Today the conversation (let’s use that term loosely…) on Twitter briefly revisited what Rachel referred to as the “Where are the Women”-permathread. The main question, as always, was around why numbers of female speakers remains low at most web & tech conferences. Rather than get into this particular issue again, I’m going to go off on a slightly different angle and talk about affirmative action.
Affirmative action (aka positive discrimination) is often suggested as the solution to diversity/representation problems. No female speakers? Just pick some names out of a hat! Completely white audience? Let’s give tickets away to anyone we can find with a dark face!
Sometimes, AA is truly the best/only course of action. In extreme situations, I’ve even been known to support it myself (although the interesting thing in the South African context is that it is actually favourable to the previously-disenfranchised majority, rather than a minority). The real problem with it for me though, is that it perpetuates discrimination. If the only reason that you chose a speaker is because she is female (and this is pretty obvious to people) then they are going to discount that speaker — after all, how talented or interesting can she be, given that she’s only up there talking because she has breasts?
As Tom Coates remarked in a post last year:
“There’s something deeply entertaining to me about fighting for inclusivity by suggesting that some people only got to speak because they were in a minority group. Smart move! Inclusive!”
Personally, I agree with incentives to promote diversity. I think organisations should be rewarded for actively trying to be fair — to pick the person truly best for the job, to build a diverse workforce that uses differences to its advantage. I’m all in favour of levelling the playing field and helping people to understand when they are discriminating unconsciously. But when you lower your standards to meet an arbitrary target, you insult the very group you are trying to attract.
Part of the reason that I feel so strongly about this is that I tick just about every diversity box you can imagine. I’m a gay, disabled, African woman working in technology. But if one of those descriptors is the primary reason you want me to work for you… Well, let’s just say your chances of success approach zero rapidly!
Comments (4) Permalink
February 7th, 2007 at 11:51 AM
I totally agree with your thoughts on affirmative action. It’s a challenging problem because it does seem like people will naturally lean towards selecting and hiring people that are most like themselves and the selection process is imperfect wtih time constraints and lack of information so often people end up picking the person they know or feel comfortable with and the “best person” for a particular job is never even identified or considered. I think mentoring and offering informal help is one of the biggest ways that I have been helped and seen others helped finding new opportunities – both men and women taking the time to mentor women and minorities and understanding the significant impact it can have.
February 25th, 2007 at 4:49 PM
[…] Positive discrimination is a dangerous place to play. It SHOULD be about keeping your standards high AND considering a wider pool of candidates than you otherwise would. Don’t lower your standards to benefit minorities — you’ll just reinforce the original discrimination. Equally, consider whether your “standards” are automatically discriminatory to some groups. E.g. if “is good with the senior execs” == “plays golf with us all on Sundays”, that MIGHT just be a little unfair… […]
March 13th, 2007 at 5:36 AM
Keep life simple, don’t hurt some to help others, be consistent, treat all the same. AA jumps to the bottom line, hiring or selection based on correting a perceived disparity. If helping to level the field is the goal, what about providing assistance to increase the desireablility of the candidate, which candidate??? all who need help. Provide the learning opportunity, to all, encourage all, train all, select the best, offer remedial training to those who were not selected in their area of weakness. STOP taking the easy way out, it has far too many drawbacks, as shown in the prior writers comments…. or consider…”We must hire blind airline pilots, there aren’t any flying now so we must be discriminating against them!!!”, not all are suitable for everything but where training and encouragement could make success possible, offer it, never lower standards!!!
March 25th, 2007 at 5:35 PM
Support for affirmative action is strong and growing stronger in my part of the country. I live in a border community of about 750,000 people that is about 85 percent Hispanic-American. (Oddly, the city prides itself on its diversity, as though it hopes to acheive diversity by becoming 100 percent Hispanic.) When the city’s African Americans, Native Americans and non-Hispanic white females are counted along with Hispanics, about 95 percent of the city’s population is eligible for affirmative action. As you might imagine, we have achieved a strong concensus on affirmative action. About 95 percent support it.