> "Only 11% of all engineers in the U.S. are women, according to Department of Labor. The situation is a better among computer programmers, but not much. Women account for only 26% of all American coders." - Wired
and
> Track the gender of your applicants, not just the hires.
> "You need to be aiming for a 50/50 men-to-women ratio." - Allison Sawyer, The Wall Street Journal
> *NOTE: aim for this ratio in these early days, as we try to build towards a more equitable system.
This pretty much invalidates itself. You can't have a 50/50 ratio if only 26% of the population of programmers is women. You, at best, can hope for a 74/26 split.
Also? Gender bias in hiring is illegal, regardless of direction. In fact, employers are generally make the "gender identification" and "race identification" portions optional for liability reasons in this regard.
If your objective is 50/50, you need to encourage more women to enter the field [programming] rather than complain it isn't 50/50. 74/26 makes it mathematically impossible for every company to hire a 50/50 split.
and
> Track the gender of your applicants, not just the hires.
> "You need to be aiming for a 50/50 men-to-women ratio." - Allison Sawyer, The Wall Street Journal
> *NOTE: aim for this ratio in these early days, as we try to build towards a more equitable system.
This pretty much invalidates itself. You can't have a 50/50 ratio if only 26% of the population of programmers is women. You, at best, can hope for a 74/26 split.
Also? Gender bias in hiring is illegal, regardless of direction. In fact, employers are generally make the "gender identification" and "race identification" portions optional for liability reasons in this regard.
If your objective is 50/50, you need to encourage more women to enter the field [programming] rather than complain it isn't 50/50. 74/26 makes it mathematically impossible for every company to hire a 50/50 split.