discuss why men aren't seeking those positions.
  - geofft 11y ago
    > They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers Admittedly, this is about (academic) science, not tech, but Neil deGrasse Tyson disagrees: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7ihNLEDiuM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7ihNLEDiuM
- hsod 11y ago
  I agree with you that this is great but > The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. I don't like this logic. The news media has their own agenda, we shouldn't use "what they choose to write about" as a barometer.
  - jusben1369 11y ago
    Well the news media write about a lot of things but that's different to being newsworthy. Readers decide that. It's why Yahoo's homepage might have a story about a wounded war veteran returning home next to one of Kim and Kayne. When Kim and Kayne get 10x or 100x the shares it's not Yahoo's fault right?
  - warfangle 11y ago
    > The news media has their own agenda, we shouldn't use "what they choose to write about" as a barometer. I don't like this logic. It presumes that there's some dark cabal of web journalists conspiring to change the world. Unfortunately their agenda is typically, 'will we get advertising revenue from our target demographic by publishing this?' Nothing more sinister than that. And given this was published to, uh, a _news site for and about POC_ and not a tech news site.... (take a look at the domain, maybe?) what nefarious agenda could they POSSIBLY be running? Maybe one that promotes POC, and responds positively to a company that celebrates its diversity?
    - psycr 11y ago
      Frankly, this is wilfully ignorant. To suggest that the production of media is devoid of political or ideological interest beyond ad dollars is, I think, stretching the boundary of believability to a breaking point.
      - warfangle 11y ago
        Well, sure. It's pretty impossible to be completely unbiased. But the parent of my comment couched the phrase as if there's some dark cabal pushing some evil agenda. It reeked of a cis-gendered cis-sexual white male privilege soaked persecution complex.
- supernintendo 11y ago
  Thank you! It is rare to see a positive comment on Hacker News regarding diversity in tech.
EmitErwin 11y ago
Nice. Side question: Is slack really successful? I thought they were overvalued at 2.5 billion - 3 billion.
- molecule 11y ago
  > Side question: Is slack really successful? I thought they were overvalued at 2.5 billion - 3 billion. Either way, those two things are far from mutually exclusive.
- cookiecaper 11y ago
  Slack is a convenient messaging platform, even though there's nothing particularly innovative about it. It's essentially a web-based IRC client with a few obvious enhancements (object embedding, built-in cross-channel search, etc.). Slack is one of the most popular things to clone now that people realize that businesses will use an IRC clone if it's packaged correctly, so I wouldn't go putting all your eggs in the basket of Slack's longevity as a company.
eanzenberg 11y ago
That's cool. Now if only they could stop the slack client for OSX from crashing everytime on load with a spinning wheel of death and taking the rest of the system with it (only a force-quit will kill it) then that would be even cooler.
- leesalminen 11y ago
  I've never had this happen to me. I use Slack for OS X daily on a 2015 MBP and a 2012 Air.
- allendoerfer 11y ago
  I have chosen Hipchat, solely based on the fact that I can sometimes type faster than Slack's web interface can update, causing typos. All the feel-good stuff inside the interface that wants to make me love it, just makes this worse for me, because now I am thinking "You have had time to add that?! Make it fast first! It is a text-based chat, goddammit!!!11" Though Slack's mobile client is better.
vonklaus 11y ago
> "Tech companies, what's your excuse for your lack of diversity? We're diverse and successful. Now what?" Well minorities, as that descriptor might point out are minorities relative to the population. So there are less of them. Also, less of the "underrepresented" classes of people are underrepresented because they didn't formally or informally study engineering. I think it is pretty good that Slack did this. The cynical part of me of course sees it as a political stunt, but on balance it does serve a purpose. It does stand out as such an irregularity that 4 black women would receive an award for technology and engineering that it is actully very unexpected. While there are obvious reasons that these demographics are not regular recipients, it is still fairly disappointing that such a display is as shocking as it was. I understand issues like this need visability, but many times the author comes to the conclusion (as does on of the speakers it seems) that we should just hire more minorities/women/lgbt etc.? Like from fucking where? There aren't X demographic in tech because there isn't X Demographic in tech. You can't move a finite number of something around and change a percentage. Obvious. We have a shitty pipeline and we are working on fixing it. I think an alright job has been done, but no one will know how effective it was for 4-10 years as the people going through these programs grow and develop as people and engineers and become successful. I look forward to that. Affirmative action is rediculously stupid. Creating a fair playing feild, especially at the training level (school, society, norms, etc) is paramount to a strong society and it isn't just diversity for diversities sake. edit: I want to