5 ms·

So which report makes an organization less racist: Org A) 10% of applicants are brown, 9% of hires are brown Org B) 10% of applicants are brown, 0% of hires

So which report makes an organization less racist: Org A) 10% of applicants are brown, 9% of hires are brown Org B) 10% of applicants are brown, 0% of hires are brown Org A might be close enough to a rounding error you can call it good. Org B likely has some issues. Hard to fix what you don't measure.

gambiting 4y ago
It's insane to me that the automatic conclusion from the above is that organisation B is racist.
- 31337Logic 4y ago
  ...or that Org A is "less racist", as I've demonstrated. Poor analogy by the OP.
- aidenn0 4y ago
  You just went from "Org B likely has some issues" to "automatic conclusion."
  - gambiting 4y ago
    No, I actually went off the first sentence: "So which report makes an organization less racist" So that implies that org B is more racist(because it hired zero brown people) - is that not the conclusion the author of the comment wants us to reach?
    - atq2119 4y ago
      "More racist" does not imply "racist". Forrest Gump is smarter than a rock, but he is not smart.
      - gambiting 4y ago
        If I say that my uncle is more racist than my cousin, do you think my uncle is racist, or not?
- TylerE 4y ago
  You roll a die 120 times, get 20 1's, 20 2's, 0 3's, 20 4's, 40 5's, and 20 6's. Do you or do you not think it is incredibly likely this is an unfair die. That's Company B.
  - gambiting 4y ago
    If your company takes a pile of CVs and randomly picks a bunch of people to hire, then yes, you are absolutely correct, there is something very very wrong with company B if a truly random process results in an unequal distribution of hires. But hiring isn't random. Maybe all the "brown" candidates lacked necessary qualifications. Or needed visas which they couldn't get. Or a million other reasons other than "org B is racist". My point is: you need further context. To look at that one stat as given above and conclude org B is racist is....unwise.
  - MockObject 4y ago
    This is a very inappropriate analogy, because humans are very diverse; the exact opposite of a die's faces.
    - TylerE 4y ago
      We’re not discussing f a human. We’re talking about fairly coarse demographic buckets
  - brianwawok 4y ago
    Is that how you hire? You litearlly roll a dice for an interview? No bias of "This guy looks / acts / talks like me?" I am not sure I have ever been on a team without some kind of like-me bias. It's real hard.
annyeonghada 4y ago
>Org B likely has some issues Or in the exact time slice you got the data there weren't any brown applicants.
xigoi 4y ago
10% out of how many?
31337Logic 4y ago
> So which report makes an organization less racist: > Org A) 10% of applicants are brown, 9% of hires are brown That means nearly all brown applicants for got hired. You're probably thinking this is a "good stat" and therefore a "good employer". But what if the rest of that company's stats were "90% of applicants are white, 80% of hires are white." Is that still a "good stat/good company"? According to you, it should be (and I would tend to agree.) In both cases, we're pretty much showing "If you apply for a job here, you have a ~90% chance of getting in, regardless of skin color." Not bad!! But wait. What if the demographic of applicants is more like 50% white and 50% brown. (Assume a non-remote workplace). Now, one has to wonder why, in a demographic where half the population is brown, why only 10% are applying to this organization? Could be many reasons. Culturally, maybe the brown folds simply choose not to apply here. Or maybe the organization has a history of mistreating brown folks, abusing them, paying them less, etc. That could explain the low rate of applicants here. Your good example of a "less racist" org doesn't look so good anymore. Many factors could be a play; some less intentionally-evil than others. Hard to draw conclusions simply by reporting on one stat in isolation. > Hard to fix what you don't measure. Yes, but harder to think critically about the data you do gather.
- Scea91 4y ago
  > That means nearly all brown applicants for got hired. Nope, the denominator is different. If you select the same percentage from each category the proportions stay the same. If there are 100 fruits where 10 are apples and 90 are pears and each fruit has 10% chance to be selected then you get on average 1 apple and 9 pears => 10% of the selected fruits are apples.

gambiting 4y ago

It's insane to me that the automatic conclusion from the above is that organisation B is racist.

31337Logic 4y ago
...or that Org A is "less racist", as I've demonstrated. Poor analogy by the OP.
aidenn0 4y ago
You just went from "Org B likely has some issues" to "automatic conclusion."
- gambiting 4y ago
  No, I actually went off the first sentence: "So which report makes an organization less racist" So that implies that org B is more racist(because it hired zero brown people) - is that not the conclusion the author of the comment wants us to reach?
  - atq2119 4y ago
    "More racist" does not imply "racist". Forrest Gump is smarter than a rock, but he is not smart.
    - gambiting 4y ago
      If I say that my uncle is more racist than my cousin, do you think my uncle is racist, or not?
TylerE 4y ago
You roll a die 120 times, get 20 1's, 20 2's, 0 3's, 20 4's, 40 5's, and 20 6's. Do you or do you not think it is incredibly likely this is an unfair die. That's Company B.
- gambiting 4y ago
  If your company takes a pile of CVs and randomly picks a bunch of people to hire, then yes, you are absolutely correct, there is something very very wrong with company B if a truly random process results in an unequal distribution of hires. But hiring isn't random. Maybe all the "brown" candidates lacked necessary qualifications. Or needed visas which they couldn't get. Or a million other reasons other than "org B is racist". My point is: you need further context. To look at that one stat as given above and conclude org B is racist is....unwise.
- MockObject 4y ago
  This is a very inappropriate analogy, because humans are very diverse; the exact opposite of a die's faces.
  - TylerE 4y ago
    We’re not discussing f a human. We’re talking about fairly coarse demographic buckets
- brianwawok 4y ago
  Is that how you hire? You litearlly roll a dice for an interview? No bias of "This guy looks / acts / talks like me?" I am not sure I have ever been on a team without some kind of like-me bias. It's real hard.

annyeonghada 4y ago

>Org B likely has some issues Or in the exact time slice you got the data there weren't any brown applicants.

xigoi 4y ago

10% out of how many?

31337Logic 4y ago

> So which report makes an organization less racist: > Org A) 10% of applicants are brown, 9% of hires are brown That means nearly all brown applicants for got hired. You're probably thinking this is a "good stat" and therefore a "good employer". But what if the rest of that company's stats were "90% of applicants are white, 80% of hires are white." Is that still a "good stat/good company"? According to you, it should be (and I would tend to agree.) In both cases, we're pretty much showing "If you apply for a job here, you have a ~90% chance of getting in, regardless of skin color." Not bad!! But wait. What if the demographic of applicants is more like 50% white and 50% brown. (Assume a non-remote workplace). Now, one has to wonder why, in a demographic where half the population is brown, why only 10% are applying to this organization? Could be many reasons. Culturally, maybe the brown folds simply choose not to apply here. Or maybe the organization has a history of mistreating brown folks, abusing them, paying them less, etc. That could explain the low rate of applicants here. Your good example of a "less racist" org doesn't look so good anymore. Many factors could be a play; some less intentionally-evil than others. Hard to draw conclusions simply by reporting on one stat in isolation. > Hard to fix what you don't measure. Yes, but harder to think critically about the data you do gather.

Scea91 4y ago
> That means nearly all brown applicants for got hired. Nope, the denominator is different. If you select the same percentage from each category the proportions stay the same. If there are 100 fruits where 10 are apples and 90 are pears and each fruit has 10% chance to be selected then you get on average 1 apple and 9 pears => 10% of the selected fruits are apples.