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HR Chief: Google Sexual, Racial Diversity "Not Where We Want to Be"
theodp (442580) writes "In 2007, Congress asked Google, "How many [Google employees] are African-American?" "I don't actually have that data at my fingertips," replied Google HR Chief Laszlo Bock. Seven years later, Google finally disclosed diversity data for the first time ever, revealing that 17% of its tech workforce is female, and only 1% is Black. "Put simply," wrote Google's Bock, "Google is not where we want to be when it comes to diversity." To put things in perspective, it looks like the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers — commemorated in last year's Google Doodle of Jackie Robinson — put up better Black diversity numbers than Google was able to muster 67 years later. Things could have been worse, but the EEOC doesn't ask for and Google chose not to disclose anything about the age makeup of its workforce, aside from a mention of the existence of Greyglers, a group "for Googlers 'of a certain age.'""
What happened to hiring the best person for the job?
The whole "there aren't enough females in the tech industry" seems like a manufactured issue to me. What exactly is the problem? How is it a problem? Etc.
Gotta love when 30% of the non-white asians don't count whatsoever into the diversity formula for these nitwits. Does anyone know what the correct mix should be btw?
I'd go into a long tirade on the subject so I'll sum it up that you either understand the argument or you're just wanting a Utopia at the cost of someone else who is the right choice for that company.
The very question is racist. Why does it matter how many of a certain color there are? If I get hired for a job, I want it to be because I was the right fit for the job, not because my skin was the appropriate color to meet some quota.
...culture does.
If the wrong skin colors are coming into Google, look towards the *cultures* of the people who don't make it, rather than the skin color. Backwards urban cultures (where sadly most self-identified blacks and latinos live), are anti-intellectual and actively discourage those who try to make it out through education by shaming them as not being "real".
So, the question is, should Google be in charge of destroying thug gansgsta culture, and forcing urban youth to speak proper english, work hard in school, treat women with respect, and avoid violent destructive behavior?
As for men/women, they've got different brains, so you'll get different outcomes. There is no shame in being a man with less empathy than a woman, and no shame in being a woman with more empathy than a man.
80% of NBA players are black, 70% of NFL players are black. Is anyone asking them for more "diversity"? Yeah I thought not.
And 100% of the top sports leagues are male. Where's the outrage over this lack of sexual diversity?
From the Washington Post's Blog section: Eugene Volokh, On google's employee demographics
... non-Hispanic whites are 61 percent of the Google work force, slightly below the national average. (That average, according to 2006-10 numbers, is 67 percent.) Google is thus less white than the typical American company. White men are probably slightly over-represented; assuming that the 30 percent number it gives for women Google employees worldwide carries over to the U.S. (the article gives no separate number for U.S. women Google employees), white men are 42 percent of the Google work force, and 35 percent of the U.S. work force — not a vast disparity. ...Google can only accomplish that by firing well over three-quarters of its Asian employees, and replacing them with blacks and Hispanics (and a few whites, to bring white numbers up from 61 percent to 67 percent).
Indeed, if the goal is “reflecting the demographics of the country” as to race...
Also - what percentage of Google's workforce are of Indian descent? What percentage of applicants have been Indian? Here in the US, people of Indian descent would certainly be considered members of an ethnic minority, a large number them (even a disproportionate number, perhaps?) being professionals in the IT field. I suspect that Google's workforce is representative of the qualified candidate pool from which they can hire.
It isn't Google's job to feel guilty for the lack of qualified black tech workers. Universities these days are falling down over themselves trying to be inclusive, promote diversity, etc.; promising black students in technical fields are highly sought after... yet there are almost none of them. I'm in computational physics, not in computer engineering, so it's a slightly different field. However, the university I'm at now is extremely diversity-promoting -- and located in a city that is ~50% black... and there is one black physicist there. She's not African-American, either; she's Ethiopian (and competent as all hell, and headed for industry). At my previous university, there were folks from all around the world: a few Afrikaaners, Dutch, Russians, Germans, Brazilians, French, Chinese, Indians, Native Americans, Koreans, Mexicans, and so on... and no black folks at all. At the physics and astronomy conferences I go to, there are almost no black people. Yes, this is physics, not tech engineering, but I imagine the situation is about the same there.
For whatever reason, blacks (and especially African-Americans) are underrepresented in the tech sector. This is definitely worth some concern: it could be for innocent reasons, it could be for ones that need to be addressed (having to do with substandard schools in black areas, for instance), but whatever it is it's not Google's problem. By all means, let's make sure tech classes in black schools are up to standard, but it's not Google's job to worry about this.
Forcing Google at Al Sharpton-point to seek out and hire black folks, regardless of whether they are able to do their jobs well or not, is only going to make things worse, as people will ask "Is that guy over there able to do his job, or is he a quota hire?"
