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Discussion on: Could your recruitment process be discouraging female developers?

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sebbdk profile image
Sebastian Vargr

Ok, let me see if i get this right. :)

The bias you are indicating is that some people have too much, or too little, confidence while in the recruitment process, and so we need to change the quality checks to include more people, because those people are secretly the shit, and our process cannot see it?

Dehumanizing interview processes are a problem across the culture spectrum last i checked. At least i have tried them a few times.

Why not encourage higher confidence levels, that's also a bias?

I'm really trying not' to be an ass-hat here, that's my bias i guess.
So please be gentle. :)

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char_bone profile image
Charlotte • Edited

No, you're totally missing the point here. The current process isn't a quality check, it's actually a rather lazy robotic process that doesn't require much effort from the companies but requires lots of preparation from candidates. This is why it's not at all about lowering the bar; of course companies want to make sure to hire talented people, but this process simply hires one type of person.

Take this example, a skilled person comes in with years of experience and skills beyond coding and messes up one algorithm question because they've spent years doing actual work so that's it, they're out. A graduate comes in who has literally just memorised algorithms and they ace it. Now the companies involved don't care, they've got tonnes of applicants... but they aren't considering that they don't have tonnes of diverse applicants. They are making that pool even smaller because they don't have the human element to their processes.

I get that lots of males don't understand the problem and think it's just minorities complaining. But we experience bias on a daily basis. We don't just go into interviews with the standard worry that everyone has, but the added worry that the interviewer might hate the idea of a woman going into this role. You can call that lack of confidence, maybe it is a little, but that's because of how women are treated in the industry.

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v6 profile image
🦄N B🛡

The current process isn't a quality check, it's actually a rather lazy robotic process that doesn't require much effort from the companies but requires lots of preparation from candidates.

Now that, at least, is a sentiment I can heartily co-sign. It's as much or more of a filter for free time and willingness to inflate credentials than it is a filter for job fitness.

Unless job fitness is determined by one's willingness to do worthless busy-work.

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sebbdk profile image
Sebastian Vargr • Edited

I think we agree on the first part, that the process is robotic. I’ve been in the exact problem you describe.

But the latter i will have to take your word on. I still think a mitigating action could be to work on confidence. Especially because of the biases you mention.

Even if’ the recruiter did all the things mentioned, in the current state of things, wouldn’t a women still be loaded with the same bias of less confidence?

How would we solve for that?

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char_bone profile image
Charlotte

OK apologies I must have misunderstood :)

I don't think it's a purely confidence thing. In fact most women are totally confident in their abilities to do their jobs. So if the process was less demoralizing I think you'd get the best out of everyone.

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sebbdk profile image
Sebastian Vargr

No problem, I am not always the best at expressing my self. :)

Yeah, It’s lack of confidence in the hiring managers/process etc. right? at least that was my assumption.

I was thinking that might be cause for anxiety, meaning poorer interview performance than someone without it.