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We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

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Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#481

Post by kmonsen »

datashow wrote: post #452
hellisothers wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of the article is that restricting your hiring pool to only CS graduates is a bad pattern and you should consider other qualities instead so saying only 18% of CS graduates are female misses the point. Having no CS degree myself and excelling in a top 10 company I agree with this sentiment, especially seeing the epidemic of “over leveling” the small pool of CS graduates occurring. I’d rather work with…

The problem is how you gonna find a different hiring pattern to force 50%? Internal training, ok, but are you going to only provide internal training to women? Is this even legal? Basecamp training, ok, but are you going to only provide basecamp training to women? Is this even legal? Special talents (dropouts etc.), ok, but are you going to only hire special talents who are women? Is this even legal? Non-traditional…

Not saying I know you are wrong, but there are alternative ways we end up in this world. Like that the world of computer engineering is currently full of Brogrammers that females know it is best to stay way clear of. Or that there are countless examples of horrible behavior of men towards woman in computer engineering and perhaps this is affecting the pipeline.

We don't know which one of these is true, and perhaps there are even other factors at work. Let's just not pretend that 18% will forever stay like that and that all woman just want to find someone to nurture.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#482

Post by burfog »

gusmd wrote: post #112
burfog wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh yes. Hispanic is the correct term when speaking English. Latinx is a sign of wanting to show off Spanish (to virtue signal) but actually being intolerant of the way the language works. Values collided, and thus Latinx was born. Using the correct term, Hispanic, just wasn't an option.

As a Brazilian Latin American, there's nothing Hispanic about me or my people. Most of us are some mixture of European (primarily Italian or Portuguese), African, indian (as in the native people of South America) descendents. Our official language is Portuguese.

So you're Brazilian.

Latinx, Latino, Latina are not normally used for all Latin-based languages. Italians and French don't qualify either, despite being Latin-based. (Quebec???) It's also not race; the Cherokee do not qualify even if of mixed ancestry. Really it is just a synonym for Hispanic.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#483

Post by avgeek23 »

The bit where she says 39% of Hires from india are women.Thats because parents decide what major their kids take which is completely opposite of the west. Thus the more no of female grads.The college i go to has a 50:50 ratio. Majority of the people there both men and women have no idea why they picked cs,they just are there because it pays ways and their parents told them to rather forced them into cs.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#484

Post by drdeca »

baddox wrote: post #342
drdeca wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying: 1) the input is not actually biased 2) the company is responsible for making the output less biased than the input (or produce an unbiased output from a biased input) 3) the company is responsible for making sure that they don’t cause the output to be more biased than the input, (but you are not saying that it is responsible for more than that) 3’) The same as 3, except that the amount of bias in the…

I'm saying that, if one thinks diversity is important [0] at companies, then the outcomes of hiring and retention are largely (overwhelmingly) the responsibility of the hiring company. This is especially for very large hiring companies. [0] If you don't think diversity is important, then that's another discussion altogether. In this thread I have been operating under the assumption that we agree it is important (and…

I was also working under the assumption that diversity was important, or, at least, that a bias is bad.

I don’t see any conflict between this and the list of options that I listed.

Do you think that my list of options is missing an option, or are you refusing to pick one?

If the latter, why are you refusing to pick one?

Do you think that the list isn’t logically valid?

I am asking simple questions which I am aiming to make as easy to answer as I can, and you seem to be dodging the questions, and are instead responding with an accusation.

It is a simple question, and I left a clear option for in case the question would otherwise accidentally presuppose something false.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#485

Post by CapricornNoble »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #338
kelnos wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many aspects of the differing realities are due to inherent biological differences, and how many are due to societal environment, though?

I think enough are due to societal environment that this is something we can work on, but not by arbitrarily saying things like "We want to hire more women in tech." I posted something of a "case study" in this discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21695925 It's currently downvoted and has one not very nice reply. I guess it's far less of a shit show than it really "should" be, but this is kind of par for…

>>>And I think I can't get that primarily because men basically are nice to women when they are looking for sex and that's pretty much it. And they actively avoid being too nice to any woman they aren't trying to sleep with for fear of it having some kind of negative outcome, such as an unintended affair or career-damaging gossip.

You're not wrong....but I'm in no way, shape, or form surprised by this gender dynamic. Although I think the "career-damaging gossip" is a fairly recent phenomenon. Enough men have had their lives destroyed by either awkward romantic attempts on their part or flat-out lies on a woman's part that guys have reacted in an entirely rational manner by simply avoiding females. The assumption is that there is NO professional benefit to the guy that is worth the risk.

