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>It's bad, and it matches that of the schools we recruit from. I don't understand this. If you're matching the diversity of the market, that would seem to me

>It's bad, and it matches that of the schools we recruit from. I don't understand this. If you're matching the diversity of the market, that would seem to me that your recruiting practices are unbiased, which is good, right?

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
gumby 9y ago
They are matching the diversity of the schools' recruiting efforts. So yes, you could say they are (perhaps) unbiased vs their input, but their input has problems. In other words, their selection of schools to recruit from means they are outsourcing the distribution of your their candidate pool, and the GP poster is not happy with that aspect of the result. If it doesn't match your society or customer base, and you think those things are important (I do), then it's bad. (The reasons why I think it's bad are complex, so I won't belabor them here.)
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  I'm not disagreeing that the situation is bad. I just don't see how adding bias to your recruitment is a solution to the problem. If we had a bunch of women who couldn't get engineering jobs I'd understand, but we seem to have the opposite situation where everyone is competing for a limited resource. If you're proportionate to the pool, you're probably doing well.
  - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
    > I just don't see how adding bias to your recruitment is a solution to the problem The goal isn't to add bias. It's to seek out the source of a bias we think might exist and then remove it. For example, if we find 5% of top-tier schools' CS grads are women while 20% of mid-tier schools' CS grads are, and find similar quality in both pools (keep in mind, when you interview graduates you get to select for quality), then it makes sense to recruit from both pools. By excluding the latter pool, even if not for discriminatory reasons, we're implicitly biasing our inputs.
    - Bartweiss 9y ago
      > we find 5% of top-tier schools' CS grads are women while 20% of mid-tier schools' CS grads are I agree with the sentiment, but isn't the situation exactly the opposite of that? Top-tier schools work to balance gender distributions, and many of them succeed well above industry averages. Other schools spend less effort, and get predictably thinner results. Compare, say, RPI and MIT. (I know RPI is uncommonly skewed, but I wanted to compare tech schools to one another. Otherwise specific stats are swamped by the ratio of tech to non-tech majors.) - RPI, overall: 32% female - MIT, overall: 46% female - RPI, computer science: 16% female - MIT, computer science, 32% female As I understood the stats, a company that pulls students at the same rate as their candidate schools will see worse gender diversity as they broaden their pool. (Among CS programs at 4 year US colleges; outside that I don't know.)
      - hexane360 9y ago
        Using this data: http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N47/women/tables.pdf http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N47/women/tables.pdf MIT's computer science program is 31.7% women. MIT's school of engineering is 39.87% women. I think even comparing tech school to tech school, non-tech majors have a significant impact. MIT especially has a surprising number of non tech majors.
  - s73ver_ 9y ago
    Who said anything about bias? Looking in places that you don't traditionally look isn't bias.
  - AgentME 9y ago
    Rather than try to counteract the bias with an opposing one on the input pool, the answer can be to try to find new less-biased input pools to draw from.
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      We have to be careful about using the phrase "less biased" because bias goes both directions. In fact almost all universities go out of their way to get women into their tech programs. I think what you're talking about is trying to find a candidate pool that is more biased towards minorities than average, which is fine, but let's use the correct language. Generally speaking I do see the lack of diversity in tech as a problem and I applaud people making an effort to rectifying that. Unless the universities the OP was pulling from are really out of synch with the industry I have a hard time understanding why being proportionate is a problem. In fact, it seems like the right place to want to be.
      - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
