Thought Apple was kidding about diversity? Here's 50 MEEELLION reasons you're wrong Apple has announced a $50m donation to help improve diversity in the science and technology fields. The company revealed on Tuesday that it would be pledging the cash to a group of charities aiming to train women, minorities, and military veterans for careers in the information technology sector. "We wanted to create …
Thumbs up - and well done Apple. It makes good business sense too, I suspect, because (if you're a 'minority') where would you rather work? Somewhere that supports and encourages you, or somewhere that shrugs its collective shoulders. This move might give Apple a larger selection of applicants to choose from. Maybe.
It would depend on how they approached it, I think i would feel a bit of a token effort like they where just ticking boxes on a Facebook how diverse are you quiz. Really Apple should focus on employing the best software engineers (they certainly need it) and not focus on their sexuality, skin colour or race.
@David 138
I agree entirely. It they're spending the money on attracting minorities into IT through advertising the benefits of a technology career, through funding courses and education, through internships and so forth then it's money very well spent.
If, on the other hand, they're just going to spending the money paying lip service to the right thing then they might just as well give it to me.
I suspect though, and I hope, that they'll be doing the former rather than the latter.
Obviously you never worked for a place that really pushed diversity. It is just another form of racism only it is a different skin color getting the shaft. Or gender preference or whatever. Some members of the minority groups are really good at working the system to their advantage. I worked with a lesbian engineer who promoted her girlfriend after going on vacation with her. Straight Male employees had been fired for less. Further, she passed over a much more qualified male engineer. He just happened to be straight and devout Christian. So that made it affirmative action, inclusiveness, etc and not discrimination.
A lot of people don't like the LGBT community not because of their sexual preference but because they use their current advantage in the workforce to screw over everyone else, and complain about discrimination at the same time.
If you work at Apple and you are a straight male and you are going up against a member of the LGBT community for a promotion, who do you think is going to get it. Not you. So why should you work hard?
Maybe you just go work for Tesla where you will be treated as a person and not a gender preference/ skin color.
Another person mentioned Asians and how will they do. At one point Chinese immigrants were the only nationality that could not get citizenship. How is that for discrimination?
and you've obviously never worked at a place where you can get fired just for being LGBT, terrorised by a manager or worse by very junior colleagues who happen to go to the same church as the manager.
Consider that this is perfectly legal in many many many places of the world (including huge swathes of the US and Europe).
Yes - any form of discrimination based on any thing other than Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve and Talent is entirely and utterly wrong - there is some opportunity and equality catch up required tho...
"A lot of people don't like the LGBT community not because of their sexual preference but because they use their current advantage in the workforce to screw over everyone else, and complain about discrimination at the same time."
It certainly seems like you don't.
Swap LGBT for black and sexual preference for colour, and then think about how bigoted your statement is.
If a minority group had an advantage - guess what - they wouldn't be a minority. That's kind of how it works. Stop whining because someone tipped the scales ever so slightly away from being completely in your favour, in all cases, all the time.
Is the lack of diversity really explained by a simple lack of resources, or is there something else lacking? Those asians weren't handed a lot of free training, and by and large they didn't inherit wealth, and further one could argue that in the US they had to struggle against at least some racial predjudice, yet there they are, at the top. Additionally, I understand that university student bodies are majority female and have been for some time, but somehow those women aren't going for the high tech jobs.
Nevertheless, it must be due to lack of funds. Any other reason is unthinkable!
Can't argue with this, well done Cook & Co. Encouraging a more diverse range of humanoids to work for the company is a far more sensible and (whisper it) fair approach than having diversity quotas, positive discrimination, ir driving around in a pink bus to patronise the very people you're trying to empower.
I think that any steps to create a diverse and equal workforce should be applauded; yes, you could say that money isn't the answer, or telling people about it (like the BBC - "we're officially banning all-male panels on comedy shows") leads to tokenism, but you have to start somewhere before it becomes the norm. Any effort to move towards making diversity and equality the norm is a Good Thing in my opinion :)
"...can’t innovate without being diverse and inclusive." Well, I have one word to say about that: Japan.
The reality is that the UK in the 19th Century was one of the most innovative places on earth, and very homogenous.
I am curious. Are the major universities going to spend cash to ensure that ther intake isn't too Chinese? Thought not.
Positive discrimination is still discrimination.
The tricky thing here is that diversity can be a great asset to a company, but only if that diversity is relevant.
If team 1 consists of 4 white male developers and team 2 consists of 2 women and 2 black men, the diversity crowd will say that team 1 is not diverse. But what if the members of team 1 are experts in different computer languages, systems and industries, while everybody in team 2 has the same background? Team 1 would be more diverse, in a way that actually benefits the business.
What gets me is that the least diverse industries by gender are female dominated, such as kindergarten teachers. But you never hear about diversity drives there. Wonder why that is?
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
