8 ms·

Gasp! I knew girls with hair like that ... and I hung out with girls that skated (and did BMX and gymnastics). Judged by the timing, I must be about the same a

by smoyer 12y ago

Gasp! I knew girls with hair like that ... and I hung out with girls that skated (and did BMX and gymnastics). Judged by the timing, I must be about the same age as Ms. Siera and it's kind of an amazing parallel universe in some ways (I had an injury I never recovered from enough to return to the so-called "extreme sports"). In any case, I'm old (yeah ... I said it) now and definitely agree that we need more diversity in our tech work-places. We have an additional problem as our applicant pool is extremely homogeneous. How do we fix that?

jacalata 12y ago
here's some tips on expanding your applicant pool: https://modelviewculture.com/pieces/25-tips-for-diverse-hiring https://modelviewculture.com/pieces/25-tips-for-diverse-hiri...
- sqrt17 12y ago
  I'm not always a fan of modelviewculture, but I think what they say implcitly is very important: start with culture. Have a culture where men and women alike consider themselves functional and important parts of your business. Let this culture speak through your actions (specifically: offer benefits that are attractive to the kind of person you want to attract), and let both the culture and you actions shine through in your public appearance (general website, HR-specific website, job ads). Also: pre-recruiting activities (community involvement, generally getting in touch with people) can help your visibility especially with people who are not well-connected members of the majority group. Get involved, and, as mentioned, let your culture shine through. As they further mention, some of the recruiting practices that are popular tend to be systematically biased towards a single, relatively homogeneous group of people. See this as an opportunity to perform arbitrage on that market by talking to suitable candidates that some of the other players are ignoring.
pron 12y ago
A good start would be to not actively push women away with a hostile work environment: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-women-tech-20150222-story.html http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-women-tech-20150222-st...
- TeMPOraL 12y ago
  I think this article was just debunked here yesterday as generalizing from few selected anecdotes.
  - pron 12y ago
    Oh, good, because my belief in meritocracy was getting shaky, but if HN has debunked the well-documented decline in women participation in software (one of the only professions where this happens) over the past one or two decades, then I guess we're all good.
    - TeMPOraL 12y ago
      I said the article was debunked, not the whole phenomenon. There are better sources documenting it.
      - pron 12y ago
        That's true. These for example: * http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-women-stopped-coding http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-wom... * http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/software-engineer/it-gender-gap-where-are-the-female-programmers/ http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/software-engineer/it-gender... * http://www.lpfi.org/sites/default/files/tilted_playing_field_lpfi_9_29_11.pdf http://www.lpfi.org/sites/default/files/tilted_playing_field... * http://qz.com/143967/the-tech-industrys-woman-problem-statistics-show-its-worse-than-you-think/ http://qz.com/143967/the-tech-industrys-woman-problem-statis... * http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/technology/technologys-man-problem.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/technology/technologys-man...
m-photonic 12y ago
"When I'm hiring, I have an HR intern (or the external recruiter) strip anything that could indicate gender or race from the résumés before they get their initial evaluation. For the ones that make the first cut, I have the recruiter print out code from Github, with the username redacted. This has resulted in a tremendous increase in the number of women who make it through to an actual interview." https://devmynd.com/blog/2015-2-mind-the-gap https://devmynd.com/blog/2015-2-mind-the-gap
- jobu 12y ago
  Kudos to you, that's a great way of doing it. I've worked with a few women in technical roles that decided to take more masculine versions of their names (Jackie -> Jack, Ashley -> Ash, Jessica to Jesse). For two of them it started out as a way of getting hassled less online, and the other did it as an experiment to see which resume got more interviews (surprise, the masculine name got more than double the callbacks.)
  - m-photonic 12y ago
    Not me, I'm just linking this here. It was submitted the other day but didn't get much attention. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9092545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9092545
- mc32 12y ago
  Now, if only German companies would do away with requiring, photos, place of birth and marital status in their Lebenslaufs... I mean, this is a good thing to do, but wish it would happen overseas as well. Could you imagine requiring photos and marital status in the US (aside from modeling and the like)
  - pgeorgi 12y ago
    I haven't added marital status, place of birth or birth name in my Lebenslauf, ever. But then I never listened to teachers or any public employment agencies and their leaflets since I had HR people in family who knew more contemporary habits (eg. that handwritten long-form CVs mean pretty much immediate rejection, while they were sold in class as the best thing ever) The photo requirement is still rather annoying though.
gonzo 12y ago
Kathy was born in 1957. (I was born in 62.) We were there, dude. And yes, the applicant pool is homogeneous in the extreme.
- smoyer 12y ago
  radical!
peterwwillis 12y ago
How do we make the applicant pool more diverse? That's easy. Step one: improve economic forces on lower-income families, the working poor, migrant and other ethnic immigrant communities, and the most at risk of poverty, incarceration, preventable disease and unplanned pregnancy. Step two: provide education for all those groups. Step three: balance a new middle class through job creation combined with a return to increased domestic jobs which don't require a college degree (since nobody can afford it now), primarily industrial and manufacturing. Step four: as a new middle class emerges, the roadblocks to a good education, freedom from incarceration, increased communication skills, and improved local ethnic-minority economies produces tech workers who have the same intellectual and cultural advantages of caucasian-american males and females. suddenly more people who are 'like us' start applying, and their skin color, family history, cultural/religious differences and accents don't seem like such a barrier anymore. Alternate plan: Step one: get involved in community outreach for young disadvantaged people. Step two: invest in tech classes at community centers. Step three: convert blighted neighborhoods into training centers, call centers, minimalist office spaces, etc. Step four: work with local governments to increase availability of cheap public transportation. Step five: hire local young people who are now trained in tech work to do the jobs you'd normally farm out to similarly-skilled foreign workers.
- redblacktree 12y ago
  simple != easy What you have described are simple solutions, not easy ones.

