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Microsoft Uses US Women's Soccer Team To Explain Why It Doesn't Hire More Women
theodp writes: "It is not surprising that the U.S. women have been dominant in the sport [of soccer] in recent years. The explanation for that success lies in the talent pipeline," writes General Manager of Citizenship & Public Affairs Lori Forte Harnick on The Official Microsoft Blog. "Said another way, many girls in the U.S. have the opportunity to learn how to play soccer and, as a result, they benefit from the teamwork, skill development and fun involved. That's the kind of opportunity I would like to see develop for the technology sector, which presents a different, yet perhaps even more significant, set of opportunities for girls and young women. Unfortunately, the strength in the talent pipeline that we see in female soccer today is not the reality for technology. The U.S. is facing a shortage of Computer Science (CS) graduates. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, every year there are close to 140,000 jobs requiring a CS degree, but only 40,000 U.S. college graduates major in CS, which means that 100,000 positions go unfilled by domestic talent." Going with the soccer analogy, one thing FIFA realized that Microsoft didn't is that if you want girls to play your sport, you don't take away their ball!
Some engineering degrees (Computer, Electrical), math degrees, etc. can be used in lieu of a CS degree provided you can prove you can code.
This is all pandering to the need that companies HAVE to go get H1-B's, when the reality is no, there is PLENTY of local talent that can do these jobs.
When I studied CS there were 5 women and 200 guys in my class. With that in mind, complaining about an IT company not hiring many woman is nonsense.
As a tech marketing lady I met observed, the men make the stuff and the women sell it in our industry. She added "maybe that's because we're smarter about getting paid!"
Might help if Microsoft, among others, stopped supporting increased tech H1-B quotas. They tend to depress wages and working conditions, making the "pipeline" we're trying to promote less attractive than, say, marketing. Or doctoring or lawyering. There are only so many really smart people to go around, so one profession's gain is another profession's loss. Design engineers seem to have plateaued around very roughly $100K. That's an OK living, but not exactly what I'd call professional earnings.
So the argument is that because more women don't take Computer Science degrees that results in less women being hired, so don't take Computer Science away from them?
Very few women actually enroll in Computer Science / Engineering Programs, as a result this means that the talent pool from which to hire from contains less females vs males. This doesn't mean that big commons don't want to hire women, it just means that there aren't a lot of qualified women pick from.
Why don't you try offering them MORE MONEY, and watch the problem resolve itself! It might not be cool, but classic labor Economics still works in the 21st century.
Of course, Microsoft (or any other big tech company) doesn't really have a reason to do that as long as they can get a bunch of cheap H1-B workers to fill the positions instead.
Is this statistic really true? Are those 140,000 net new jobs, or just job openings that exist for some period of time during the year?
The article cites but does not link to a source for this statistic.
Also, a CS degree is a long, tough slog through dull material that has dubious relevance to most jobs that require a CS degree.
The story submitter and/or editors clearly had some agenda here in using a misleadingly suggestive title.
Fortunately, in technology as in soccer, nobody has taken away the ball, and the women that are interested in the field have just as much if not more opportunity than males to learn, study and pursue a career in Computer Science, and the whole article is bullcrap.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Enough of the gender/race baiting nonsense.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
"every year there are close to 140,000 jobs requiring a CS degree, but only 40,000 U.S. college graduates major in CS, which means that 100,000 positions go unfilled by domestic talent."
And this would be a logical inference if the only people looking for jobs were that year's college graduates.
But, actually, very few job openings are filled by fresh-outs.
Conclusion: mIsleading and false.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Why would anybody, in their right mind, get a CS or IT degree if they knew how shitty the environment was?
Microsoft and every other tech company: We want talent, but we don't want to pay for it. Give us more H1-B workers to cut the average salary, please.
Game corps: We slave-drive our workers, because it's better to take young talent and burn them out so they leave before they get too expensive. Which is why we're always re-inventing wheels.
IT: Dealing with really ungrateful idiots every day, all week, all year. The higher-up the chain, the stupider (with tech) they are.
Why would anyone, male or female, bother to get into this?
Fuck it. Play soccer.
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BMO
Of course, there are not 140,000 new jobs. There are a whole bunch of layoff's, office closures that puts a bunch of programmers out of work [like, say, Microsoft did not too long ago].
There are a whole bunch of already-graduated programmers that are explicitly rejected from these 'new jobs' because they can't afford to work cheap enough.
H1B's to the rescue!
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!