BIT!!! Blacks in Tech
A mini-documentary on the lives and contributions of Blacks at Microsoft
By Tracy Jones
The following video, BIT!! or Blacks In Tech, is the first installment of a documentary series about design culture at Microsoft.
Design is a verb. It’s a living, breathing act made of many disciplines and one of the main roles of an ERG (Employee Resource Group) is to craft amazing employee experiences, particularly for those historically marginalized within our industry.
Today, in partnership with BAM (Blacks at Microsoft), we are debuting BIT!! to commemorate Juneteenth — but as you know, we are alive year-round, not just on Juneteenth or in February. At Microsoft, we make Black history every day. Our intellect, creativity, and life experiences make vital contributions to technology and innovation. Blacks In Tech!! documents the beauty and complexities of working in an industry where the future is now.
The video focuses on Kat Noel and Jamel Jenkins, both of whom were generous and gracious about taking the time to tell their stories. Kat, a Content Designer, is a first-generation, Haitian-American from Brooklyn, NY. She currently lives in Washington state, where she co-led the refresh of Microsoft Editor’s Inclusive Language feature. “The beauty of the Inclusive Language feature is that it offers users a non-judgmental, safe space to reduce the risk of offending their readers,” she said.
Jamel, a Lead Software Engineer, hails from Atlanta, Georgia. “I have a passion for helping people reach their dreams through tech,” he said. Jamel leads a team of Full Stack engineers, a discipline that’s a hybrid of front end and back end developers. Together, they innovate and technically advance user interface design and experiences.
We would like to thank Kat, Jamel, and their families. Without them, this video would not be possible. Shout out to Genise Dawson, Samuel Trim, Donna Bouldin, Kara Costa, Michael Kroll, Rachel Romano, Phil Evans, Ohemaa Dixon, and all our day-ones that supported BIT!! from the jump.
As we celebrate Juneteenth, Kat and Jamel are a reminder that we’ve come quite a long way from slavery, but systemic racism still exists and the last month has overwhelmingly shown that, as Kat says in the documentary, “More work needs to be done.”
To stay in the know with Microsoft Design, follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or join our Windows or Office Insider program. And if you are interested in working with us at Microsoft, head over to aka.ms/DesignCareers.
