The tech world has a diversity problem, one that stretches beyond Silicon Valley to Texas and the rest of the United States. Despite assurances from tech industry leaders at Google, Facebook, Twitter, Apple and other industry leaders, diversity reports show little progress on the inclusive hiring front.
At Yahoo, Facebook, and Apple in 2015, African American employees held just 1, 2, and 3 percent of the respective companies' leadership positions. Twitter and Pinterest, meanwhile, had zero African Americans in these positions. Women don't have things much better in the tech industry, as they held just 11 percent of Silicon Valley's leadership positions in the same year.
The reasons for this problem are numerous, but they all point to the conclusion that the tech world is in need of a major culture change. Even before women and minority candidates face the reality that they may need to overcome a potential employers' bias, they need to find a way to simply get their foot in the door for an interview. Employers tend to look to their own social networks first when seeking new employees, and those networks are predominantly made up of other white men. The result is a pool of job candidates that look just like the person making the hire. Other times, women and minority candidates are simply dismissed as a bad fit for a company's culture.
Workplace discrimination does not only cover instances that take place on the job. Hiring practices that discriminate based on race or gender violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. People who believe that they have been unfairly targeted during the interview process may want to meet with an attorney who has employment law experience in order to learn what rights they have.
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