When Google says "Not Where We Want to Be" , what they are saying is that it is time to start discriminating against white males and hire other less qualified candidates because some groups are getting uppidy. We never hear similar claims of needing "more diversity" from the NBA or the National Felons League, but when we find an area where white males excel by working hard, it is time to put a stop to it.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
It's true, but it's also just part of the way the world works. It's not just Silicon Valley. The big difference there is that Smart People have far more of a chance of first succeeding because software is "hard", and requires smart people in the first place to do anything useful.
1. By definition, most of the population is not-so-smart. (Please note, this does NOT mean smart people are better than everyone else, just smarter)
2. It takes smart people, and often times a particular kind of smart person to distinguish the smart people from the not-so-smart, but overly confident people.
3. People are heavily biased towards confident people. Confidence everyone can recognize. (as evidenced by the rise of Sara Palin, who has no business being confident, but yet was/is beloved by a certain segment of the populace).
4. There's an inverse relationship between skill and confidence. The more skillful people become, the less confident they are. (Primarly because they realize how much they really don't know).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...
So given the above, it's a natural tendency as a company grows that it'll start to get filled with people who aren't quite as smart as the founders. It's really inevitable at a certain point of growth because you'll just need more people, and a larger percentage of them will be not-so-smart. They'll start promoting the confident, but less skilled people because of point 2 and 3. This will create a feedback loop (less smart promotes even less smart people), and eventually the company is filled with morons who coast on the success of others. (i.e. Microsoft).
AccountKiller
In America "racial minority" means "black or Hispanic".
There's a deficit of Chinese people in football and Jews in growing soybeans but nobody really worries about that.
My team here consists only of white males. Why? Because only white males applied for the jobs.
If a black, gay, transsexual Jewish woman applies AND displays the necessary skill set, I'll hire her. But certainly not just because she's a black, gay, transsexual Jewish woman.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
As a computer engineering student, after five years of the program I've had exactly three black classmates. All three described being ridiculed and physically beaten by their black peers for being 'nerdy' and being into science and math. All three had friends with similar interests that gave them up due to peer pressure.
In high school I frequently recall black and Latino students who were literally afraid to turn in homework in front of their peers. They'd wait for the hoodlum kids to leave first and turn in papers with a whispered apology to the teacher. This happened all the way from 8th grade to 12th grade. I've seen kids get beaten up after a teacher announced they got the highest score on a test (this was back in the 90s when you could still single out students for their accomplishments).
So what is the problem here? A culture that equates educational success with selling out or otherwise punishes people for excelling. It's the same culture that called Bill Cosby a sell-out because he want from a teen in the projects to a millionaire with a Ph.D, despite his life-long efforts to help his own people and encourage education and success. This is a culture associated with poor people of ANY ethnicity, including whites. Believe me I've seen enough pot-smoking tatted up white trash hitting their children to know we can do it too.
BTW my campus is one of the most diverse in California, and whites are the minority, with Latino students in the middle and the majority is Indian and Asian, mostly Chinese. So diversity and support of non-white students is definitely not an issue. We have tons of black students too, just not going into the hard sciences.
So let's not talk about "Google needs to hire N amount of black employees" and say "How do we reach out to the black community and remove the stigma on educational success". THAT is the issue.
I'm a boss. There are lots of right people. The right person is someone who can get along with all the OTHER people. Aptitude is not as important as attitude. Yours is kind of selfish and cynical. I'd hire a woman over you. She's more likely to be a team player. It's a stereotype, but....
I don't think I can stress this enough. For the vast majority of positions, there are plenty of people who can do the job I need them to do. There are no rock stars needed. We have rock stars. They cause problems and unneeded stress. I need bright motivated people who get along well. One asshole ruins motivation for everyone.
That's why we need diversity. That's why we need people with emotional intelligence. Then there's the whole "diversity of experiences helps come up with clever solutions to the problems we are trying to overcome." thing, which is really really important.
I grew up in an anti-intellectual culture, and was persecuted for "trying to be white" when I focused on academics, proper english, and polite behavior.
I made it out. Many others I knew didn't.
If you can't understand how "urban" culture, with their thugs, gangstas, misogyny, violence and victimhood mentality, cause massive problems for those stuck in it, either you've never been there, or you're part of the problem.
Sorry for being cynical, but they may be trying to take the eyes off an even worse number.
The major thing they left out of their diversity statistics is how many people are over the age of 40. It's pretty clear that ageism is pervasive in the tech sector - and the internet. Last time I mentioned this, there was a serious sneer response to my post saying that "old people" (i.e. people over 40) should be discriminated against, "because they have issues."
There you have it slashdot. You had better be looking over your shoulder! You aren't getting any younger!
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
Have you worked with women? Women are no more team players than men. I've observed women back-stab, gossip, manipulate, ostracize, and generally destroy team dynamics plenty of times (and I've seen men do it too). There are a lot of features which contribute to who would be best for a job. Gender, race, biological sex, none of it is relevant to a job in the tech world. By saying "I'd hire a woman over you" because "she's more likely to be a team player" you are either being inflammatory, or your boss needs to reevaluate your own position as a "boss".