My (totally unsolicited) ¥2 is you probably need to overcome that assumption very early in any conversation if you expect assistance.

>>>I just have no means to somehow blow up HN and multiple people met through HN.

Do some social engineering to reveal their physical locations. Then strap tannerite-based nailbombs to UAVs? As long as we are brainstorming here...

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#486

Post by int_19h »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #415
int_19h wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience as somebody without a degree and employed for >15 years now, you don't need a degree to get enough understanding of type theory and statistics, even for things at senior level. It will obviously depend on the specific project, but self-learning is very much a viable option in this industry. Conversely, I've seen many candidates with a CS degree who couldn't handle trivial coding challenges (and I mea…

Yes, but the issue is how likely is an arbitrary person interested in being a programmer but lacking a degree going to be able to self-teach the vast amounts of information needed to be productive as a modern developer? I wager it is very unlikely. Those who do follow the self-taught route are 1) unusually smart and/or self-motivated or 2) got into the field when there were fewer moving parts and so self-teaching had…

That's what the interviews are for, no? The point of the article is that if you are using degrees as a filter, you're passing on a lot of otherwise qualified candidates.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#487

Post by oconnore »

anonytrary wrote: post #468
supernova87a wrote: post #187

With such politically charged issues, it's always a problem of people wanting to believe something is possible (and mandatory to pursue) banging their heads against what is true and actually possible. If the percentage of female computer science graduates (as a strong proxy for the available candidate population) is 18% (Google for the facts and stats), how is every company to hit an idealistic goal of 50% representa…

> A while back, I did rough envelope calculations that if one of the major FAANG companies hit their diversity goal, there would be none left for any of the rest of them. Not to mention, if the other companies also wish to hit their diversity goals, they will be forced to take on weaker hires, since the (already small) pool of adequate hires has been exhausted. In my opinion, diversity hiring is an anti-pattern. Hiri…

Common practice is to ignore diversity (to the extent possible) in assessing, but not in sourcing.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#488

Post by LoSboccacc »

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #418
greggman2 wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Companies used to train internally Please no. Japan is that way. Japan pays programmers $20k to start, no better than working fast food. Their salaries go up to $60k at the top end at most big Japanese companies and they have the attitude that anyone over 35 is too old to code. I feel the fact they hire grads with zero experience is one of the reasons. Why pay someone $$$ if they can't actually do the job yet? Conv…

> Why pay someone $$$ if they can't actually do the job yet? Senior devs have to come from somewhere.

/puts MBA hat on

yeah, other companies that invested in them but tried not to give them market raises.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#489

Post by dragonwriter »

supernova87a wrote: post #187

With such politically charged issues, it's always a problem of people wanting to believe something is possible (and mandatory to pursue) banging their heads against what is true and actually possible. If the percentage of female computer science graduates (as a strong proxy for the available candidate population) is 18% (Google for the facts and stats), how is every company to hit an idealistic goal of 50% representa…

> If the percentage of female computer science graduates (as a strong proxy for the available candidate population)

I don't see why one would assume that gender distribution of CS degree holders is a strong proxy for the gender distribution of available candidates suitable for software development positions. Its true that many big firms (and even a large number of small firms) have a well-known strong bias for CS degree holders (and for CS degree holders from particular elite institutions), but the statistics of the field as a whole, and of CS degree holders, show that that is a bias inconsistent with the real qualifications for the field which cannot avoid exaggerating the gender gap in the field.

> A while back, I did rough envelope calculations that if one of the major FAANG companies hit their diversity goal, there would be none left for any of the rest of them.

That only makes sense if you assume that none of the meeting the target was done by bringing people into the field that otherwise would not be in it, despite the fact that that is typically a focus of such efforts by large firms.

Re: We ran the numbers, and there really is a pipeline problem in engineering hiring

#490

Post by mburst »

uwuhn wrote: post #222

I'm going to preface this post by saying that I don't have a problem with most of my coworkers (male and female) being Asian. In fact, I prefer it. I'm not Asian, but the majority of my friends, classmates, and coworkers throughout my life have been, and that continues even now during my career in tech. Whenever I see anything related to affirmative action being discussed nowadays, I think that it's only a matter of…

> It's fortunate that the best jobs are the most fair, but even if a place sucks, a first SWE job is still a first SWE job.

I think part of this is just the free market at work. Some companies will pass on great talent to meet diversity goals and those that are focused on hiring the best people will end up giving themselves a better chance at succeeding

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