The Intro: The Unsurprising Twist in Diversity & Inclusion

a series of unsurprising discussions on diversity in tech

Over the next weeks I’ll be publishing a series on Diversity & Inclusion.

This topic has received a fairly wide range of reviews, analysis and commentary over the last year as Silicon Valley companies have released figures on their internal demographics. These statistics have served to highlight an already known fact for underrepresented groups of people who work within these organizations and those who have worked to counter the trend with perspectives that approach the issues at play from a variety of angles.

I’ve extensively researched diversity within technology and, unsurprisingly, there is a single persisting theme.

The Technology industry’s diversity problem is underpinned by the same issues which affect diversity everywhere else.

This in turn is what makes this soul searching being done on this topic, unsurprising. It however, takes center stage for technology because of its significance to society and how much of our future will be shaped by it. Exclusion of a diversity of experience, perspective and judgement afforded by employees of a variety of backgrounds would not only mean a new generation of people of underrepresented groups being withheld from a say in how technology is implemented in our lives, but also psychological harm to those who attempt to enter and lost access to the economic opportunity it creates for practitioners — and in that calculus, everyone loses.

At it’s core, the issue is made up of an old and well documented, largely unaware, collective unwillingness to engage and cultivate people of underrepresented groups of color.

But there’s some good news. As an industry, technologists and those committed to the virtues of Diversity & Inclusion, from both within and outside of the industry are actively engaged in correcting course. Invested interests in diversifying technology have initiatives which offer technical, educational, financial, recruitment, retainment and social engineering solutions, and I’ll be covering each of these and my thoughts on them throughout this series.

The Unsurprising Twist of Diversity & Inclusion, will explore efforts beyond the pipeline. I discuss the perspectives, technology and strategies of various startups and diversity and inclusion leads — such as Laura Weidman Powers and Tristan Walker, founders of Code2040, Kedar Iyer, co-founder of GapJumpers, Kieran Snyder co-founder of Textio, Porter Braswell and Ryan Williams, co-founders of Jopwell, Kimberly Bryant of Black Girls Code, Joelle Emerson, CEO and founder of Paradigm IQ, the work of Chris Benett, Hadiyah Mujhid, Nnena Ukuku and Monique Woodard through Black Founders, Kathryn Finney, founder of Digitally Undivided, Christina Lewis Halpern, founder of All-Star-Coding and Jessica Berlinger Gilmartin and Anthony Luckett of Piazza, Nicole Sanchez VP of Social Impact at GitHub, among others.

The Unsurprising Twist in Diversity & Inclusion

a series of unsurprising discussions on diversity

Introduction: The Unsurprising Twist in Diversity & Inclusion

Part I: SMASH
A look at Level Playing Field Institute’s SMASH, in the context of Diversity & Inclusion