Do You Know How to Tackle Diversity Issues on Your Team?

Problem

"We've always had a tough hiring process and I had never had somebody decline a job offer. However, on this occasion, I had been interviewing a woman for an Android Developer job and she declined the offer. She told me that she had chosen another company where she thought she'd 'fit better'. The truth is, she went to a more gender-balanced company. Whether that was the reason she declined or not, it was a wake-up call for me that 90% of the team were men."

Actions Taken

"We decided to do a lot more sourcing at women's engineering events. By doing so, we managed to get a more balanced pool of candidates and eventually ended up with a more gender-balanced team (with a 60/40 male to female ratio) without changing our requirements for technical competencies."

Lessons learned

"It's not only about always hiring the 'best of the best'. It's also important to create a non-hostile work environment for everyone. With 90% of men on our team, we had become hostile to women, and as a consequence, had reduced our access to the talent pool. But how can you build a more diverse team without changing the tech level, whilst prioritizing women candidates instead of being impartial? Do not change the bar, change how you source potential candidates."