Diversity isn’t a position. It starts with you and me.
Over the last few months, one of the biggest trends we’ve seen is a concentrated focus on attracting a diverse group of participants, which is awesome. Hackathon organizations from Major League Hacking to individual hackathons like MHacks are looking for someone to take a role that completely focuses on diversity and inclusiveness. While this sounds (and largely is) fantastic, we have to be incredibly careful.
You can’t outsource diversity.
Our biggest fear with creating a position solely around diversity is that everyone will think someone else is taking care of it. We’re not just worried that someone will say:
“Should we have Ladies T shirts? I don’t know. I’ll leave that to the diversity coordinator to take care of”
Instead, we might stop asking ourselves those questions altogether. We’ll assume someone else is taking care of it, or that they will bring it up and think about diverse audiences for us.
Creating a welcoming, inclusive environment where people feel totally comfortable is up to each and every one of us.
It belongs to those working on food selections, those determining bus routes, making sleeping arrangements, picking prizes— each and every component of a hackathon.
To be clear, I don’t think anyone thinks that ‘diversity’ isn’t their problem anymore if someone else is working on it. And I do believe that we should have people focus on diversity. MHacks will. My fear is that they might forget to see it as their responsibility too.
This post serves as a reminder that this responsibility to make our spaces and experiences welcoming to people of all stripes, genders, races and backgrounds doesn’t belong to an individual.
The responsibility still falls on each and every one of us.
‘Diversity coordinators’ will solve some problems, but we should never become complacent assuming someone else has it covered. Issues don’t only arise from the way a hackathon is planned, but from the atmosphere the participants create.
Ask yourself: Is there anything I might be doing (attendees and organizers) that would make a space less welcoming and feel exclusive? Better yet: What can I do to make this space more inclusive?
We can all start from here.
Agree? Recommend this and put it on more people’s radar.
