4 ms·

I think the article mixes non-tech hiring problems with tech problems. I think tech is one of the only fields where your skin color really does not matter. We h

I think the article mixes non-tech hiring problems with tech problems. I think tech is one of the only fields where your skin color really does not matter. We hire people from far-flung countries who can barely communicate in english; we hire 17-year-olds who have not even finished highschool; we hire total misfits; etc., based solely on their technical expertise. So it bothers me to read crap like this: Research has found that during hiring, managers are biased against black-sounding names on résumés, for instance, and interviewers weigh too heavily whether they’d want to hang out with someone. This may happen in other jobs, but in my 20 years in tech, I have never seen this. Go to any good tech company, and see the odd folks walking about. And yet they'll have an issue with black or hispanic folks? I doubt it. Network does play a role, I will agree. But what plays a bigger role is your technical chops; and it is very easy today to demonstrate your skills via SO or Github.

deleted 11y ago
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duaneb 11y ago
> This may happen in other jobs, but in my 20 years in tech, I have never seen this. It's typically called "culture fit". EDIT: Not all culture fit is bad, I think it's important that people can work together. But it can easily disguise any number of subjective biases, many of which you may not be aware.
- staunch 11y ago
  Where "culture" really means class. Lower class culture vs upper class culture. Poor people make non-poor people very uncomfortable. The bar scene in Good Will Hunting is such a good example.
  - duaneb 11y ago
    I don't necessarily agree with this. There are a number of polarizing factors—ethnicity, religion, politics, age, having a family. Class is only one way to get filtered out.
  - dajohnson89 11y ago
    Class is part of it, but culture as a term is often expanded to mean whatever the hiring manager wants it to be.
p4wnc6 11y ago
I think a better response might be to say, depending on how strongly you evaluate the evidence, "Gee, my personal opinion about this might need to be revised or given less weight in light of broader trends and evidence." For example, bias against black-sounding names is a real thing. It doesn't really matter if you personally have seen it, or if you think you haven't seen it. It's still real and quantifiable. Most of us should continue to be skeptical that statistical analyses about these things must be carried out robustly and stand up to statistical grokking ... but conditional on that, believe the data and not your gut.
- 1024core 11y ago
  > believe the data and not your gut. Without considering where the data came from, under what assumptions was it collected, when was it collected, etc. how can you blindly lay faith in some "data"? I have some data which says N horses died on the streets of San Francisco last year; will you believe it? It just so happens that "last year" was 1895. Doesn't that make the "data" useless? Show me any other major industrial sector where a 17-year-old can start a company and be bought out for $30MM. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly Show me where highschool dropouts can make more than Harvard MBAs. Yes, tech has problems with gender or ageism; but skin color is hardly ever an issue. In fact, if it is, it is in the other direction. I had a friend who graduated from a top CS school and couldn't get a faculty position. The Chair at one department actually told him: if you were a woman or minority, I'd hire you right away. BTW: I'm not implying that everything is great. But compared to other sectors, tech is actually a pretty decent place to be if you don't "fit in" into the convention.
  - p4wnc6 11y ago
    I said conditional upon the data passing statistical grokking, then believe the data and not your gut. I should have made this conditionality more clear. I didn't say blindly believe the data or blindly believe your gut. But many people use their anecdotal experiences as justification to deny clearly significant trends because they personally "never observed it." > Show me any other major industrial sector where a 17-year-old can start a company and be bought out for $30MM. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly Show me where highschool dropouts can make more than Harvard MBAs. In a lot of ways these are not good things about our field. They represent a lot of the ways that toxic culture and a flight from quality are pervasive in tech. In tech, it's rarely about actually adding value and often much more about extracting rents from marketing and status. Just like it is in tons of other fields. Tech is not like this because tech is more meritocratic. Tech is absolutely not meritocratic. > but skin color is hardly ever an issue. What are you basing this on? As far as I can tell, only your vague assessment of your personal observations. OK. That's not nothing. But because a lot of people present compelling arguments that it is an issue, I'm generally not just going to take some anecdotal reasoning. There are other explanations. Maybe you've been around racial bias and just not noticed it. Or maybe you've been extremely lucky to avoid being near it. Either of those are more plausible that the unlikely case that your anecdotal experience just happens to be more representative than all of the principled studies (which yes, always have flaws, but no that's not a good reason to believe their basic premise is entirely wrong).
bilbo0s 11y ago
> This may happen in other jobs, but in my 20 years in tech, I have never seen this. I've been in Tech about 25 to 30 years. I'm sad to report that I have seen it happen a time or two in tech. But what I will say... is that before I went into "pure" tech, it happened in other fields in a much more overt manner. I was a peon at DDB Needham in Chicago a long time ago and was talking to a friend of mine when one of the VP's came into her cube. The VP wanted her to go through the resumes and circular file all of the ones who were black. My friend asked how would she know if they were black... the woman said "Oh... you'll know. Look at the names." As it happened some other friends of mine were talking about starting a company using this really cool thing called "WinSock" to do networking. So I went home that night and joined them. I'd had enough of the BigCo lifestyle. Two really good exits later ... here I am. So I really ought to thank that VP lady. I ran into that attitude a couple of times in tech over the 25 or so years since then... but not NEARLY as often as when I was doing the BigCo thing. It does happen though. And I tended to run away from those people as fast and as far as I could.

