You can’t fix diversity in tech without fixing the technical interview

Post by nitrogen » Wed, Nov 02, 2016, 9:48 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #53

mrkurt wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expanding the hiring pool is valuable to these companies. Many companies also feel like they'll perform better with a more diverse group of employees. I sure felt like that about my company. They probably _also_ feel like it's right. This is one of those social problems where both the business need and moral need match up. My guess is that people who want racial diversity want class diversity, diversity of thought, c…

I feel the same way. I want teams that are diverse and inclusive, because I think that's how you get both the best business results and the best society. One good historical example is labor force inclusion of women. For centuries, women were excluded from most professions. Circa 1970, women got only 10% of law and medicine degrees. They hit parity in the mid-aughts. Are doctors or lawyers making less? No. The expand…

Post by jdmichal » Wed, Nov 02, 2016, 9:48 PM UTC

treehau5 wrote: post #35

burkaman wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the next couple sentences explain it well: > It takes a lot of interviews to get used to the process and the format and to understand that the stuff you do in technical interviews isn’t actually the stuff you do at work every day. And it takes people in your social circle all going through the same experience, screwing up interviews here and there, and getting back on the horse to realize that poor performanc…

But this can be literally true for anyone. I tried re-reading it again and again and I am not seeing the distinction. Different people have different reactions to things. In other fields, it's not uncommon for people to submit resumes to 10, 15, even 20 firms and go through 5 to 10 interviews before landing their first "real" job. I think we forget how good we have it in tech relative to the rest of the economy. It's…

Post by golergka » Wed, Nov 02, 2016, 9:50 PM UTC

trhway wrote: post #11

Animats wrote: post #5

The big result there is this: "Poor performances in technical interviewing happen to most people, even people who are generally very strong. However, when we looked at our data, we discovered that after a poor performance, women are 7 times more likely to stop practicing than men." On the hiring side, "For the specific case of an online job posting, on average, 1,000 individuals will see a job post, 200 will begin th…

logically unexplainable multiple rejections just after very short interactions by seemingly picky capricious agents on the other side of the interactions - isn't it that the men have biologically wired in them as a normal thing to expect, doesn't matter be it dating or sales or tech interview...

Post by Houshalter » Wed, Nov 02, 2016, 9:54 PM UTC

Post by anon2986 » Wed, Nov 02, 2016, 9:55 PM UTC

stanleydrew wrote: post #40

balls187 wrote: post #36

Indians of Asian descent are a minority in the US, but well represented in Software Engineering. Further, there are plenty more Indian, Chinese, and Russian female engineers, than there are American (of european, aka White) female engineers. I am less inclined to believe there is systemic bias against women, and minorities, and instead a culture difference between groups who are well represented in engineering, and g…

> I am less inclined to believe there is systemic bias against women, and minorities, and instead a culture difference between groups who are well represented in engineering, and groups which are not. This reveals a complete misunderstanding of how "systemic bias" occurs and persists. [Edited with further thoughts] "Cultural differences" don't just appear out of nowhere. Culture itself is an amalgamation of different…