SilverHood
FH is my second home
- Joined
- Dec 23, 2003
- Messages
- 2,317
I guess there's really two types of DEI. I've seen both: Hard targets and preference, and the other, more nuanced view that diversity is good, but not a goal in itself.
One firm I worked at, we had some really low performing staff. But they were both female and a minority, so they counted double on the DEI targets. Senior managers had hard targets (30% women and minority, I think). If they went below that, their bonuses could be impacted. They made sure to stay above that target. It sucked for the rest of us, we had to pickup the slack while they played on their phones. My team wasn't too badly impacted, because we were 12 people, but a friends team was 3 people, and one person not carrying their weight was way more noticeable. When teams dropped below their target, preference would be given so that these hard targets were met. This meant better candidates sometimes lost out. It was no good for everyone involved. The DEI person who made it through this way usually didn't last long either, unable to handle the pressure of working on a trading floor.
At my current firm, a large part of DEI is just getting candidates in the door for the interview. The tendency is to just hire more of what you already have, and while that works to a certain extent, it's also somewhat limiting. We want to see candidates from a wide array of backgrounds, and then we chose the best candidate. Where DEI really comes in here, is that we often have junior dev entry level roles that do not require any experience except an IT degree and some sort of work experience or internship. Prior to the DEI program, it was all just white males from the Tri-state area. Afterwards, it was a bit more diverse, but no one lost out because some target had to be hit. Now that the program has been in place for 10+ years, one of the biggest things we're noticing, is that attracting top tier talent that isn't white male is much easier. They interview, they come see the office, and notice that it's not an office full of white males, and they're way more likely to join us. Having a well structured DEI program is a competitive advantage as a recruiting tool. If it didn't make sense from a return on investment point of view, it would have been scrapped a long time ago, but it works for us, so it's staying.
One firm I worked at, we had some really low performing staff. But they were both female and a minority, so they counted double on the DEI targets. Senior managers had hard targets (30% women and minority, I think). If they went below that, their bonuses could be impacted. They made sure to stay above that target. It sucked for the rest of us, we had to pickup the slack while they played on their phones. My team wasn't too badly impacted, because we were 12 people, but a friends team was 3 people, and one person not carrying their weight was way more noticeable. When teams dropped below their target, preference would be given so that these hard targets were met. This meant better candidates sometimes lost out. It was no good for everyone involved. The DEI person who made it through this way usually didn't last long either, unable to handle the pressure of working on a trading floor.
At my current firm, a large part of DEI is just getting candidates in the door for the interview. The tendency is to just hire more of what you already have, and while that works to a certain extent, it's also somewhat limiting. We want to see candidates from a wide array of backgrounds, and then we chose the best candidate. Where DEI really comes in here, is that we often have junior dev entry level roles that do not require any experience except an IT degree and some sort of work experience or internship. Prior to the DEI program, it was all just white males from the Tri-state area. Afterwards, it was a bit more diverse, but no one lost out because some target had to be hit. Now that the program has been in place for 10+ years, one of the biggest things we're noticing, is that attracting top tier talent that isn't white male is much easier. They interview, they come see the office, and notice that it's not an office full of white males, and they're way more likely to join us. Having a well structured DEI program is a competitive advantage as a recruiting tool. If it didn't make sense from a return on investment point of view, it would have been scrapped a long time ago, but it works for us, so it's staying.
