Diversity Works
The notes are working :-)
Show of hands - Who here knows who this is?
Shonda Rhimes is a titan
SR is a self-described Titan of network television.
300th episode. Creator, head writer and executive producer.
Creator, head writer and executive producer
She is the Creator and executive producer of
Creator and executive producer
Executive producer. Firefighter Spinoff. Maranida Bailey's husband Ben leaving Grey-Sloan Memorial Hospital.
She owns a production company called Shondaland.
2014 ABC dedicated Thursday nights entirely to Shondaland programming. Named = TGIT. Thursdays = important night of TV. Advertisers make their biggest ad buys Thursday nights for the stuff they want to sell us over the weekend. Networks air their highest rated shows on that night.
2015. Her book = Year of Yes, which is about her experiment of saying ‘yes’ to everything for a year.
Last September Shonda partnered with Hearst Media, who owns online magazines like Cosmopolitan and ELLE, to launch shondaland.com a digital lifestyle magazine.
Last August Shonda signed a huge deal with Netfix. This will give her more creative freedom with the shows she wants to make. And she still gets to keep her TGIT shows on ABC.
Here are some quick facts about Shonda.
What has helped Shonda be so successful?
Diversity
In addition to producing addictive shows, Shonda's programs are incredibly diverse and appeal to the widest audience possible. Almost everyone will see a person from their demographic reflected back to them as a character on her shows.
I really hate the word 'diversity.'
Ironically SR doesn't like the word Diversity.
I have a different word: normalizing . I am making TV look like the world looks. Women, people of color, LGBTQ people equal way more than 50 percent of the population. Which means it ain't out of the ordinary.
If you've been paying attention to demographic numbers released by major companies, you would know there is a huge lack of diversity in tech and other industries.
This may look familiar
Maybe you've gone to a company website and navigated to a page that looks like this.
The US Population
What is normal? I will show you. These 20 smilies will represent the adult population of the US.
Gender Orientation
First up breakdown by gender.
Race and Ethnicity
63.7% White
2010 Census
2010 Census 63.7% White. Since then the US has gotten more diverse.
0.9% Native American/Alaskan/Hawaiian & PI
2010 Census
About % Indigenous people are PI
Sexual Orientation
Ability
Age
Let's look at the age breakdown of the adult population.
Our Users
A conservative estimate
This is what normal looks like
Our Users
Shondaland edition
Shonda has a character from every demographic, except native American, so I added Scott.
Our Users
Shondaland edition + Scott
This is just US adults, our products are used Worldwide. Our users get more diverse every day.
Why is this a problem?
Why is this an issue we should be concerned about?
Diversity is good for our products
We build products that are used people all over the world.
We’ve found that when at least one member of a team has traits in common with the end user, the entire team better understands that user.
Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Melinda Marshall, Laura Sherbin "How Diversity Can Drive Innovation"
Harvard Business Review did a national survey of 1,800 professionals.
One way to prevent these kind of screw-ups is to employ people of color, who can tell you if you’re about to step in it.
Robinson Meyer "The Repeated Racism of Snapchat"
If they had a more diverse team, someone could have given them a heads up before those filters went into production.
Like many technology companies, executives form a key early testing team... if people with dark skin do have problems with the watch's heart-rate sensor, none of Apple's top executives would have experienced it.
Alexis Madrigal "Will the Apple Watch's coolest feature work for people of color?"
A more diverse team could have avoided unintended and costly mistakes.
Diversity is good for productivity
In addition to the benefit of diverse teams better understanding end users. Research proves diversity makes companies more productive.
When selecting a problem-solving team...a team of randomly selected agents outperforms a team comprised of the best-performing agents.
Lu Hong and Scott E. Page "Groups of diverse problem solvers can outperform groups of high-ability problem solvers."
U of Michigan Researchers put together groups to solve problems. 1 group was randomly chosen, and the second group was made of best individual performers. They found the randomly chosen group of people with varying abilities consistently out-performed the group made of the best of the best.
Diversity is crucial to encouraging different perspectives and ideas that foster innovation.
"Global Diversity and Inclusion: Fostering Innovation Through a Diverse Workforce."
Forbes surveyed 321 executives from global companies making $500 million and up that had diversity programs in place.
In research-oriented and hi-tech industries, the broad base of talents generated by a gender-and ethnic-diverse organization becomes a priceless advantage.
Ankita Saxena "Workforce Diversity: A Key to Improve Productivity"
This research critically examined a large collection of literature and research papers on workplace diversity.