        > We have to be careful about using the phrase "less biased Fine--we want more women. Research, and personal experience, shows gender-mixed teams outperform [1][2][3][4]. This is a business, not HR, decision. We also want more cultural diversity. I don't like pitching in Latin America or the Middle East with zero cultural context on the home team. If you're a B2C company, you probably want socioeconomic diversity on your product teams (at the very least). [1] http://eepulse.net/include/content/articles/Wall_Street_Reaction_to_Women_in_IPOs.pdf http://eepulse.net/include/content/articles/Wall_Street_Reac... IPOs [2] http://scholarship.sha.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1778&context=articles http://scholarship.sha.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic... Fund management [3] http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4486&context=nclr http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4... Boards [4] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Antonio_Vera/publication/23534553_Gender_Diversity_in_the_Boardroom_and_Firm_Financial_Performance/links/54512e7b0cf285a067c6854f/Gender-Diversity-in-the-Boardroom-and-Firm-Financial-Performance.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Antonio_Vera/publicatio... Boards
- home_boi 9y ago
  > If it doesn't match your society or customer base, and you think those things are important (I do), then it's bad. Mismatch between company demographics and society/customer demographics is common in all industries. It is not a unique phenomenon. Before asking what we can do to change the discrepancy at tech companies, we must first ask why this is a problem in the first place when tens of thousands of companies in different industries have the same problem.
- home_boi 9y ago
  > They are matching the diversity of the schools' recruiting efforts. I think many undergrad schools actually positively discriminate based on gender/race for underrepresented minorities.
  - jasonx1e 9y ago
    This is pretty clearly documented. In universities that don't consider race or gender in admissions (notably the UC system and Caltech), the minority rate tanks (except for Asian-American rates, which double).
- jasonx1e 9y ago
  It is matching society, however: CollegeBoard testing statistics reveal that in high school girls take AP Computer Science much less frequently than boys - at proportions fairly close to 1:3. Given that anyone is free to take an AP exam provided they can spend $100, the only plausible explanation is that fewer girls choose to pursue computer science as a major. Alternatively, you could suggest that there is nationwide collusion between CollegeBoard and amongst computer science teachers to limit girls from taking the APCS test - and that no one has found out or exposed it.
  - Karrot_Kream 9y ago
    > Given that anyone is free to take an AP exam provided they can spend $100, it seems to be down to individual choice. In which world is it "individual choice" for a 14-18 year old to pay $100 per exam to take an exam?
    - jasonx1e 9y ago
      What I mean by that is there exist no gender barriers to take an AP exam - that fewer women are studying CS in college or working a technical role is not a result of a biased system, but of an individual decision that comes down to fewer girls DECIDING to learn computer science.
s73ver_ 9y ago
Well, for one, 3 schools do not the market make. For two, it means they're not making any effort to reach out to those in disadvantaged populations. It's a large problem that a lot of companies have.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  The thing I'm questioning is how you could describe being proportionate to the candidate pool as "a large problem." Lack of diversity in STEM is a large problem, but your payroll matching the market doesn't seem like a large problem.
  - s73ver_ 9y ago
    For one, the candidate pool is artificially limited. And, like I said, 3 schools does not the market make.
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      >For one, the candidate pool is artificially limited. The candidate pool has an artificially inflated number of women due to the success of nearly universal outreach among STEM programs towards women. I'm not suggesting that's a bad thing, but let's not throw shade at universities where it's undeserved. >And, like I said, 3 schools does not the market make. If the 3 schools OP was recruiting from have gender bias against women then let's call them out.
  - QAkICoU7IDNkpFu 9y ago
    >Lack of diversity in STEM is a large problem Diversity of what? And why is it a problem?