by smoyer 12y ago

jacalata 12y ago

here's some tips on expanding your applicant pool: https://modelviewculture.com/pieces/25-tips-for-diverse-hiring https://modelviewculture.com/pieces/25-tips-for-diverse-hiri...

sqrt17 12y ago
I'm not always a fan of modelviewculture, but I think what they say implcitly is very important: start with culture. Have a culture where men and women alike consider themselves functional and important parts of your business. Let this culture speak through your actions (specifically: offer benefits that are attractive to the kind of person you want to attract), and let both the culture and you actions shine through in your public appearance (general website, HR-specific website, job ads). Also: pre-recruiting activities (community involvement, generally getting in touch with people) can help your visibility especially with people who are not well-connected members of the majority group. Get involved, and, as mentioned, let your culture shine through. As they further mention, some of the recruiting practices that are popular tend to be systematically biased towards a single, relatively homogeneous group of people. See this as an opportunity to perform arbitrage on that market by talking to suitable candidates that some of the other players are ignoring.

pron 12y ago

A good start would be to not actively push women away with a hostile work environment: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-women-tech-20150222-story.html http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-women-tech-20150222-st...

TeMPOraL 12y ago
I think this article was just debunked here yesterday as generalizing from few selected anecdotes.
- pron 12y ago
  Oh, good, because my belief in meritocracy was getting shaky, but if HN has debunked the well-documented decline in women participation in software (one of the only professions where this happens) over the past one or two decades, then I guess we're all good.
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    I said the article was debunked, not the whole phenomenon. There are better sources documenting it.
    - pron 12y ago
      That's true. These for example: * http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-women-stopped-coding http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2014/10/21/357629765/when-wom... * http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/software-engineer/it-gender-gap-where-are-the-female-programmers/ http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/software-engineer/it-gender... * http://www.lpfi.org/sites/default/files/tilted_playing_field_lpfi_9_29_11.pdf http://www.lpfi.org/sites/default/files/tilted_playing_field... * http://qz.com/143967/the-tech-industrys-woman-problem-statistics-show-its-worse-than-you-think/ http://qz.com/143967/the-tech-industrys-woman-problem-statis... * http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/technology/technologys-man-problem.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/06/technology/technologys-man...

m-photonic 12y ago

"When I'm hiring, I have an HR intern (or the external recruiter) strip anything that could indicate gender or race from the résumés before they get their initial evaluation. For the ones that make the first cut, I have the recruiter print out code from Github, with the username redacted. This has resulted in a tremendous increase in the number of women who make it through to an actual interview." https://devmynd.com/blog/2015-2-mind-the-gap https://devmynd.com/blog/2015-2-mind-the-gap

jobu 12y ago
Kudos to you, that's a great way of doing it. I've worked with a few women in technical roles that decided to take more masculine versions of their names (Jackie -> Jack, Ashley -> Ash, Jessica to Jesse). For two of them it started out as a way of getting hassled less online, and the other did it as an experiment to see which resume got more interviews (surprise, the masculine name got more than double the callbacks.)
- m-photonic 12y ago
  Not me, I'm just linking this here. It was submitted the other day but didn't get much attention. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9092545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9092545
mc32 12y ago
Now, if only German companies would do away with requiring, photos, place of birth and marital status in their Lebenslaufs... I mean, this is a good thing to do, but wish it would happen overseas as well. Could you imagine requiring photos and marital status in the US (aside from modeling and the like)
- pgeorgi 12y ago
  I haven't added marital status, place of birth or birth name in my Lebenslauf, ever. But then I never listened to teachers or any public employment agencies and their leaflets since I had HR people in family who knew more contemporary habits (eg. that handwritten long-form CVs mean pretty much immediate rejection, while they were sold in class as the best thing ever) The photo requirement is still rather annoying though.

gonzo 12y ago

Kathy was born in 1957. (I was born in 62.) We were there, dude. And yes, the applicant pool is homogeneous in the extreme.

smoyer 12y ago
radical!

peterwwillis 12y ago

How do we make the applicant pool more diverse? That's easy. Step one: improve economic forces on lower-income families, the working poor, migrant and other ethnic immigrant communities, and the most at risk of poverty, incarceration, preventable disease and unplanned pregnancy. Step two: provide education for all those groups. Step three: balance a new middle class through job creation combined with a return to increased domestic jobs which don't require a college degree (since nobody can afford it now), primarily industrial and manufacturing. Step four: as a new middle class emerges, the roadblocks to a good education, freedom from incarceration, increased communication skills, and improved local ethnic-minority economies produces tech workers who have the same intellectual and cultural advantages of caucasian-american males and females. suddenly more people who are 'like us' start applying, and their skin color, family history, cultural/religious differences and accents don't seem like such a barrier anymore. Alternate plan: Step one: get involved in community outreach for young disadvantaged people. Step two: invest in tech classes at community centers. Step three: convert blighted neighborhoods into training centers, call centers, minimalist office spaces, etc. Step four: work with local governments to increase availability of cheap public transportation. Step five: hire local young people who are now trained in tech work to do the jobs you'd normally farm out to similarly-skilled foreign workers.

redblacktree 12y ago
simple != easy What you have described are simple solutions, not easy ones.