They found multicultural organizations to be better at problem solving, possess better ability to extract expanded meanings, and are more likely to display multiple perspectives and interpretations in dealing with complex issues.
Diversity is good for the bottom line
Research has also found diversity makes companies more profitable overall.
Companies in the top quartile for gender or racial and ethnic diversity are more likely to have financial returns above their national industry medians.
Vivian Hunt, Dennis Layton and Sara Prince "Diversity Matters"
In this 2015 study of 366 International companies
In 2015, we found that companies in the top quartile for gender diversity were 15 percent more likely to experience above-average profitability...In our expanded 2017 data set this number rose to 21 percent.
Vivian Hunt, Lareina Yee, Sara Prince, and Sundiatu Dixon-Fyle "Delivering through diversity"
3 years later, the same team of researchers found gender diversity in management positions increases profitability more than previously thought. From 15% to 21%.
We found having gender diversity on executive teams, specifically, consistently positively correlated with higher profitability across geographies in our data set.
Vivian Hunt, Lareina Yee, Sara Prince, and Sundiatu Dixon-Fyle "Delivering through diversity"
They expanded their sample from 366 International companies to 1,000 and found an even stronger correlation between gender diversity and higher profits.
Companies with the most ethnically diverse executives are 33 percent more likely to outperform their peers on profitability.
Vivian Hunt, Lareina Yee, Sara Prince, and Sundiatu Dixon-Fyle "Delivering through diversity"
In this same study they found ethnic diversity, in addition to gender diversity resulted in higher profits as well.
It's the right thing
Not just about making better products and profits.
Why does this happen?
Why aren't tech companies more diverse?
Myth:
The most qualified candidate gets the job.
Truth:
Some qualified people never make it to the first round because of unconscious bias.
I give people the benefit of the doubt that this bias is unconscious. I know there is conscious bias, too. But I believe if given the chance, most folks want to be inclusive rather than discriminatory.
Kim O'Grady
Maybe you've heard of Kim O'Grady who had 2013 Tumblr post go viral. After 4 months of job hunting all of applications were rejected. Applied to jobs he felt overqualified for. One day it dawned on him.
I made one change that day. I put Mr in front of my name on my CV. ...I got an interview for the very next job I applied for. And the one after that.
Kim O'Grady "How I Discovered Gender Discrimination."
What's in a name?
What difference does a name make.
Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male students
In a Yale University randomized double-blind study, 127 US STEM professors asked to evaluate resumes. Resumes were identical, except half "John" and half "Jennifer".
Faculty participants rated the male applicant as significantly more competent and hire-able than the (identical) female applicant.
Corinne A. Moss-Racusin, John F. Dovidio, Victoria L. Brescoll, Mark J. Graham, and Jo Handelsman "Science faculty’s subtle gender biases favor male students."
The scientists were less willing to mentor or to hire Jennifer. And the ones who were, on average, offered Jennifer $4,000 or 13% less per year than John.
Racial Bias in Hiring
A November 2002 study by the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business
Professors from the U of Chicago sent fictitious resumes to 1,300 help-wanted ads Boston Globe & Chicago Tribune. Success of each resume = Callbacks for interviews.
Applicants with "white-sounding" names were 50 percent more likely to get called for an interview.
outloud
The most surprising and disheartening result is seeing that applicants with African-American names were not rewarded for having better resumes.
Marianne Bertrand "Racial Bias in Hiring."
White applicants' higher-quality resumes resulted in 30% more callbacks and the identical resumes for African-American applicants resulted in 9% more callbacks.
"Culture Fit"
We hear a lot about Culture Fit when it comes to building teams, but Why is hiring for Culture Fit an issue when it comes to diversity?
Courtney Wilburn
Go through list first
Courtney Wilburn
The phone and in-person interviews went incredibly well. A few days later, they called saying I was qualified and felt confident I had the ability to perform whatever was required of me, but they felt that I wasn’t a good 'culture fit.'
Courtney Wilburn
I'm incredibly easy-going, so I was mystified by what that meant until I took a second look at the company’s website. If I joined them as a developer, I'd be the only woman there outside of administration, and the only Black person.
The biggest problem is that while we invoke cultural fit as a reason to hire someone, it is far more common to use it to not hire someone.
Katherine Klein "Is Cultural Fit a Qualification for Hiring or a Disguise for Bias?"
Researchers at the Wharton School for Business found.
What do you want your company culture to be?
Do you want to build a work environment where folks with similar backgrounds party with their friends?
Mia Levesque
Your clients don't give a sh*t about your Beer Pong Fridays and foosball tables.