share an anecdote, which is indicative of why I think this way. Several years ago I went to a code bootcamp. I became close with another student who was one of the top guys in our class of ~40. He went to some shitty online MBA program IIRC but he had worked his ass off and paid for it himself as well as this bootcamp which was >10k at the time. He might of got like $500 off for being black. Another student was also a minority. I know she received scholarship and significant tuition reduction. She also had a lot of trouble with the work, and I do not think she prepared as well as she could have. She took offense to a lot of the jokes and things and complained. I think some jokes were crass, not sure if it was racial but maybe some sexual harassment type stuff. Not physical, just general bro-type humor. A few other students also complained and we had a 2 hour talk about race and sexual harassment. My buddy said some pretty funny stuff during that and we cleared it up. It was pretty evident though that: * He was obviously aware he was a minority * Didn't want to be treated differently and had grown up with people doing that his whole life (positively and mostly negatively) * On balance, he was pissed off he had to waste 2 hours not coding and working talking about this bullshit. He worked his fucking ass off, was the guy many people turned to for help and he was putting himself entirely through the program (quite a risk considering he had just left a good paying job and had a kid and another on the way). He was later hired at a fairly prominent tech company as an engineer. He had to learn a new skillset quickly as they used a different stack than he was accustomed to. It isn't fair to him to say he got where he was because he was black. Complaining and asking for people to accomadate you is not as successful of a strategy as outworking everyone. If you have been the victim of something that violates the law, that is quite different. If you see someone say "slut" or "bitch" in hipchat or whatever, I would try to ignore it and get to a point in your career where you can set the culture if you disagree with it.
jsf666 11y ago
Could someone explain me how more blacks make the product or company better. Why this isn't also directed to other races/minorites (Asians maybe)? We really should stop treating minorites like some special snowflake with this racism and sexism towards whites and men
- jsf666 11y ago
  Okay just try to bury my opinion with downvotes. Fight harder for "equality" leftist facists
  - frign 11y ago
    I'm with you brother. It's a hard fact to accept that the majority of the tech-world is leftist. And for those who think I'm wrong: Imagine company X sent 4 white blond-haired blue-eyed women on the stage with a "message" of this kind. Double-standards anybody? Also, somebody has to explain to me how exactly the products of a company magically become better when more minorities worked on it. When I engage in work with people, I don't care what their skin color is or if they are male or female. People embracing this culture of unfairness (because it's unfair to favor minorities over better-qualified non-minority applicants) should rethink what they are doing and who they are cheering at.
    - wavefunction 11y ago
      I strongly disagree with your contention that the majority of the tech-world is left-leaning in their politics. I have met many libertarians and conservative tech-workers in my almost eighteen years working in development.
      - frign 11y ago
        I bet it's part of where we had our experiences. In Germany, it's almost exclusively leftist. It doesn't get in my way, because I care about the technology and don't think politics have a place there, but many people do strongly put both in one bin (if you allow me, I noticed that these are mostly people who do not really shine with their code contributions and want to "contribute" in other ways instead of improving their skills).
ondrae 11y ago
You all are tripping. You've decided that those women were being patronized? Thats where you start from, your own bias? https://twitter.com/EricaJoy/status/697237904662204416 https://twitter.com/EricaJoy/status/697237904662204416
minimaxir 11y ago
Backstage interview with the Slack engineers: http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/09/slack-wins-for-fastest-rising-startup/ http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/09/slack-wins-for-fastest-risi...
exstudent2 11y ago
As a minority, I have to admit that this new fad of "diversity" feels really, really wrong. I want to be judged by my contributions, not my race. I don't want to tell anyone (including white males) that they should take a step back so others can stand in the spotlight. If you're passionate about what you do and you're good at it, that's all that should matter. I also find all this focus on "PoC" to be infantilizing, patronizing and objectifying. I'm a human not a pawn in the game of political correctness. I'm also confident enough in my skills that I don't want or need anyone making exceptions for me.
- frank0631 11y ago
  Well put. +1
- splintercell 11y ago
  You don't understand, you lack a certain privilege (or probably have it, depending upon whether we can convince you). You may be a 'minority', but if you are Asian or Indian, then you don't count because you're not an underprivileged minority.
  - exstudent2 11y ago
    I'm hispanic (not that it should matter!) and grew up dirt poor. Yes, I lacked the privilege of many of my now peers. In the end though I've built a successful career for myself. I'm proud at having done that through working hard and being good at what I do. My ethnicity is only a distraction to my tale.
