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I don't know why anyone would be hesitant to join companies' with uncertain financials with unremunerated risk... probably has nothing to do with gender and eve

by fleitz 14y ago

I don't know why anyone would be hesitant to join companies' with uncertain financials with unremunerated risk... probably has nothing to do with gender and everything to do with intelligence. Buying lottery tickets is not a wealth building strategy. They talk a lot about diversity and then talk about ivy league, how much diversity are you really getting from focusing on such small segments of the workforce? Unless they are specifically targeting the Ivy league Harvard's grad gender ratio should mean absolutely nothing. I don't see what being born to wealthy parents has to do with good developers, or diversity. The article might as well say "We're diverse because we hire people who think the same but have different genitals"

JPKab 14y ago
Your point about the Ivy League is, sadly, waay too true. The Ivy League is way too weak on socioeconomic diversity. I think a classic, and rather accurate criticism of efforts to increase diversity is the notion of what "diversity" actually means. How many students does Harvard have who grew up in trailer parks in Appalachia? Certainly these students, culturally, would be more different, and therefore increase "diversity" more than a black student raised by a wealthy family in a New England suburb. What about an Asian student who is from a poor Hmong family in Minnesota? It seems current admission policies would lump her in with all of the other Asian students which the Ivy League has used a defacto cap to limit. What has always been weird to me is the widespread observation (and most certainly accurate) that organizations with huge gender imbalances are more prone to weird groupthink type issues (Wall Street's excessive risk taking, hospital nurse/elementary school infighting), and a constant notion of "we need more women here." But when companies try to talk about solutions, there is suddenly a requirement to view women as exactly the same as men. If the effect of having more women in an organization will change the organization (for the better, according to research), it is very likely that women have some inherent attributes which make them differ from men.

by fleitz 14y ago

JPKab 14y ago

Your point about the Ivy League is, sadly, waay too true. The Ivy League is way too weak on socioeconomic diversity. I think a classic, and rather accurate criticism of efforts to increase diversity is the notion of what "diversity" actually means. How many students does Harvard have who grew up in trailer parks in Appalachia? Certainly these students, culturally, would be more different, and therefore increase "diversity" more than a black student raised by a wealthy family in a New England suburb. What about an Asian student who is from a poor Hmong family in Minnesota? It seems current admission policies would lump her in with all of the other Asian students which the Ivy League has used a defacto cap to limit. What has always been weird to me is the widespread observation (and most certainly accurate) that organizations with huge gender imbalances are more prone to weird groupthink type issues (Wall Street's excessive risk taking, hospital nurse/elementary school infighting), and a constant notion of "we need more women here." But when companies try to talk about solutions, there is suddenly a requirement to view women as exactly the same as men. If the effect of having more women in an organization will change the organization (for the better, according to research), it is very likely that women have some inherent attributes which make them differ from men.