

Ask HN: When should a startup start caring about gender and racial diversity? - alokedesai

Should it be as soon as it launches or after the company has gotten some level of funding and traction?
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davismwfl
It is always about hiring the best fit candidates, but to me that does mean
balancing the team. Which for engineering usually means intentionally seeking
out qualified female candidates early on. This balances the team out greatly
in my opinion. Honestly from my experience, it stops some typical male BS that
we are all guilty of at one time or another.

BTW -- same thing goes for other roles, say customer service (or HR) where it
can sometimes be dominated by women, I think hiring men into some of those
positions provides balance.

As for race/ethnic background that to me is really nothing that needs to be
done with Technology, as I always seem to see a pretty diverse group of
people. Although if I ever saw a team (after say 1-2 years or 6 months post
funding) too lopsided it would be a warning indicator to me. And the warning
would be not a human diversity warning but an intellectual diversity warning,
so I would want to ask questions around that angle. As to me, too many like
minds usually bring too many of the same ideas which might reenforce each
other in a bad direction, without intention. Plus we are global in everything
we do now so having that represented in the team seems almost mandatory.

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Mnwhlp
No one should consider gender and racial diversity in the hiring process or
any other aspect of a company. Hire the best person, period.

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jesusmichael
You should hire the best candidates possible. I would never consider the issue
unless my workforce represented a significant portion of the community. In my
opinion if a startup has to waste resources thinking about anything but hiring
the best it will fail.