    - splintercell 11y ago
      Do you disagree that there are underprivileged hispanics, or people who were in a similar situation as you, but didn't "make it"?? What solution do you suggest for them?
      - exstudent2 11y ago
        There are absolutely underprivileged people of every race! I happened to grow up around poor hispanics and whites. I would say on average that the hispanics have actually faired a bit better due to (imho) a stronger family culture that offered a bit of a support net. A lot of the poor white people I know ended up in legal trouble or worse, actually dead. The solution that I would advocate for is one of individual responsibility and confidence to make your own choices. Nearly everyone I grew up around (regardless of race) thought it was "lame" that I was into technology. Having the strength to follow your passions in the face of that pressure is key. In fact I would say pressure from people of my own background to continue their lifestyle was much harder to overcome than the small amount of discrimination I've faced in the professional world. It sounds almost too good to be true, but in the tech industry, if you can write great code you will succeed.
revelation 11y ago
Let me just be the devil's advocate here and suggest that (minority) engineers might not enjoy being asked to do public duties unrelated to their actual job in order to give their company an image of being progressive and diverse.
- exstudent2 11y ago
  I said as much in my sibling comment. It's dehumanzing to be viewed as a representative of your race when all you want to do is write code and pursue the career you're passionate about. I think it's also dangerous to provide this PR-esque track for advancement that has nothing to do with your skills. People should be judge by their actual contributions and not who they are.
- chris_wot 11y ago
  Or it could be that Slack are actually progressive and have a diverse workforce and these developers were very happy to accept an award on behalf of their company due to working in a place that they love working for.
- itp 11y ago
  I do see what you're getting at. But this situation at least seems more like four engineers, all women of color, were asked to take on additional public duties to reflect what appears to be a sincere initiative on the part of their company to be progressive and diverse. There's a fairly crucial difference there.
obeid 11y ago
Actual scientific studies proved that more diverse teams do better in problem-solving. Listen to Reply All episode #52 for more info https://gimletmedia.com/episode/52-raising-the-bar/ https://gimletmedia.com/episode/52-raising-the-bar/
- itsdrewmiller 11y ago
  Also specifically wrt programming projects: https://bvasiles.github.io/papers/chi15.pdf https://bvasiles.github.io/papers/chi15.pdf
  - xiaoma 11y ago
    Thanks for sharing that.
- contravert 11y ago
  There is diversity and then there's "diversity". This is ultimately a Americentric political movement. You only see American demographics as targets, ignoring the vast number of immigrants and foreign students that enter the industry. When is the last time you heard someone advocating for more linguistic or geographic diversity? If these diversity advocates truly care about these studies for something other than political gain, they would be at the front lines advocating for more H1-Bs.
- xiaoma 11y ago
  Paypal's cofounder made the argument for homogeneity in the book Zero to One. Not only were the founders of the typical demographic mix but they were also ideologically similar. They were all libertarian and all believed a digital currency would displace the US dollar. That was a very fringe view 15 years ago. They were fantastically successful, even after Paypal. Many other successful teams are 100% Asian or 100% Jewish in early days. I love working in diverse, multi-ethnic teams, but based on what I've observed more diverse teams seem to be a wash at best in terms of results in the US and are a significant liability in China (possibly due to the demographics of the target market). Possibly the most egregious example in the US would be Facebook. Not only were the employees narrow demographically, they also went to the same schools, were all in their early twenties or teens and the CEO publicly said like it was important to be "young and technical" and that young people were "just smarter". From everything I've read about it, it was basically run like a frat while it was bulldozing all competition in its path. (Snapchat appears to be a sequel of this story) What sorts of problem-solving did the study look at? Is there a way to reconcile it with the conflicting outcomes from basically all the hugely successful startups except for Slack (assuming its founding team was diverse)?
hnamazon123 11y ago
I'm an male Ashkenazi Jew. I don't look stereotypically Jewish so I don't claim to fully be able to relate to these women and their experiences but if the startup I work for now asked me to accept an award on its behalf because I'm a Jew, I would feel incredibly patronized and would start looking for other work.
- jusben1369 11y ago
  But let's say you were asked to accept an award on behalf of your company from a group that had a troubled history of anti-semitic sentiment and it was thought that, amongst this group, there were still large swaths of members who held anti-semitic beliefs. Would you feel patronized and start job searching?
