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Comment by pgodzin | Hacker News Reader

A woman with a perspective on the diversity and culture they need to create seems uniquely qualified for the role.

"Diversity hiring" is a double edged sword though. There's a stigma attached to it which is really hard to overcome even if you're good.

It's crazy that hiring a woman to be the second woman on a board is considered "diversity hiring" though. It's not a super minority that is being looked for to tout diversity, it's half the population! I'm sure there are women who are both utterly qualified AND can provide a perspective on the more inclusive culture they are trying to create.

Hiring a woman is not crazy in the least. Hiring a woman because she's a woman over a more qualified male candidate (or the other way around) is harmful. There are plenty of women who don't need such "help".

Not sure why we immediately need to jump to the trope that a more qualified male candidate would be passed over. You're treating a seat on the board as if were some sort of technical role with hard skills. It's not - it's a role to be a positive and influential voice within a company dealing with a toxic culture. Being a successful woman and having all the experiences and perspectives that come with that is literally part of their qualification for the position.

> Not sure why we immediately need to jump to the trope that a more qualified male candidate would be passed over.

This is the original piece comment we are talking about:

> He needs to be replaced by a woman

It's evident that the objective is to hire a women, not to hire a qualified person, therefore a less qualified person can be hired just because she is a women. A person hired like this would most likely not get too much respect because she had an advantage not because of her skill, but her gender.

> Being a successful woman and having all the experiences and perspectives that come with that

See my question in another comment.

Replacing Bonderman with "a woman" will not magically solve issues around sexism. There is quite a bit of research, for instance on academic hiring, showing that women often have the same or at least similar sexist biases against women as men. See also the research on implicit stereotypes showing that both men and women associate men with traits related to strength and power and women with traits related to weakness. A female board member would probably not make stupid comments like Bonderman's but that alone is not going to change the toxic culture at Uber.

Not sure what straw man you are arguing against, certainly never said it would "magically solve issues around sexism" or that "alone" is "enough to change the toxic culture".

We are talking about the role of board member - which comes with the impact of immediately being one of the most powerful and influential voices within Uber. Bonderman's voice spoke volumes today about the culture the company previously condoned, and a new female board member could potentially have a far greater positive impact promoting a more inclusive culture. By definition, one person can't change a company culture, but could set an example and set the ball rolling.

Sorry, my previous comment wasn't clear enough. Perhaps I misunderstood you, but you seemed to suggest that being female would uniquely qualify a new board member to promote a more diverse and inclusive culture. The research that I referred to suggests that this may not be the case or at least not as much as you might think.

Are you implying that men are incapable of those sensibilities?

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