Dispell myths and understand the value of diversity
There are a lot of misconceptions around diversity that many of us need to correct in our minds.
"Diversity for diversity's sake"
I have seen this term thrown around a lot. It implies you're assembling an artificial team of people just for the sake of diversity. Instead of "Diversity for diversity's sake," it should be Diversity for Normalizing's sake. Reality is diverse. Homogeneity is a world like the Smurfs and we all know that is not real.
Understand
Diversity ≠ Lower Quality
Homogeneity = Less Quality
Diversity is not a lowering of quality, as we have learned through scientific research it is in fact it is the opposite.
"Diversity hire"
I really dislike this term. It implies you are hiring an unqualified person just for the sake of diversity.
Realize
Diversity is an asset
Diversity brings value
Diversity makes teams better problem solvers, more understanding of end-users & brings measurable financial gain.
Marc Coleman
Founder and president of The Tactile Group, LLC.
When we have to choose among equally qualified candidates, we choose the candidate that will best maintain our culture of diversity.
Outoud then
How can we improve?
What can we do about this problem? How can we make it better?
Job listings
One step is writing inclusive job listings.
Highly masculine wording used in job postings reduces women’s appeal of the job because it signals that women do not fit or belong in that job.
Stephen Shearman "You Don’t Know It, But Women See Gender Bias in Your Job Postings"
A scientific study of 4,000 job descriptions found lack of gender-inclusive wording made it harder to recruit women in positions where women are underrepresented.
Evidence That Gendered Wording in Job Advertisements Exists and Sustains Gender Inequality
A March 2011 study University of Waterloo Department of Psychology
In this study, 96 random job seekers were asked to read job descriptions containing what researchers identified as masculine/feminine-themed words. They found listings with female-friendly words appealed to women - even for male dominated jobs.
Words not to use
Ninja
Rockstar
Hacker
Cowboy
Guys
Superhero
Jedi
Guru
"Job Listings That Don't Alienate"
I'm going to get to those words in a second, but let's talk about words you should never use in your job listings.
"Masculine" themed words
Ambitious
Analytical
Assertive
Autonomous
Best of the Best
Boastful
Chairman
Competitive Salary
Dominate
Rigid
Takes Risks
Hierarchical
Here are some words that researchers identified as "Masculine" themed.
"Feminine" themed words
Adaptable
Choose
Collaborate
Creative
Curious
Flexible Schedule
Multitasking
Imaginative
Intuitive
Self-Aware
Thoughtful
Trustworthy
The point is not to only use feminine themed words and no masculine words, but if you want to use a word like "Ambitious", Balance it out with a word like "Creative."
Job interviews
The next step is looking at your job interview process.
Melanie Chongolola
The day of my interview, I arrived and the manager took me into his office.
First I want to share a story from, Melanie a former employee, who has gone on from working in web development to being a funeral director, about a job interview experience she once had.
Interview questions to avoid
That is an example of something that should never be said at an interview, but here are examples of questions not to ask.
Sheryl L. Axelrod, Esquire
The Axelrod Firm, PC
Never, under any circumstances, ask interviewees such questions.
Sheryl is a Philadelphia lawyer who specializes in diversity issues and she advises that the following questions never be asked at an interview.
How old are you?
The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 forbids employment discrimination against anyone at least 40 years of age in the United States.
Do you have children or plan to?
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a federal law that prohibits employers from discriminating against employees on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, and religion. The innocent sounding version of this question is Where do you see yourself in 2 years, maybe having a family? and should not be asked.
What is your race or ethnicity?
Title VII. Where is your family from?
What is your religious affiliation?
Title VII. Where do you go to Church?
Are you disabled?
Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 prohibits employers from discriminating against employees on the basis of disability. The ADA also requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations to employees with disabilities
Check local laws
In addition to these are Federal, you should check your state and city laws. Philly LGBTQ laws.
Fight unconscious bias
Now you know unconscious bias = real, researched and proven, think hard why turning down an applicant. Why are you deleting that resume? Strive for a true Meritocracy.
Shonda Rhimes...pointedly avoided specifying her characters’ ethnicities, going so far as to leave off last names to help ensure the casting process would be a truly open one.
Nina Shen Rastogi "The tricky business of writing casting notices."
This: Shonda uses an open casting process and you should to.
Anonymise your job applicants
Hiding all information that gives away gender, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation and disability status will promote truly merit-based hiring.
Anonymise your job applicants
Blendoor
Our company is working on a plugin called Level Playing Field that will allow you to list jobs and collect anonymised job applications.