  - hnamazon123 11y ago
    Yes, if I worked at Ford or at IBM or some other firm with past antisemitic connections I would feel even more patronized. I'm a person, not a prop to be used by a corporation to score social points.
    - tptacek 11y ago
      Has some corporation made you feel like you were being used as a "prop" to "score social points"? All the evidence in this story points to the conclusion that these particular people do not feel so used.
      - hnamazon123 11y ago
        Right, so it's interesting to consider why they don't feel used. Considering this was done consciously what is message we are meant to come away with? Is it a) to show the world that black women can be engineers at successful companies? b) to show the world that companies can be successful with black women engineers? c) to show the world that companies are more successful with black women engineers? In each of those cases what are the implications of them not feeling like a prop?
draw_down 11y ago
Cool. I hope they get equity too, not just award-show glory.
beatpanda 11y ago
I don't use slack, I don't even like the idea of slack, but boy, are they killing it when it comes to trying to make the tech industry a better place. They also gave their employees MLK day off. Excellent work all around. This is especially important given that only 3% of San Francisco's black population remains in the city, as economic pressure, along with intentional malfeasance on the part of the city government, has pushed most of them out over the last few decades. It's neat that lots of high paying jobs are available in the Bay Area, but it won't really mean anything until the people who suffered through the hard times here are able to take part in the good times instead of being forced out of the way of progress. So, thanks slack, it's a hard time to live in this part of the world right now but it seems like you all are really making an effort.
sealthedeal 11y ago
Honestly, its kinda disgusting. Its like they are showing them off as a prize or something...
heisnotanalien 11y ago
Diversity is so in right now. This is the just another way for white high-status individuals to show that's they're not just rich BUT also MORALLY better than you. I can just see the execs at Slack, sitting back in their chair in some posh SF restaurant, recounting to their friends how they got four BLACK WOMEN to accept an award for them.
- tootie 11y ago
  That's awfully cynical. I think they just wanted to send a message that diversity can pay dividends on it's own. Can't we just be happy for Slack and for these women?
  - ferrari8608 11y ago
    Cynical it may be, and sure we can be happy for Slack. He's right though, at least in that is what this looks like.
- tptacek 11y ago
  You're arguing that stories about racial and gender diversity overshadow some larger story about class divisions in Silicon Valley. Fine. I agree that there are real issues of class in tech startups. But I'm left wondering: stipulate that class is an issue, would you prefer to see less racial and gender diversity?
  - heisnotanalien 11y ago
    Honestly I'm not very well versed in this space to have a real opinion. On a personal level, I judge people by their abilities rather than their race or gender though I fully appreciate that there are difficulties with this. It does seem to me that class isn't talked about though. Sorry but a middle-class Ivy league black woman is not of a lower status than a white working-class male.
  - heisnotanalien 11y ago
    Honestly I'm not very well versed in this space to have a real opinion. On a personal level, I judge people by their abilities rather than their race or gender though I fully appreciate that there are difficulties with this. It does seem to me that class isn't talked about though. Sorry but a middle-class Ivy league black woman is not of a lower status than a white working-class male.
warfangle 11y ago
This headline is editorializing (compared with the link) and kind of throwing the discussion off base, isn't it?
- dang 11y ago
  I'm not sure it is, since both the title and the story highlight the same detail. What do you suggest as a better title?
logfromblammo 11y ago
As an introvert, for whom standing up in front of a crowd to receive an award and maybe even give a speech would be the purest and most excruciating of torments, my first thought was "Sure, go ahead and give them the scut work, you racist, sexist jerks." But then I remembered that other people actually like doing that sort of thing. Aside from that, I'm pretty antipathic toward identity politics. It's a lot like attaching a long lever to your own head that lets other people control where it points, which is often just a way to ensure you are not looking at something genuinely concerning that is in a different direction. For instance, I heard on NPR's ATC a few days ago a segment on how feminists are pressuring women to support Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination because she is a woman. But that doesn't tell me jack squat about whether she shares or supports my values. It was just a bunch of people grabbing an identity politics lever and yanking on it. So gestures like this make me nervous. It makes me feel as though someone is trying to manipulate my emotions for their own gain, except I cannot fathom how anyone could possibly gain from it.
SmokyBorbon 11y ago
"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their Github." What does skin color have to do with technical ability, Slack?
imartin2k 11y ago
Watching this video actually gave me goosebumps.

