Diversity in Technical Industry
Diversity requires recognition of every worker’s capability in delivering services in an organization by creating equal opportunities and remuneration for all employees without checking gender, status, and ethnicity dimensions. For example, the tech industry has only 25% of computer science-related jobs taken by women, which means women are less represented in these jobs (Wooll, 2021). Additionally, people of color have long been a victim of disregard for diverse perspectives in the technical industry. This work explores the tech industry’s diversity issues and what should be done to combat the same.
Specific Problems in Terms of Selection
There are existing challenges when it comes to selection in the tech industry. The first problem is the underrepresentation of women and people of color. Evans (2020 para. 5) says that “the percentage of women in these workforces increased less than 2%. The reports that specified gender and race said most of these women were White.” This means there is execution on the diversity metrics but on a low note. The article shows that the number of Hispanic and black employees has been slowly increasing compared to the white majority in tech firms. That means tech companies have a problem diversifying, which might lead to slowed innovation due to stereotyping and disregard for the potential of people in various fields. Figure 1 shows a conceptual aspect of the problem as it exists in tech industries.
The lack of significant representation of women in the tech industry is costly. The reason is that women control about $20 trillion in consumer spending; therefore, it is undeserved to lowly include them in the workforce (Wooll, 2021). Inclusion of women means improvement of working metrics and advanced creation of products and services that fit other women; hence, diversity creates equality in society. A more diverse workforce means a wide array of opinions that improves creativity, artificial intelligence, and the stability of modern digital architecture. The other problem is discrimination in the workplace against members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community. If a company does not respect these groups, a potential innovative mind may not reveal the idea that can transform the industry (“Executives must solve Silicon Valley’s diversity problem articles, 2021”). Another problem is selecting employees based on certain religious affiliations. These problems need addressing, with a key goal being neutralizing the diversity factor.
Suggestions Proposed for Increasing Diversity
The articles have given their recommendations on increasing diversity in the tech industry. Suggestions include being location-inclusive, focusing on company culture, creating a diverse hiring strategy, developing diverse talent, being vocal about the need to be diverse, and measuring results to ascertain progress (Wooll, 2021). Additionally, studying international business issues, improving diversity recruiting, and creating a supportive culture are suggestions to increase diversity.
The most helpful venture in curling diversity constraints includes the creation of a diversity hiring strategy, the development of diverse talent, and focusing on the culture that a company belongs in. The reason is that if a company undertakes a strategic move to have an inclusive workforce, hiring people from all walks of life will be possible, boosting innovation in tech industries. It works better since hiring patterns can be created, such as selecting candidates from pools that show regional, religious, ethnical, gender-based, and racial notations (“Executives must solve Silicon Valley’s diversity problem articles, 2021”). Additionally, developing diverse talent means incorporating various people in a broad spectrum of information and technology (IT), such as leadership, research, and microservices architecture development team.
Suggestions that may backfire include being vocal on the issue and studying international business issues. The reason is that if people were to champion diversity by lobbying for it without the necessary actions, the synergy might go down with time, creating more challenging diversity discrepancies (“Diversity in the workplace, 2023”). Additionally, learning international business issues may not work well in implementing diversity factors since trends vary depending on the location and culture in given societies. For example, a company may not effectively be inclusive if they learn objections that some countries have regarding LGBTQ members in regions where religious extremism has been the key cause of trouble (“Diversity in the workplace, 2023”). Thus, implementing well balanced, diverse workforce require critical analysis and observance of labor laws to ensure no party feels underrepresented.
Ideas for Promoting Diversity
Diversity cannot be undertaken well without knowing what to do regarding workplace metrics and human capital. The first idea is to increase women in leadership roles based on their merit and experience. Supervisory and management roles should not be for males only since women are as intelligent as men when dealing with technical IT issues that need critical thinking. In every section of the tech industry, there should be at least a woman in team leadership or executive board since that will show equality in gender inclusion in the workforce. The existing leadership should be trained to integrate gender equality from various dimensions, such as the potential and talent a female worker has when it comes to the digital configuration of elements in the tech industry. Talent search should consider women’s potential to ensure organizational balance in gender.
The other idea is to have a racially balanced workforce in tech organizations. That calls for hiring more people of color, Hispanics, and other races to match the white majority in many technology firms. During recruitment and selection, at least 30% of candidates selected should be from the minority races since that empowers them. For example, if a digital tech firm requires five technicians in big data management, at least two selected people must be from these races. Additionally, balancing employees in terms of their race requires training so that the people in human resource departments will be keen not to fall prey to discrimination towards certain races.
Description of Workability of the Ideas Above
The two highlighted ideas will work because they are easy to implement and create a holistic approach to diversity measures in IT companies. First, a workforce that comprises minority races means that during hiring, more people from the population will have a chance to join the company, not due to bias but as one way of promoting companies’ culture of diversity. A holistic approach is beneficial since it will be possible to explain why particular individuals have been picked by highlighting the need to balance human capital by creating equal opportunities (Lindsay, 2022). The other benefit is that equal representation in terms of race brings the potential for a company to have a wide array of innovative minds, which can lead to the digital revolution and sustainability of the Internet of Things (IoT). Therefore, it is essential to have this population in tech companies.
Furthermore, increasing women’s representation in the tech industry will work since many abled female professionals can effectively work as IT professionals. The idea will be easy to execute due to this group’s education, experience, and talent in yielding toward digital tech transformation. The benefit is that the female gender has knowledge and expertise power in IT because the contemporary world is open for everyone to explore (Lindsay, 2022). Additional benefits of the digital field are that women can carefully analyze and project matters based on their logic and rational perspectives. Thus, having them in the IT workforce is significantly vital.
References
Evans, D. (2020). Tech companies have made big promises, and small gains, for diversity and inclusion. CNBC. Web.
Executives must solve Silicon Valley’s diversity problem articles. WSU Online MBA. Web.
Lindsay, G. (2022). The pandemic accelerated hybrid cloud growth. Where do we go from here?Fast Company. Web.
Rooney, K., & Khorram, Y. (2020). Tech companies value diversity, but reports show little change in the last six years. CNBC. Web.
Diversity in the Workplace. (2023). Lecture, United States.
Wooll, M. (2021). Diversity in tech: Closing the gap in the modern industry. Diversity in Tech: Closing the Gap in the Modern Industry. Web.