Ask: How are you approaching diversity at your workplace? | Hacker News Reader

Ask: How are you approaching diversity at your workplace?

I guess this is more of a question for management. I am curious to get different perspectives on this matter. I am already sold on the value but just looking for ways to increase diversity without injecting a bias into hiring process. Currently we make sure to have a diverse set of candidates in the interview pool, and ultimately pick the best candidate. I am curious to see what others are doing.

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By picking the best candidates that apply and not thinking about "oh are we diverse enough"; but instead, lets make the best product we can, who will do the job the best for us. You're inherently being bias right from the start if you are saying "we make sure to have a diverse set of candidates in the interview pool".

Do you ever consider the possibility that the best candidate is the one with the highest potential?

I believe that a candidate with unique perspectives and experiences might be able to contribute more over the long-term than the person who ticks the most boxes right now?

A lot goes into choosing a candidate, my point was that we do not just pick someone because we need to meet a certain quota of diversity. I will add that we are diverse more than everyone might be thinking from my statement above. But allowing the diversity to be organic, natural, and not hand crafted leads to a much better work environment and culture (at least in our case).

> But allowing the diversity to be organic, natural, and not hand crafted leads to a much better work environment and culture (at least in our case).

How can you know this to be true when you don't seem to have tried "hand crafted" diversity at your current workplace?

You don’t need to jump off a tall building to know it’s a bad idea. Even with less obvious things you can infer outcomes based on available data. Available data in social science and reported experiences suggests successful hiring is done based on two criteria: merit and cohesion with the team. That’s it. Outside of a few very particular jobs, diversity of workplace has no intrinsic value that somehow makes up for not hiring based on merit. On the contrary, some studies suggest that “diversity” can actually reduce team cohesion and trust.

I work for a fortune 100 tech company as an IC, here's what I've noticed.

- All managers have gone through training w.r.t unconscious bias and the companies initiative to diversity and inclusion. - Recruiters have worked w/ organizations like Code 2040 and events like Afrotech (which is awesome by the way) to reach out to minority candidates. - The Employee Resource Groups have been given additional funding to help retain new employees. - The company has been transparent in answering questions related to "quotas" and the like. - More recruiting has been focused on HBCUs

Making sure we’re tackling “classism” and not just “racism”.

A lot of times this means focusing on people who don’t have college degrees (or recruiting directly at community college), speaking to local activists and anti-poverty groups, and making an effort to hire not as many referrals (who will often be of the same socioeconomic class/status).

The biggest part though is making sure 10% of our roles are explicitly entry level no experience needed, or sometimes just trivial experience (like 1 year working in an office environment).

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