77 points by frandroid 11y ago

lomgm 11y ago

You know essentially nothing about the situation, but you're willing to shit on it. That's gross, that's gutless, and that's lame. IOW: it's exactly what passes for 'top comment' on HN. saltman: you're not an asshole. Why do you take steps to enable and perpetuate a culture of assholes?

dang 11y ago
Please stop trolling Hacker News. We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11076118 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11076118 and marked it off-topic.

pmilot 11y ago

That is a great move no matter how you look at it. I applaud the Slack team for this! The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. As a society we should try to find more ways to encourage women and minorities of all sorts to get into this industry.

jsf666 11y ago
>The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. As a society we should try to find more ways to encourage women and minorities of all sorts to get into this industry. Why? What's the benefit from this? They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers
- itp 11y ago
  > They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers Even if I interpret that to merely mean actively barred, I still don't think it's true. But women and minorities are certainly passively barred from these kind of careers. By virtue of opportunity, environment, peer group, role model, education, and all sorts of passive mechanisms.
  - jsf666 11y ago
    That's why colleges discriminate against whites and asians? I want to be judged and to judge by merit, not by some leftist agenda of "equality". And you come up with this argument without any proof, only that it's "well-known". I would like to see the numbers, if you may.
    - frign 11y ago
      In Germany, a "study" is often cited saying that men were better paid than women. However, peer review uncovered that the media covering this study omitted the fact that the women also worked less hours than men and thus got less money (obviously). This however does not stop "female-rights-activists" from citing it over and over again. I'm sick of it. I also don't like the notion that women are portraied as victims here. Most women I know don't want to go into tech-jobs because they think it's fucking boring. Live with it, people! I know it's also due to socialization, but do we really want to change the entire society just to shoehorn exactly 50% in our employee statistics? Who benefits from this? I know no woman who is sad because she just can't get hold in a tech job. If a woman is passionate about something, and pursues it, it will work out for her. Same with men of course. Oh, and why don't people go berserk because we have like 96% women as educators (kindergartens, pre-schools, ...). Oh yeah, right, I know, because you can't earn as much money with that.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - lsgrep 11y ago
        the fact that the women also worked less hours than men Why is that? Could it be that women are still subject to traditional roles, even in advanced countries like Germany? http://ec.europa.eu/justice/gender-equality/files/epo_campaign/country-profile_germany_en.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/justice/gender-equality/files/epo_campai... Or maybe that women of a certain age are discriminated against during the hiring process because of maternity leave? https://books.google.com/books?id=26FB_ny0tVsC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=discrimination+against+women+of+childbearing+age+germany&source=bl&ots=7nQHGaSavK&sig=v-e9AjoKhz7PxHzaUOfwPXD_7zw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiz3IXkqu7KAhUMy2MKHbCWA2gQ6AEINjAD#v=onepage&q=child-bearing&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=26FB_ny0tVsC&pg=PA114&lpg=... Or any of those many other reasons that people talk about that explain the statistic? The issue isn't as black and white as you want to make it. I know it's also due to socialization, but do we really want to change the entire society just to shoehorn exactly 50% in our employee statistics? Diversity increases performance. So yes, yes we do. Most women I know don't want to go into tech-jobs because they think it's fucking boring. Live with it, people! I guess all those programmers who were originally women back when men saw it is as "secretary" work and there wasn't a lot of money in it just absolutely found technology boring. Or all those game-designers/programmers who were women, before it became popular and the market crashed? No, you're right, there can be no other explanations. If a woman is passionate about something, and pursues it, it will work out for her. Just have to navigate all that there discrimination and sexual harassment and it'll be totally fine. Oh, and why don't people go berserk because we have like 96% women as educators Perhaps we can discuss why men aren't seeking those positions.
- geofft 11y ago
  > They aren't barred in no way in pursuing these kind of careers Admittedly, this is about (academic) science, not tech, but Neil deGrasse Tyson disagrees: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7ihNLEDiuM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7ihNLEDiuM
hsod 11y ago
I agree with you that this is great but > The very fact that this is newsworthy says a lot about the lack of diversity in our industry. I don't like this logic. The news media has their own agenda, we shouldn't use "what they choose to write about" as a barometer.
- jusben1369 11y ago
  Well the news media write about a lot of things but that's different to being newsworthy. Readers decide that. It's why Yahoo's homepage might have a story about a wounded war veteran returning home next to one of Kim and Kayne. When Kim and Kayne get 10x or 100x the shares it's not Yahoo's fault right?
- warfangle 11y ago
  > The news media has their own agenda, we shouldn't use "what they choose to write about" as a barometer. I don't like this logic. It presumes that there's some dark cabal of web journalists conspiring to change the world. Unfortunately their agenda is typically, 'will we get advertising revenue from our target demographic by publishing this?' Nothing more sinister than that. And given this was published to, uh, a _news site for and about POC_ and not a tech news site.... (take a look at the domain, maybe?) what nefarious agenda could they POSSIBLY be running? Maybe one that promotes POC, and responds positively to a company that celebrates its diversity?
  - psycr 11y ago
    Frankly, this is wilfully ignorant. To suggest that the production of media is devoid of political or ideological interest beyond ad dollars is, I think, stretching the boundary of believability to a breaking point.
    - warfangle 11y ago
      Well, sure. It's pretty impossible to be completely unbiased. But the parent of my comment couched the phrase as if there's some dark cabal pushing some evil agenda. It reeked of a cis-gendered cis-sexual white male privilege soaked persecution complex.
supernintendo 11y ago
Thank you! It is rare to see a positive comment on Hacker News regarding diversity in tech.

EmitErwin 11y ago

Nice. Side question: Is slack really successful? I thought they were overvalued at 2.5 billion - 3 billion.

molecule 11y ago
> Side question: Is slack really successful? I thought they were overvalued at 2.5 billion - 3 billion. Either way, those two things are far from mutually exclusive.
cookiecaper 11y ago
Slack is a convenient messaging platform, even though there's nothing particularly innovative about it. It's essentially a web-based IRC client with a few obvious enhancements (object embedding, built-in cross-channel search, etc.). Slack is one of the most popular things to clone now that people realize that businesses will use an IRC clone if it's packaged correctly, so I wouldn't go putting all your eggs in the basket of Slack's longevity as a company.

eanzenberg 11y ago

That's cool. Now if only they could stop the slack client for OSX from crashing everytime on load with a spinning wheel of death and taking the rest of the system with it (only a force-quit will kill it) then that would be even cooler.