A week ago we won a business award from the Independence Business Alliance which will allow us to complete development of the plugin and launch it this year.
Diversify your vendors
In addition to providing jobs, companies also provide opportunities to other companies.
Supplier Diversity
A business strategy that ensures a diverse supplier base in the procurement of goods and services for any business or organization.
The firm who does your accounting, the company who does your printing, the agency who develops your website, these are all opportunities to send business to diverse companies.
Inclusion
Inclusion is just as important as diversity. If diverse employees do not feel like a valued member of your organization with a future they will not stay.
Diversity is being invited to the party. Inclusion is being asked to dance.
Without inclusion, the crucial connections that attract diverse talent, encourage their participation, foster innovation, and lead to business growth won’t happen.
Laura Sherbin and Ripa Rashid "Diversity Doesn’t Stick Without Inclusion"
Outloud then
Inclusive leaders
Six behaviors of an Inclusive Leader: Ensure team members speak up and are heard; Make it safe to propose ideas; Empower team members to make decisions; take advice and implement feedback; give actionable feedback; and share credit for team success.
Authenticity
We all need to be professional at work, however people from marginalized communities often feel they can't be their authentic selves. Do women feel the need to "act like a man" to get ahead? If photos are allowed, can LGBT folks feel comfortable putting up pictures of their families? Can Black folks have natural hair without being told it doesn't look professional? Any time a person feels they have to hide or alter a part of themselves that others do not it's a little soul crushing.
Networking and visibility
Within companies there is mentorship, guidance and feedback given by senior employees in order to improve job performance and progress. Make sure mentorship is given equally to diverse employees.
Clear career paths
Is there a game that needs to be played to get to the top, diverse folks feel they will never be able to participate in? People need to feel there is fair path to advancement to see a future for themselves or they will not stay.
Make new connections
Here's the fun part - go out and make new friends.
Expand your network
Go beyond your usual networks and find diverse networking groups and attend their events. We may have different life experiences, but we also have a lot in common as human beings. Make sincere, real connections with people.
Diverse networking groups
In Philly we also have multiple diverse tech networking groups. Meetup.com is a great resource to find groups in your area.
Help increase a diverse pipeline
Supply is the next piece of the puzzle. Marginalized people have been historically roadblocked from careers in tech and engineering. Work to help increase the pipeline of diverse folks in tech.
Support organizations working to fix the problem
Philly groups - teaching people to code. Find groups in your area and support them. Raise money, promote their events, find volunteer and sponsorship opportunities.
Be a good ally
I would not have the rights I have today if it weren't for allies. Back to Duane.
Help all of your clients be successful
If you have diverse clients work as hard for them as you do all of your clients.
Witchsy
Aug 2017, an article came out about a startup called Witchsy who was having trouble with their web developers. Not getting back to them, completing tasks asked of them. Hurting getting their online shop off the ground.
It would take me days to get a response, but Keith could not only get a response and a status update, but also be asked if he wanted anything else or if there was anything else that Keith needed help with.
John Paul Titlow "These Women Entrepreneurs Created A Fake Male Cofounder To Dodge Startup Sexism"
Outloud then
Use the power of your words
Many of us are in leadership positions or do a lot of presenting at conferences and events.
Avoid default pronouns
Programmer ≠ He
I've been to countless presentations or in conversations where speakers refer to hypothetical, fictitious programmers, developers & hires as he, him & guys
When referring to hypothetical people, use gender neutral pronouns or switch back and forth equally
Outloud then
Liam Dempsey
Director and Designer at lbdesign
Intermixing 'she', 'he' and 'they' in your talks deepens your connection with your audience.
Have a wide rage of people in your slides
When putting together presentations and adding images to slide decks, make sure the pictures depicting people in tech are not homogeneous.
Challenge homogeneous speaker lineups and panels
If you're invited to be on a panel where everyone else looks like you, say something. The organizers may not realize they've put together a homogeneous panel.
It'll help avoid debacles like this that happened a few months ago.
Be a normailzer
As leaders, we have the opportunity to be leaders in increasing in our industries. We hire and mentor people, speak at conferences, make products and build the software that runs 30% of the web.
If people aren’t being included, then I’m going to find a way to make sure they’re included. I’m going to find a way to make sure they have opportunities.
Tracy Levesque
Co-owner, Co-founder YIKES, Inc.@LilJimmi • yikesinc.com
My name is Tracy Levesque and I co-own YIKES, Inc. a web design and development agency in the awesome city of Philadelphia, PA.
