5 ms·

The interesting thing is that the top of the funnel is still heavily tilted towards e.g. men. I'm not claiming whether this right or wrong, but this is how it i

The interesting thing is that the top of the funnel is still heavily tilted towards e.g. men. I'm not claiming whether this right or wrong, but this is how it is. Now good luck for your small company to hire minorities. It's extremely hard. I have talked to a recruiting agency recently about getting some engineers on board, and their first question was "Are you only looking for female engineers or are you OK with any genders?" So as far my experience goes it is pretty difficult to hire non-male engineers if you're on a budget, then you end up with a full male team and then you might end up being accused with bias and discrimination against women. (I've seen this happening.)

azth 5y ago
> and their first question was "Are you only looking for female engineers or are you OK with any genders?" If that isn't outright blatant sexism, I don't know what is.
- zeroj22 5y ago
  This is extremely common among my recruiter friends. I know several and keep in touch in order to have my finger on the pulse of the hiring industry. The vast majority of their clients seem to word it like "we'd love to have great talent" followed by "do you have any non-white, preferably women engineers?" Since this is all off the books conversation it would be difficult to bring up a sexism or racism case. But there is currently a distinct, non-meritocratic, sub-industry cropping up in recruiting and it's getting more aggressive. Companies are being subverted in the name of "Diversity and Inclusion". I have personal experience with this. When I was working out of a bay area consulting shop the "diverse" candidates were most often hired onto client projects despite experience levels not being the same. Again, the internal sales people had no choice. The companies would ask for "diverse" engineers off the books. I've also been passed up for promotion vs less tenured (but similarly experienced) engineers because the next rank up wasn't diverse enough. This one was not confirmed through any source but was deduced by the racial make up of promotion and personally knowing the promoted engineers. You'd expect it to be more random. Racism is acceptable to big tech. It's both obvious and appalling.
  - esyir 5y ago
    Would be nice to see a leak of this somewhere. A smoking gun that this is happening, followed by the legal hammer would be what we need here.
- blindmute 5y ago
  As someone who has been involved in the hiring track at a couple different places, you're absolutely right that it is sexism (and racism). All this shit ends up doing is making me very hesitant to visit a minority doctor or work with a minority contractor or whatever else. How can we ever know, with these kinds of hiring practices, if they are actually qualified? "Anti-discrimination", if you behave rationally, must lead to further discrimination. I guess behaving rationally is not at the forefront of most of these peoples' minds.

azth 5y ago

> and their first question was "Are you only looking for female engineers or are you OK with any genders?" If that isn't outright blatant sexism, I don't know what is.

zeroj22 5y ago
This is extremely common among my recruiter friends. I know several and keep in touch in order to have my finger on the pulse of the hiring industry. The vast majority of their clients seem to word it like "we'd love to have great talent" followed by "do you have any non-white, preferably women engineers?" Since this is all off the books conversation it would be difficult to bring up a sexism or racism case. But there is currently a distinct, non-meritocratic, sub-industry cropping up in recruiting and it's getting more aggressive. Companies are being subverted in the name of "Diversity and Inclusion". I have personal experience with this. When I was working out of a bay area consulting shop the "diverse" candidates were most often hired onto client projects despite experience levels not being the same. Again, the internal sales people had no choice. The companies would ask for "diverse" engineers off the books. I've also been passed up for promotion vs less tenured (but similarly experienced) engineers because the next rank up wasn't diverse enough. This one was not confirmed through any source but was deduced by the racial make up of promotion and personally knowing the promoted engineers. You'd expect it to be more random. Racism is acceptable to big tech. It's both obvious and appalling.
- esyir 5y ago
  Would be nice to see a leak of this somewhere. A smoking gun that this is happening, followed by the legal hammer would be what we need here.
blindmute 5y ago
As someone who has been involved in the hiring track at a couple different places, you're absolutely right that it is sexism (and racism). All this shit ends up doing is making me very hesitant to visit a minority doctor or work with a minority contractor or whatever else. How can we ever know, with these kinds of hiring practices, if they are actually qualified? "Anti-discrimination", if you behave rationally, must lead to further discrimination. I guess behaving rationally is not at the forefront of most of these peoples' minds.