leesalminen 11y ago
I've never had this happen to me. I use Slack for OS X daily on a 2015 MBP and a 2012 Air.
allendoerfer 11y ago
I have chosen Hipchat, solely based on the fact that I can sometimes type faster than Slack's web interface can update, causing typos. All the feel-good stuff inside the interface that wants to make me love it, just makes this worse for me, because now I am thinking "You have had time to add that?! Make it fast first! It is a text-based chat, goddammit!!!11" Though Slack's mobile client is better.

vonklaus 11y ago

> "Tech companies, what's your excuse for your lack of diversity? We're diverse and successful. Now what?" Well minorities, as that descriptor might point out are minorities relative to the population. So there are less of them. Also, less of the "underrepresented" classes of people are underrepresented because they didn't formally or informally study engineering. I think it is pretty good that Slack did this. The cynical part of me of course sees it as a political stunt, but on balance it does serve a purpose. It does stand out as such an irregularity that 4 black women would receive an award for technology and engineering that it is actully very unexpected. While there are obvious reasons that these demographics are not regular recipients, it is still fairly disappointing that such a display is as shocking as it was. I understand issues like this need visability, but many times the author comes to the conclusion (as does on of the speakers it seems) that we should just hire more minorities/women/lgbt etc.? Like from fucking where? There aren't X demographic in tech because there isn't X Demographic in tech. You can't move a finite number of something around and change a percentage. Obvious. We have a shitty pipeline and we are working on fixing it. I think an alright job has been done, but no one will know how effective it was for 4-10 years as the people going through these programs grow and develop as people and engineers and become successful. I look forward to that. Affirmative action is rediculously stupid. Creating a fair playing feild, especially at the training level (school, society, norms, etc) is paramount to a strong society and it isn't just diversity for diversities sake. edit: I want to share an anecdote, which is indicative of why I think this way. Several years ago I went to a code bootcamp. I became close with another student who was one of the top guys in our class of ~40. He went to some shitty online MBA program IIRC but he had worked his ass off and paid for it himself as well as this bootcamp which was >10k at the time. He might of got like $500 off for being black. Another student was also a minority. I know she received scholarship and significant tuition reduction. She also had a lot of trouble with the work, and I do not think she prepared as well as she could have. She took offense to a lot of the jokes and things and complained. I think some jokes were crass, not sure if it was racial but maybe some sexual harassment type stuff. Not physical, just general bro-type humor. A few other students also complained and we had a 2 hour talk about race and sexual harassment. My buddy said some pretty funny stuff during that and we cleared it up. It was pretty evident though that: * He was obviously aware he was a minority * Didn't want to be treated differently and had grown up with people doing that his whole life (positively and mostly negatively) * On balance, he was pissed off he had to waste 2 hours not coding and working talking about this bullshit. He worked his fucking ass off, was the guy many people turned to for help and he was putting himself entirely through the program (quite a risk considering he had just left a good paying job and had a kid and another on the way). He was later hired at a fairly prominent tech company as an engineer. He had to learn a new skillset quickly as they used a different stack than he was accustomed to. It isn't fair to him to say he got where he was because he was black. Complaining and asking for people to accomadate you is not as successful of a strategy as outworking everyone. If you have been the victim of something that violates the law, that is quite different. If you see someone say "slut" or "bitch" in hipchat or whatever, I would try to ignore it and get to a point in your career where you can set the culture if you disagree with it.

jsf666 11y ago

Could someone explain me how more blacks make the product or company better. Why this isn't also directed to other races/minorites (Asians maybe)? We really should stop treating minorites like some special snowflake with this racism and sexism towards whites and men

jsf666 11y ago
Okay just try to bury my opinion with downvotes. Fight harder for "equality" leftist facists
- frign 11y ago
  I'm with you brother. It's a hard fact to accept that the majority of the tech-world is leftist. And for those who think I'm wrong: Imagine company X sent 4 white blond-haired blue-eyed women on the stage with a "message" of this kind. Double-standards anybody? Also, somebody has to explain to me how exactly the products of a company magically become better when more minorities worked on it. When I engage in work with people, I don't care what their skin color is or if they are male or female. People embracing this culture of unfairness (because it's unfair to favor minorities over better-qualified non-minority applicants) should rethink what they are doing and who they are cheering at.
  - wavefunction 11y ago
    I strongly disagree with your contention that the majority of the tech-world is left-leaning in their politics. I have met many libertarians and conservative tech-workers in my almost eighteen years working in development.
    - frign 11y ago
      I bet it's part of where we had our experiences. In Germany, it's almost exclusively leftist. It doesn't get in my way, because I care about the technology and don't think politics have a place there, but many people do strongly put both in one bin (if you allow me, I noticed that these are mostly people who do not really shine with their code contributions and want to "contribute" in other ways instead of improving their skills).

ondrae 11y ago

You all are tripping. You've decided that those women were being patronized? Thats where you start from, your own bias? https://twitter.com/EricaJoy/status/697237904662204416 https://twitter.com/EricaJoy/status/697237904662204416

minimaxir 11y ago

Backstage interview with the Slack engineers: http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/09/slack-wins-for-fastest-rising-startup/ http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/09/slack-wins-for-fastest-risi...

