Writing 03

How should the computing and technology community work towards creating a welcoming, diverse, and inclusive community? Is this a moral imperative or a laudable goal or unlikely wish?

I believe that diversity is an important factor in basically all environments whether professional, personal, or other. In a world full of so many different kinds of people with different ideas, beliefs, and lifestyles, being inclusive, inviting, and open is of paramount importance for many reasons. Having representative populations allows for the best, most innovative, and morally sound work to get done.

In tech, diversity is of extreme importance. In an industry that impacts literally every single person living on earth, I believe that the people designing, implementing, and selling tech products should represent the population being served. If a product is for a certain group of people, it simply makes sense for those creating that product to have some common ground with said group to make it as suitable to the need as possible. Additionally, having a diverse workforce is a great avenue to new ideas a less diverse group simply couldn’t or wouldn’t ever dream up.

In my limited experience in the tech industry, I have seen and heard some great examples of supportive diversity, as well as some not so great examples. Interning at Google, my cohort was one of the most diverse groups of people I’ve ever been a part of. While it definitely skewed more male, there was solid female representation, as well as ethnic and racial representation from seemingly everywhere imaginable. I know Google makes it a point for their intern classes to be diverse, and from my experience, they seemed to succeed on this front. The full time work force seemed a little less diverse, skewing much more male and white/asian.

While I haven’t experienced any aggressive intolerance personally, many of the stories shared by peers in class this last week were incredibly powerful, sad, and shocking. I’m aware that this sort of thing happens (I see it in the news), but to hear so many stories from young people was really unexpected.

I do believe that we need to take active steps to create a more diverse and inclusive environment to allow for a workforce of people from all backgrounds to help make the best products possible. I really liked hearing that Notre Dame asks questions like “what would you do to contribute to diversity here?” in their interviews, and believe practices like this would go a long way. It’s not this this excludes non-minorities, but rather, makes sure the candidate is aware of diversity problems and actively wants to help solve them.

Additionally, I believe aggressive no-tolerance policies against behavior that limits diversity should be adopted. While Google’s firing of the infamous “women don’t like to code” memo-writer was controversial, I think it showed a strong commitment to protecting minority employees and made a strong statement of the company’s values.

The Google memo case is a good example of how words are important no matter what you believe. While a phrase like “self-censorship” is pretty loaded, the idea itself is valuable. I think it’s really important to really consider what you believe in terms of other people and think about how your ideas align with creating a safe, productive, happy world. There are definitely things that should not be said in certain settings, and I think it is reasonable to reprimand people for violating the safety and comfort of others in this fashion.