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

gumby 9y ago

They are matching the diversity of the schools' recruiting efforts. So yes, you could say they are (perhaps) unbiased vs their input, but their input has problems. In other words, their selection of schools to recruit from means they are outsourcing the distribution of your their candidate pool, and the GP poster is not happy with that aspect of the result. If it doesn't match your society or customer base, and you think those things are important (I do), then it's bad. (The reasons why I think it's bad are complex, so I won't belabor them here.)

Consultant32452 9y ago
I'm not disagreeing that the situation is bad. I just don't see how adding bias to your recruitment is a solution to the problem. If we had a bunch of women who couldn't get engineering jobs I'd understand, but we seem to have the opposite situation where everyone is competing for a limited resource. If you're proportionate to the pool, you're probably doing well.
- JumpCrisscross 9y ago
  > I just don't see how adding bias to your recruitment is a solution to the problem The goal isn't to add bias. It's to seek out the source of a bias we think might exist and then remove it. For example, if we find 5% of top-tier schools' CS grads are women while 20% of mid-tier schools' CS grads are, and find similar quality in both pools (keep in mind, when you interview graduates you get to select for quality), then it makes sense to recruit from both pools. By excluding the latter pool, even if not for discriminatory reasons, we're implicitly biasing our inputs.
  - Bartweiss 9y ago
    > we find 5% of top-tier schools' CS grads are women while 20% of mid-tier schools' CS grads are I agree with the sentiment, but isn't the situation exactly the opposite of that? Top-tier schools work to balance gender distributions, and many of them succeed well above industry averages. Other schools spend less effort, and get predictably thinner results. Compare, say, RPI and MIT. (I know RPI is uncommonly skewed, but I wanted to compare tech schools to one another. Otherwise specific stats are swamped by the ratio of tech to non-tech majors.) - RPI, overall: 32% female - MIT, overall: 46% female - RPI, computer science: 16% female - MIT, computer science, 32% female As I understood the stats, a company that pulls students at the same rate as their candidate schools will see worse gender diversity as they broaden their pool. (Among CS programs at 4 year US colleges; outside that I don't know.)
    - hexane360 9y ago
      Using this data: http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N47/women/tables.pdf http://tech.mit.edu/V128/N47/women/tables.pdf MIT's computer science program is 31.7% women. MIT's school of engineering is 39.87% women. I think even comparing tech school to tech school, non-tech majors have a significant impact. MIT especially has a surprising number of non tech majors.
- s73ver_ 9y ago
  Who said anything about bias? Looking in places that you don't traditionally look isn't bias.
- AgentME 9y ago
  Rather than try to counteract the bias with an opposing one on the input pool, the answer can be to try to find new less-biased input pools to draw from.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    We have to be careful about using the phrase "less biased" because bias goes both directions. In fact almost all universities go out of their way to get women into their tech programs. I think what you're talking about is trying to find a candidate pool that is more biased towards minorities than average, which is fine, but let's use the correct language. Generally speaking I do see the lack of diversity in tech as a problem and I applaud people making an effort to rectifying that. Unless the universities the OP was pulling from are really out of synch with the industry I have a hard time understanding why being proportionate is a problem. In fact, it seems like the right place to want to be.
    - JumpCrisscross 9y ago
      > We have to be careful about using the phrase "less biased Fine--we want more women. Research, and personal experience, shows gender-mixed teams outperform [1][2][3][4]. This is a business, not HR, decision. We also want more cultural diversity. I don't like pitching in Latin America or the Middle East with zero cultural context on the home team. If you're a B2C company, you probably want socioeconomic diversity on your product teams (at the very least). [1] http://eepulse.net/include/content/articles/Wall_Street_Reaction_to_Women_in_IPOs.pdf http://eepulse.net/include/content/articles/Wall_Street_Reac... IPOs [2] http://scholarship.sha.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1778&context=articles http://scholarship.sha.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic... Fund management [3] http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4486&context=nclr http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4... Boards [4] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Antonio_Vera/publication/23534553_Gender_Diversity_in_the_Boardroom_and_Firm_Financial_Performance/links/54512e7b0cf285a067c6854f/Gender-Diversity-in-the-Boardroom-and-Firm-Financial-Performance.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Antonio_Vera/publicatio... Boards
home_boi 9y ago
> If it doesn't match your society or customer base, and you think those things are important (I do), then it's bad. Mismatch between company demographics and society/customer demographics is common in all industries. It is not a unique phenomenon. Before asking what we can do to change the discrepancy at tech companies, we must first ask why this is a problem in the first place when tens of thousands of companies in different industries have the same problem.
home_boi 9y ago
> They are matching the diversity of the schools' recruiting efforts. I think many undergrad schools actually positively discriminate based on gender/race for underrepresented minorities.
- jasonx1e 9y ago
  This is pretty clearly documented. In universities that don't consider race or gender in admissions (notably the UC system and Caltech), the minority rate tanks (except for Asian-American rates, which double).
jasonx1e 9y ago
It is matching society, however: CollegeBoard testing statistics reveal that in high school girls take AP Computer Science much less frequently than boys - at proportions fairly close to 1:3. Given that anyone is free to take an AP exam provided they can spend $100, the only plausible explanation is that fewer girls choose to pursue computer science as a major. Alternatively, you could suggest that there is nationwide collusion between CollegeBoard and amongst computer science teachers to limit girls from taking the APCS test - and that no one has found out or exposed it.
- Karrot_Kream 9y ago
  > Given that anyone is free to take an AP exam provided they can spend $100, it seems to be down to individual choice. In which world is it "individual choice" for a 14-18 year old to pay $100 per exam to take an exam?
  - jasonx1e 9y ago
    What I mean by that is there exist no gender barriers to take an AP exam - that fewer women are studying CS in college or working a technical role is not a result of a biased system, but of an individual decision that comes down to fewer girls DECIDING to learn computer science.

s73ver_ 9y ago

Well, for one, 3 schools do not the market make. For two, it means they're not making any effort to reach out to those in disadvantaged populations. It's a large problem that a lot of companies have.

Consultant32452 9y ago
The thing I'm questioning is how you could describe being proportionate to the candidate pool as "a large problem." Lack of diversity in STEM is a large problem, but your payroll matching the market doesn't seem like a large problem.
- s73ver_ 9y ago
  For one, the candidate pool is artificially limited. And, like I said, 3 schools does not the market make.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    >For one, the candidate pool is artificially limited. The candidate pool has an artificially inflated number of women due to the success of nearly universal outreach among STEM programs towards women. I'm not suggesting that's a bad thing, but let's not throw shade at universities where it's undeserved. >And, like I said, 3 schools does not the market make. If the 3 schools OP was recruiting from have gender bias against women then let's call them out.
- QAkICoU7IDNkpFu 9y ago
  >Lack of diversity in STEM is a large problem Diversity of what? And why is it a problem?