exstudent2 11y ago

As a minority, I have to admit that this new fad of "diversity" feels really, really wrong. I want to be judged by my contributions, not my race. I don't want to tell anyone (including white males) that they should take a step back so others can stand in the spotlight. If you're passionate about what you do and you're good at it, that's all that should matter. I also find all this focus on "PoC" to be infantilizing, patronizing and objectifying. I'm a human not a pawn in the game of political correctness. I'm also confident enough in my skills that I don't want or need anyone making exceptions for me.

frank0631 11y ago
Well put. +1
splintercell 11y ago
You don't understand, you lack a certain privilege (or probably have it, depending upon whether we can convince you). You may be a 'minority', but if you are Asian or Indian, then you don't count because you're not an underprivileged minority.
- exstudent2 11y ago
  I'm hispanic (not that it should matter!) and grew up dirt poor. Yes, I lacked the privilege of many of my now peers. In the end though I've built a successful career for myself. I'm proud at having done that through working hard and being good at what I do. My ethnicity is only a distraction to my tale.
  - splintercell 11y ago
    Do you disagree that there are underprivileged hispanics, or people who were in a similar situation as you, but didn't "make it"?? What solution do you suggest for them?
    - exstudent2 11y ago
      There are absolutely underprivileged people of every race! I happened to grow up around poor hispanics and whites. I would say on average that the hispanics have actually faired a bit better due to (imho) a stronger family culture that offered a bit of a support net. A lot of the poor white people I know ended up in legal trouble or worse, actually dead. The solution that I would advocate for is one of individual responsibility and confidence to make your own choices. Nearly everyone I grew up around (regardless of race) thought it was "lame" that I was into technology. Having the strength to follow your passions in the face of that pressure is key. In fact I would say pressure from people of my own background to continue their lifestyle was much harder to overcome than the small amount of discrimination I've faced in the professional world. It sounds almost too good to be true, but in the tech industry, if you can write great code you will succeed.

revelation 11y ago

Let me just be the devil's advocate here and suggest that (minority) engineers might not enjoy being asked to do public duties unrelated to their actual job in order to give their company an image of being progressive and diverse.

exstudent2 11y ago
I said as much in my sibling comment. It's dehumanzing to be viewed as a representative of your race when all you want to do is write code and pursue the career you're passionate about. I think it's also dangerous to provide this PR-esque track for advancement that has nothing to do with your skills. People should be judge by their actual contributions and not who they are.
chris_wot 11y ago
Or it could be that Slack are actually progressive and have a diverse workforce and these developers were very happy to accept an award on behalf of their company due to working in a place that they love working for.
itp 11y ago
I do see what you're getting at. But this situation at least seems more like four engineers, all women of color, were asked to take on additional public duties to reflect what appears to be a sincere initiative on the part of their company to be progressive and diverse. There's a fairly crucial difference there.

obeid 11y ago

Actual scientific studies proved that more diverse teams do better in problem-solving. Listen to Reply All episode #52 for more info https://gimletmedia.com/episode/52-raising-the-bar/ https://gimletmedia.com/episode/52-raising-the-bar/

itsdrewmiller 11y ago
Also specifically wrt programming projects: https://bvasiles.github.io/papers/chi15.pdf https://bvasiles.github.io/papers/chi15.pdf
- xiaoma 11y ago
  Thanks for sharing that.
contravert 11y ago
There is diversity and then there's "diversity". This is ultimately a Americentric political movement. You only see American demographics as targets, ignoring the vast number of immigrants and foreign students that enter the industry. When is the last time you heard someone advocating for more linguistic or geographic diversity? If these diversity advocates truly care about these studies for something other than political gain, they would be at the front lines advocating for more H1-Bs.
xiaoma 11y ago
Paypal's cofounder made the argument for homogeneity in the book Zero to One. Not only were the founders of the typical demographic mix but they were also ideologically similar. They were all libertarian and all believed a digital currency would displace the US dollar. That was a very fringe view 15 years ago. They were fantastically successful, even after Paypal. Many other successful teams are 100% Asian or 100% Jewish in early days. I love working in diverse, multi-ethnic teams, but based on what I've observed more diverse teams seem to be a wash at best in terms of results in the US and are a significant liability in China (possibly due to the demographics of the target market). Possibly the most egregious example in the US would be Facebook. Not only were the employees narrow demographically, they also went to the same schools, were all in their early twenties or teens and the CEO publicly said like it was important to be "young and technical" and that young people were "just smarter". From everything I've read about it, it was basically run like a frat while it was bulldozing all competition in its path. (Snapchat appears to be a sequel of this story) What sorts of problem-solving did the study look at? Is there a way to reconcile it with the conflicting outcomes from basically all the hugely successful startups except for Slack (assuming its founding team was diverse)?