The final solution will have to come from within the backwards cultures themselves. We cannot impose a solution upon them, and cannot be held responsible for their lack of a solution.
For example, backwards islamic countries that treat women poorly will need to be reformed by internal leaders who manage to point out that flaw, and galvanize people around reforming it. Similarly, backwards urban cultures that objectify "bitches and hoes" will need to be reformed by internal leaders who manage to point out that flaw, and galvanize people around reforming it.
So, if you don't want to be part of the problem, and you're internal to the backwards culture, stop trying to protect it from reform and growth. Become a leader, and move them away from the self-destructive parts of culture.
Ultimately, it may be hopeless - islam has managed to stifle reformation for hundreds of years, for example. But I certainly understand that our responsibility to be honest and open about the failings of backwards cultures, is a small step in the right direction. Being dishonest, and blithely asserting that all cultures are of equal value or deserve equal respect, is poisonous and detrimental.
It's people who think like you who will forever keep us from addressing these problems.
Race is not tied to culture, and criticizing a dysfunctional culture is not racist, bigoted, or an action to be shamed. Your need to tie the self-destructive culture that is held by some urban people (of all races) to a specific race, and imply that they are unable to change their culture, is what is racist.
Thug gangsta culture is not a productive and viable culture, regardless of the color of the practitioner's skin. My saying that is not racist, but your implying that thug culture is an intrinsic part of being black is racist. We get to call out dysfunctional cultures and your attempts to make everything about race and shut down the conversation only make the world an uglier place.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
Some cultures are better than others, period. All cultures have problems, no doubt, but thug, ghetto culture definitely has more problems than mainstream culture.
Asserting that disparate outcomes are mostly due to racism, rather than mostly due to culture, misidentifies the root cause of the problem, and actively works *against* any future progress. If your arm is broken, and you've got a hangnail at the same time, you don't focus on the hangnail as the reason why you can't lift your arm.
When you're in the ghetto, it isn't the guy in the suburbs that you never see in person that is holding you back - it's the gang of thugs that beats you up if they see you carrying a chemistry textbook, or if they hear you speak proper english. Blaming some mythical "whitey", while you're beat down by the thug culture around you, is giving a pass to the cultural violence perpetrated, and unfairly scapegoating someone who doesn't deserve it.
It's time to get past the idea that "being real" means being uneducated, criminal, illiterate, misogynistic, and violent.
Who cares if a small percentage of the IT workforce is women? I sincerely doubt that a 50/50 split of men and women are applying for these jobs. Now, if the percentage of male/female applicants WAS 50/50, then something would definitely be wrong. I'd be interested to see data on that.
For the record, I realize I may be privileged (and I cringe using that term, to be honest). I'm reading back on some comments about students getting picked on for taking an interested in science and technology, and that never happened to me. Even though I was pretty much always the only girl in my tech-related endeavours, I was never picked on for it (I was picked on for other things though, but I'm sure it would have still happened even if I liked more "traditionally female" things).
That being said, even if there wasn't a perceived stigma attached to those interests, I doubt the numbers would be much higher.
I'm a hiring manager for a Fortune 100 Tech company (my boss reports directly to WW HR VP) and have been told point-blank that all hires must pass the "if all else is nearly equal" rule. In other words, when presented with two applicants who are "nearly" equally qualified for a position, that we are to hire the one that best addresses a minority concern. Period.
So if Jack rates a 9, and Jane rates a 7 in our interview results, Jane will always be hired. Any manager hiring Jack over Jane in this scenario will not be one much longer.
So which racist and misandry company do you work for so we can all avoid buying their products and services? Tell us so none of you can be there much longer.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
I was a manager at Home Depot for years and can tell you they do the same thing. When I got hired we had a man as a regional manager who didn't give a shit what race or sex you were. He hired the best people he could and our team became the envy of the entire company. We literally wrote the book on how to do our jobs better and most things considered 'best practices' came from our regional team at some level. Then his boss was changed to a woman who decided their were too many white men in our region things got really bad. When hiring the last three lower level managers under me I wasn't told if candidates were nearly the same, I was told I HAD to hire more females and minorities. After giving interviews for three months, and finding zero decent female or minority candidates, my new regional manager pulled me aside and basically accused me of being a racist and a sexist. I was told I had two weeks to fill the position or someone would be found to do it for me. The best of the bunch was a black woman who had been an HR department head. I had to fire her six months later for theft and was then blamed for hiring her in the first place. I ended up leaving HD because I got tired of the stupidity. At every level of the company they have gone off the rails. Management at the upper levels of the company have decided that anyone but a white male should be hired and most of the time that means not hiring the best candidate. Men are more physically capable of doing the bottom end jobs so more men are hired for those jobs. When it comes time to hire for their boss should I hire one of them who knows every aspect of his own job plus most aspects of his boss' job or a female who knows nothing about either position as an outside hire? In nearly every case it was better to hire from within but that meant I was a racist and a sexist for thinking people most capable of doing the job were the ones I should hire.