Recently, I read through Inclusion Inspires Innovation, Apple’s latest update on their diversity efforts. I applaud their efforts. In our experience, building an inclusive team is harder than it sounds, and while they acknowledge they still have work to do on this front, I’m excited to see their efforts to promote a diverse workforce.
To be honest, we continue to struggle with this here at Software for Good. We are a small team, and every hire matters. Diversity and talent are paramount. Though our short-term goals are focused on gender, we acknowledge that diversity extends well beyond that. Ethnicity, race, class, age, religion, sexual orientation, education, geography … we want people with a wide range of experiences and perspectives on our team. Diversity leads to creativity, innovation, and stronger solutions.
But our staff makeup continues to be decidedly male. Over the last two years, only 25% of our hires have been women. We need to increase this number. While software development is an industry traditionally dominated by men, we believe we can do better than Apple’s 79% male-dominated tech workforce.
Today we’re putting a stake in the ground and saying we can do better, and we will do better. Not only will we continue supporting organizations dedicated to furthering gender equality in tech — Girls in Tech, Girl Develop It, Fem Tech and the like — we will strive to develop the type of culture and people-centric policies that make Software for Good a great place for everyone to work. Look for a post on our progress this time next year. And if you have questions or ideas, let us know. We try to be as transparent as possible and we are always open to discussion.
In the meantime, if you are a talented under-represented developer, please reach out to us. We’d like to get to know you.