hnamazon123 11y ago

I'm an male Ashkenazi Jew. I don't look stereotypically Jewish so I don't claim to fully be able to relate to these women and their experiences but if the startup I work for now asked me to accept an award on its behalf because I'm a Jew, I would feel incredibly patronized and would start looking for other work.

jusben1369 11y ago
But let's say you were asked to accept an award on behalf of your company from a group that had a troubled history of anti-semitic sentiment and it was thought that, amongst this group, there were still large swaths of members who held anti-semitic beliefs. Would you feel patronized and start job searching?
- hnamazon123 11y ago
  Yes, if I worked at Ford or at IBM or some other firm with past antisemitic connections I would feel even more patronized. I'm a person, not a prop to be used by a corporation to score social points.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    Has some corporation made you feel like you were being used as a "prop" to "score social points"? All the evidence in this story points to the conclusion that these particular people do not feel so used.
    - hnamazon123 11y ago
      Right, so it's interesting to consider why they don't feel used. Considering this was done consciously what is message we are meant to come away with? Is it a) to show the world that black women can be engineers at successful companies? b) to show the world that companies can be successful with black women engineers? c) to show the world that companies are more successful with black women engineers? In each of those cases what are the implications of them not feeling like a prop?

draw_down 11y ago

Cool. I hope they get equity too, not just award-show glory.

beatpanda 11y ago

I don't use slack, I don't even like the idea of slack, but boy, are they killing it when it comes to trying to make the tech industry a better place. They also gave their employees MLK day off. Excellent work all around. This is especially important given that only 3% of San Francisco's black population remains in the city, as economic pressure, along with intentional malfeasance on the part of the city government, has pushed most of them out over the last few decades. It's neat that lots of high paying jobs are available in the Bay Area, but it won't really mean anything until the people who suffered through the hard times here are able to take part in the good times instead of being forced out of the way of progress. So, thanks slack, it's a hard time to live in this part of the world right now but it seems like you all are really making an effort.

sealthedeal 11y ago

Honestly, its kinda disgusting. Its like they are showing them off as a prize or something...

heisnotanalien 11y ago

Diversity is so in right now. This is the just another way for white high-status individuals to show that's they're not just rich BUT also MORALLY better than you. I can just see the execs at Slack, sitting back in their chair in some posh SF restaurant, recounting to their friends how they got four BLACK WOMEN to accept an award for them.

tootie 11y ago
That's awfully cynical. I think they just wanted to send a message that diversity can pay dividends on it's own. Can't we just be happy for Slack and for these women?
- ferrari8608 11y ago
  Cynical it may be, and sure we can be happy for Slack. He's right though, at least in that is what this looks like.
tptacek 11y ago
You're arguing that stories about racial and gender diversity overshadow some larger story about class divisions in Silicon Valley. Fine. I agree that there are real issues of class in tech startups. But I'm left wondering: stipulate that class is an issue, would you prefer to see less racial and gender diversity?
- heisnotanalien 11y ago
  Honestly I'm not very well versed in this space to have a real opinion. On a personal level, I judge people by their abilities rather than their race or gender though I fully appreciate that there are difficulties with this. It does seem to me that class isn't talked about though. Sorry but a middle-class Ivy league black woman is not of a lower status than a white working-class male.
- heisnotanalien 11y ago
  Honestly I'm not very well versed in this space to have a real opinion. On a personal level, I judge people by their abilities rather than their race or gender though I fully appreciate that there are difficulties with this. It does seem to me that class isn't talked about though. Sorry but a middle-class Ivy league black woman is not of a lower status than a white working-class male.

warfangle 11y ago

This headline is editorializing (compared with the link) and kind of throwing the discussion off base, isn't it?

dang 11y ago
I'm not sure it is, since both the title and the story highlight the same detail. What do you suggest as a better title?

logfromblammo 11y ago

As an introvert, for whom standing up in front of a crowd to receive an award and maybe even give a speech would be the purest and most excruciating of torments, my first thought was "Sure, go ahead and give them the scut work, you racist, sexist jerks." But then I remembered that other people actually like doing that sort of thing. Aside from that, I'm pretty antipathic toward identity politics. It's a lot like attaching a long lever to your own head that lets other people control where it points, which is often just a way to ensure you are not looking at something genuinely concerning that is in a different direction. For instance, I heard on NPR's ATC a few days ago a segment on how feminists are pressuring women to support Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination because she is a woman. But that doesn't tell me jack squat about whether she shares or supports my values. It was just a bunch of people grabbing an identity politics lever and yanking on it. So gestures like this make me nervous. It makes me feel as though someone is trying to manipulate my emotions for their own gain, except I cannot fathom how anyone could possibly gain from it.

SmokyBorbon 11y ago

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their Github." What does skin color have to do with technical ability, Slack?

imartin2k 11y ago

Watching this video actually gave me goosebumps.