The Ways Tech Companies Alienate Women - The New York Times - 0 views
www.nytimes.com/...ey-women-hiring-diversity.html
tech sexism female silicon valley entrepreneurs harassment technology discrimination
shared by Carri Bugbee on 15 Aug 17
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at least one small component of this problem is immediately solvable: Many companies are alienating the qualified women who want to work for them, and who they want to hire, during the interview process itself.
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While Silicon Valley companies are enthusiastically putting money into STEM programs in schools and nonprofits focused on diversity, with the goal of creating a richer pipeline of talent in 10 years, they’re missing opportunities to make simple, immediate improvements by changing how they communicate with women who are sitting across the table from them now.
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here’s how it usually goes in the introductory meeting: A well-meaning executive boasts that his company has been financially supporting a number of nonprofit coding organizations that aim to train female engineers. He tells us he’ll have a booth at the Grace Hopper conference, the largest annual gathering of women in tech. He complains about how hard it is to “move the needle” on diversity numbers, especially when a staff is in the thousands.
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what the executives don’t give as much thought to are some of the simplest determinants of how successful a company will be in hiring diverse candidates. Will women have any input in the hiring process? Will the interview panels be diverse? Will current female employees be available to speak to candidates about their experiences? Many times, the answer to each of these questions is no, and the resistance to make simple changes in these areas is striking.
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We have to tell these companies to talk just as proudly about their parental-leave policies, child-care programs and breast-pumping rooms. At the very least, they need to communicate that their workplaces have cultures where women are valued. They need to show they’re not places where attitudes like that of the now-infamous Google engineer who wrote a memo questioning women’s fitness for tech jobs dominate.
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executives balk at my suggestions and even wonder if explicitly talking about the place of women is sexist. But I remind them that when it comes to gender, they have to play catch-up, after long histories of eroding trust
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Silicon Valley companies are in love with themselves and don’t understand why the love isn’t always returned by the few women to whom they extend employment offers.
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I’m often asked which companies are getting diversity and inclusion right in Silicon Valley and across the country. Most aren’t.