Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#41

Post by ftrflyr » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:53 PM UTC

callinyouin wrote: post #36

ftrflyr wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is inaccurate to use the total 5.6% here. What percentage of the 5.6% depicts Asian males who are an appropriate age to hold a leadership position? I am certain the percentage is drastically lower; 0 - 1% perhaps.

That's fair, but then that "rule" would also apply to the number of white/black people in the countries listed, making it lower. Doesn't make the point of considering demographics any less valid.

It is my assumption that white males living in these countries are old enough to hold leadership positions. One can safely assume a 12 year old is not immigrating to China to live / work.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#42

Post by brighteyes » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:55 PM UTC

n00b101 wrote: post #13

brighteyes wrote: post #9

This is an important topic, but as often happens, the article just treads the same old themes. It's looking for answers in the usual places, when it's not clear the answers are there. First of all, Asian Americans are still overrepresented in tech leadership positions. Just less than they are overrepresented in tech positions in general. So looking for a negative (discriminatory) effect may be the wrong thing - we ma…

> "Asian Americans are still overrepresented in tech leadership positions." No, the article clearly states that they are under-represented. It cites 2015 report on diversity looking at 5 Silicon Valley companies: Google, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, LinkedIn, and Yahoo. The report finds that, "Asians and Asian Americans are well represented in lower-level positions but underrepresented at management and executive levels.…

> No, the article clearly states that they are under-represented. It cites 2015 report on diversity looking at 5 Silicon Valley companies: Google, Hewlett-Packard, Intel, LinkedIn, and Yahoo. The report finds that, "Asians and Asian Americans are well represented in lower-level positions but underrepresented at management and executive levels. Asian Americans (including Indians) are 27% of the workers in these companies, but only 19% of managers and 14% of executives.

Yes, but Asian Americans are just 4.7% of the US population [1]. So even 14% of executives is 3x their expected representation. That's a very high amount of overrepresentation! Just it's smaller than their overrepresentation elsewhere.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_State...

> Height being a "confounding variable" in discrimination against both Asians and women seems like an interesting theory, but it doesn't fit the facts from the article :"This is worse than the glass ceiling effect that’s been identified for women

Oh, definitely I don't think we have anywhere near the data to claim it is 100% of the explanation here - which would mean it could be disproved using the method you used.

All I am saying is that we know height has a major effect on income and leadership position attainment. This is true in business, politics, everywhere basically. So for shorter than average populations, it is plausible it explains part of their lower income or leadership attainment. (Does it explain all of it? No reason to think that.)

And I am saying that this is an often-ignored factor, which shows that we aren't actually looking at this topic objectively. We have cultural blinders.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#43

Post by nylonstrung » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:56 PM UTC

n00b101 wrote: post #21

Torgo wrote: post #3

>It is time to rethink the “good leader” prototype of being masculine, dictatorial, and charismatic. Good luck, there's a reason those attributes are dominant.

">It is time to rethink the “good leader” prototype of being masculine, dictatorial, and charismatic. Good luck, there's a reason those attributes are dominant." I agree, and I think it is a ridiculous and offensive conclusion that the authors are making here. They are perpetuating a stereotype of Asians based on a claim that "Eastern cultural norms encourage humility and deference to authority." Firstly, this claim…

>Did anyone go to Asian companies and see that all their executives are all feminine, un-charismatic, pushovers?

Racist stereotypes don't have to be logical.

>Are we to believe that they are all also all "feminine, un-charismatic, pushovers?"

When is the last time you've seen media depict an Asian male as sexual virile? When is the last time you've seen an Asian male kiss a woman on screen in Western media. For every one instance I can think of 10 depictions of exactly what you described.

I say this not because the media is solely the cause of these perceptions but it is clearly representative of the greater societal attitudes at play here.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#44

Post by acedinlowball » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:57 PM UTC

__derek__ wrote: post #31

Torgo wrote: post #3

>It is time to rethink the “good leader” prototype of being masculine, dictatorial, and charismatic. Good luck, there's a reason those attributes are dominant.

Yes, confirmation bias and superstition.

Wrong.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#45

Post by nylonstrung » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:58 PM UTC

ksk wrote: post #2

I think this article is quite poor. It doesn't explain why you would expect there to be more Asians in the first place. Asians are over-represented in STEM fields. You could just as well ask a general question about "nerds" not getting hired into executive positions.

