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One critical point I feel this piece does not touch on is how diversity of experience is great in the workplace. It's a huge benefit as a developer (and obvious

One critical point I feel this piece does not touch on is how diversity of experience is great in the workplace. It's a huge benefit as a developer (and obviously other professions too) to work on teams with people who have lived very different lives. The Mirrortocracy[0] covers this well, but it should be clear to us all that being exposed to different views helps refine our ideas and process. It's partly up to us to make diversity happen. We can prioritize offers that have diverse teams, and when we get a chance to hire to value diversity of experience. [0] http://carlos.bueno.org/2014/06/mirrortocracy.html http://carlos.bueno.org/2014/06/mirrortocracy.html

Tunabrain 10y ago
I absolutely agree, though I always feel like culture and nationality are very underplayed in this discussion - I believe an American, an Eastern European and a Chinese national would bring a lot more diverse world views to the table than a female and a male American (or black and white).
th0waway 10y ago
as a counterpoint, take a group of singers - if they all sing their own song, chaos. Then, take of group of singers singing the same song in different keys: terrible music. Finally, take a group of singers singing the same song, in the same key: art. Diversity for the sake of diversity is no better than a group of people all singing their own song. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that the only way to be great is to be diverse.
tzs 10y ago
> It's a huge benefit as a developer (and obviously other professions too) to work on teams with people who have lived very different lives. I can see how that would be true for some types of development, but there are also many type for which I don't see offhand how it would matter. For instance, if I were doing web design for my employer's shopping cart site I could see how having a diverse team could greatly help because the team would have people on it that are part of or identify with more of our customer demographics. I as a white male mid-50s atheist tall fat guy could easily inadvertently come up with a design that might turn off non-whites, females, young people or elderly people, religious people, short people, or skinny people. Even if I don't end up doing something to offend people, I could simply miss opportunities that people of other backgrounds might see. In fact, I've seen that kind of thing. I saw a company that was making CD-ROM caching software in the '90s find a nice cluster of sales when an employee who was also a Mormon pointed out that this software worked extremely well with the CD-ROM genealogy databases that were becoming quite popular among Mormons. Without that Mormon employee, they would have probably never noticed that Mormons could be a distinct market segment for this product that was worth specifically targeting. What I actually work on, though, is backend stuff like processing orders and subscription billing, interfacing to payment processors, reporting sales tax in the US and VAT in Europe, analyzing A/B tests, and so on. Would having a diverse team working on this actually produce any different results?

Tunabrain 10y ago

I absolutely agree, though I always feel like culture and nationality are very underplayed in this discussion - I believe an American, an Eastern European and a Chinese national would bring a lot more diverse world views to the table than a female and a male American (or black and white).

th0waway 10y ago

as a counterpoint, take a group of singers - if they all sing their own song, chaos. Then, take of group of singers singing the same song in different keys: terrible music. Finally, take a group of singers singing the same song, in the same key: art. Diversity for the sake of diversity is no better than a group of people all singing their own song. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that the only way to be great is to be diverse.

tzs 10y ago

> It's a huge benefit as a developer (and obviously other professions too) to work on teams with people who have lived very different lives. I can see how that would be true for some types of development, but there are also many type for which I don't see offhand how it would matter. For instance, if I were doing web design for my employer's shopping cart site I could see how having a diverse team could greatly help because the team would have people on it that are part of or identify with more of our customer demographics. I as a white male mid-50s atheist tall fat guy could easily inadvertently come up with a design that might turn off non-whites, females, young people or elderly people, religious people, short people, or skinny people. Even if I don't end up doing something to offend people, I could simply miss opportunities that people of other backgrounds might see. In fact, I've seen that kind of thing. I saw a company that was making CD-ROM caching software in the '90s find a nice cluster of sales when an employee who was also a Mormon pointed out that this software worked extremely well with the CD-ROM genealogy databases that were becoming quite popular among Mormons. Without that Mormon employee, they would have probably never noticed that Mormons could be a distinct market segment for this product that was worth specifically targeting. What I actually work on, though, is backend stuff like processing orders and subscription billing, interfacing to payment processors, reporting sales tax in the US and VAT in Europe, analyzing A/B tests, and so on. Would having a diverse team working on this actually produce any different results?