I've been in rooms with a lot of people with basically the same background as one another. While everyone may be individually smart, collectively there is a lot of reinforcement that leads to huge blindspots. The best teams I've been a part of absolutely comprise of folks with different life experiences.
Twitter’s backend was initially built on Ruby on Rails, a rudimentary web-application framework that made it nearly impossible to find a technical solution to the harassment problem.
Whether or not the source was properly represented, this general statement actually runs pretty well inline with what I know about how Twitter was run early on—absolutely nobody gave a shit about harassment because they were not the ones who would typically be vulnerable to this kind of behavior. So the problem went so poorly dealt with that more than a decade later they're still putting blame anywhere they can.
Furthermore, software development is a field that, by all possible measures, can be done by just about anyone. Very few professions benefit from thought diversity the way software does. Get the tools in more people's hands and great problems will be solved. We have an imperative to create a domain where more people feel empowered to contribute if we are going to make the most of what we have.
If inclusivity is not a priority it will become a major vulnerability for an organization eventually. We live in a society which is gradually learning to value the voices of marginalized groups more and more. We have a chance to lead the way in our theoretically meritocratic industry or we can pump out shitty companies which protect their shitty cultures through forced arbitration etc.
I agree with everything but something must to be very clear: no one likes impositions or members that have not enough technical skills, accepted in the team just because they are "different".
Yes and nobody likes members accepted on to the team without enough technical skill just because they fit in. Assembling a good team with complementary skill sets and attitudes is a many-faceted concern.
I've been in rooms with a lot of people with basically the same background as one another. While everyone may be individually smart, collectively there is a lot of reinforcement that leads to huge blindspots. The best teams I've been a part of absolutely comprise of folks with different life experiences.
Just today there was an absurd passage in a Vanity Fair article that demonstrates this idea:
Whether or not the source was properly represented, this general statement actually runs pretty well inline with what I know about how Twitter was run early on—absolutely nobody gave a shit about harassment because they were not the ones who would typically be vulnerable to this kind of behavior. So the problem went so poorly dealt with that more than a decade later they're still putting blame anywhere they can.
Furthermore, software development is a field that, by all possible measures, can be done by just about anyone. Very few professions benefit from thought diversity the way software does. Get the tools in more people's hands and great problems will be solved. We have an imperative to create a domain where more people feel empowered to contribute if we are going to make the most of what we have.
If inclusivity is not a priority it will become a major vulnerability for an organization eventually. We live in a society which is gradually learning to value the voices of marginalized groups more and more. We have a chance to lead the way in our theoretically meritocratic industry or we can pump out shitty companies which protect their shitty cultures through forced arbitration etc.
Great response
I agree with everything but something must to be very clear: no one likes impositions or members that have not enough technical skills, accepted in the team just because they are "different".
I submit that most companies have a greater need for more diverse perspectives and experiences than they have for technical talent.
Yes and nobody likes members accepted on to the team without enough technical skill just because they fit in. Assembling a good team with complementary skill sets and attitudes is a many-faceted concern.
That passage is so funny. Like, does Ruby not have a
stopHarassment()function in its standard library or what?