Likewise even in finance there is serious overrepresentation at the junior levels (and overwhelming overrepresentation in terms of applicants) yet the same near total absence of Asian leadership

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#46

Post by sushid » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:59 PM UTC

mbrameld wrote: post #22

novia wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, fine, here is a link to a comment from a year ago that is both racist and sexist: https://www.reddit.com/r/opieandanthony/comments/36mx0n/redd... The Chairman Pao nickname was used to draw comparisons between Ellen Pao and Chairman Mao. Yeah, not racist at all.

Is it racist to compare a white male leader to Hitler?

I don't think you can categorically say that (but are welcome to make that accusation). Are you saying that because we as a society make comparisons to Hitler, it's okay to call an Asian woman in a leadership position something like "Chairman Mao?"

If a black person were compared to Mugabe, is that also racist? What if you compared an Italian person to Mussolini? is that racist?

You can ask more asinine questions but you're really skirting around the real question here (with a fairly clear answer).

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#47

Post by concinds » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 6:59 PM UTC

jeffdavis wrote: post #38

Why do we expect uniform outcomes from diverse people? Say two groups are different enough that, when you put them together, you call that "diversity". Why do you expect them to be statistically identical when you divide the groups apart again? Prejudice in career advancement and other important decisions is bad, of course. People should be judged on their own merits, not group statistics. But that doesn't mean that…

This.

Why should America reflect world diversity? And how could it? Are there not enough whites in executive positions in Asia? The question doesn't make sense, because "enough" is a normative question and it's impossible to find a metric that's truly "fair".

Equality-of-outcome politics is one of the most dogmatic and dangerous movements in recent years, and it's incredible that it gained acceptance in all elite circles without any pushback. It's something that is fundamentally broken and unjust, because of widespread group differences. Have people here read the article in OP? They mention differences in education in different demographic groups. These aren't the only differences, so for example South Asians may be more likely to be engineers, but will be underrepresented in other industries, because of differences in majors and career preferences. Should equality be legislated?

Fight for equality of opportunity, and basta. This is a highly politicized and dogmatic movement that's trying to engineer the perfect society, and thinks there won't be any consequences.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#48

Post by hx87 » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 7:01 PM UTC

koolba wrote: post #37

terda12 wrote: post #4

I'm not a business leader by any means so keep that in mind. I'm an Asian, and I don't see this as a problem tbh. American leaders have, historically, tend to be white men (think the first 49 presidents). We're definitely starting to see diversity in leadership positions. Obama, Sundar Pichai of Google, Satya Nadella of Microsoft, Yishan Wong/Ellen Pao of Reddit are some examples that come to my mind. Even Ellen Pao,…

> American leaders have, historically, tend to be white men (think the first 49 presidents). You mean 43 US presidents. President Obama is number 44.

> Obama

You mean 43.5

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#49

Post by ftrflyr » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 7:02 PM UTC

concinds wrote: post #47

jeffdavis wrote: post #38

Why do we expect uniform outcomes from diverse people? Say two groups are different enough that, when you put them together, you call that "diversity". Why do you expect them to be statistically identical when you divide the groups apart again? Prejudice in career advancement and other important decisions is bad, of course. People should be judged on their own merits, not group statistics. But that doesn't mean that…

This. Why should America reflect world diversity? And how could it? Are there not enough whites in executive positions in Asia? The question doesn't make sense, because "enough" is a normative question and it's impossible to find a metric that's truly "fair". Equality-of-outcome politics is one of the most dogmatic and dangerous movements in recent years, and it's incredible that it gained acceptance in all elite cir…

Yes, yes, yes. I anticipate your comment will be down voted because HN is predominately liberal.

Re: Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?

#50

Post by nylonstrung » Mon, Dec 19, 2016, 7:03 PM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #26

Statistical fallacies abound in this article. One thought I had while reading it, is that what is the average tenure in those companies among Asians vs. whites? It can take years to get into leadership roles. Leadership numbers are lagging indicators. A lot of immigration has occurred in the last 15 years, especially with the H1-B visas and my theory is that Asian makeup of companies has increased steadily in that ti…

Do you think Silicon Valley had a shortage of Asians in 2000?

The thought process behind what you said is correct but not in light of the fact that Asians have been one of the most educated groups in the country for over 20s years.

There still is a severe underrepresentation even when you factor that into account