deleted 11y ago

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duaneb 11y ago

> This may happen in other jobs, but in my 20 years in tech, I have never seen this. It's typically called "culture fit". EDIT: Not all culture fit is bad, I think it's important that people can work together. But it can easily disguise any number of subjective biases, many of which you may not be aware.

staunch 11y ago
Where "culture" really means class. Lower class culture vs upper class culture. Poor people make non-poor people very uncomfortable. The bar scene in Good Will Hunting is such a good example.
- duaneb 11y ago
  I don't necessarily agree with this. There are a number of polarizing factors—ethnicity, religion, politics, age, having a family. Class is only one way to get filtered out.
- dajohnson89 11y ago
  Class is part of it, but culture as a term is often expanded to mean whatever the hiring manager wants it to be.

p4wnc6 11y ago

I think a better response might be to say, depending on how strongly you evaluate the evidence, "Gee, my personal opinion about this might need to be revised or given less weight in light of broader trends and evidence." For example, bias against black-sounding names is a real thing. It doesn't really matter if you personally have seen it, or if you think you haven't seen it. It's still real and quantifiable. Most of us should continue to be skeptical that statistical analyses about these things must be carried out robustly and stand up to statistical grokking ... but conditional on that, believe the data and not your gut.

1024core 11y ago
> believe the data and not your gut. Without considering where the data came from, under what assumptions was it collected, when was it collected, etc. how can you blindly lay faith in some "data"? I have some data which says N horses died on the streets of San Francisco last year; will you believe it? It just so happens that "last year" was 1895. Doesn't that make the "data" useless? Show me any other major industrial sector where a 17-year-old can start a company and be bought out for $30MM. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly Show me where highschool dropouts can make more than Harvard MBAs. Yes, tech has problems with gender or ageism; but skin color is hardly ever an issue. In fact, if it is, it is in the other direction. I had a friend who graduated from a top CS school and couldn't get a faculty position. The Chair at one department actually told him: if you were a woman or minority, I'd hire you right away. BTW: I'm not implying that everything is great. But compared to other sectors, tech is actually a pretty decent place to be if you don't "fit in" into the convention.
- p4wnc6 11y ago
  I said conditional upon the data passing statistical grokking, then believe the data and not your gut. I should have made this conditionality more clear. I didn't say blindly believe the data or blindly believe your gut. But many people use their anecdotal experiences as justification to deny clearly significant trends because they personally "never observed it." > Show me any other major industrial sector where a 17-year-old can start a company and be bought out for $30MM. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_D'Aloisio#Summly Show me where highschool dropouts can make more than Harvard MBAs. In a lot of ways these are not good things about our field. They represent a lot of the ways that toxic culture and a flight from quality are pervasive in tech. In tech, it's rarely about actually adding value and often much more about extracting rents from marketing and status. Just like it is in tons of other fields. Tech is not like this because tech is more meritocratic. Tech is absolutely not meritocratic. > but skin color is hardly ever an issue. What are you basing this on? As far as I can tell, only your vague assessment of your personal observations. OK. That's not nothing. But because a lot of people present compelling arguments that it is an issue, I'm generally not just going to take some anecdotal reasoning. There are other explanations. Maybe you've been around racial bias and just not noticed it. Or maybe you've been extremely lucky to avoid being near it. Either of those are more plausible that the unlikely case that your anecdotal experience just happens to be more representative than all of the principled studies (which yes, always have flaws, but no that's not a good reason to believe their basic premise is entirely wrong).

bilbo0s 11y ago

> This may happen in other jobs, but in my 20 years in tech, I have never seen this. I've been in Tech about 25 to 30 years. I'm sad to report that I have seen it happen a time or two in tech. But what I will say... is that before I went into "pure" tech, it happened in other fields in a much more overt manner. I was a peon at DDB Needham in Chicago a long time ago and was talking to a friend of mine when one of the VP's came into her cube. The VP wanted her to go through the resumes and circular file all of the ones who were black. My friend asked how would she know if they were black... the woman said "Oh... you'll know. Look at the names." As it happened some other friends of mine were talking about starting a company using this really cool thing called "WinSock" to do networking. So I went home that night and joined them. I'd had enough of the BigCo lifestyle. Two really good exits later ... here I am. So I really ought to thank that VP lady. I ran into that attitude a couple of times in tech over the 25 or so years since then... but not NEARLY as often as when I was doing the BigCo thing. It does happen though. And I tended to run away from those people as fast and as far as I could.