It wasn't even a particularly new observation when South Park literally named a character after it almost 25 years ago.
(Probably many of the same people getting labeled that way for holding high-level positions today were similarly judged in their entry-level positions back then! But if people are no longer suspicious of women or minorities in "regular" roles and resume their judgement for upper-level roles, I guess that's a change in the right direction, at least. :| )
The truth is that it kind of doesn't matter if it's new or not, it's a very hot subject right now and people are touchy about it.
I understand why; Women are facing a lot of abuse on the internet and it feels like many are coming forward with icky things that people have said/done.
On the other side it feels like there's been a cataclysmic overreaction- and many people get annoyed when we're asked to "make sure the next one you hire is a $under-represented" or getting overruled by HR when hiring otherwise.
(yes, this happened, and it was frustrating because the person we hired was not able to lead the project we needed and was hired anyway- she later left, burned out, nearly wrecked her career and I feel incredibly guilty for not being more vocal about it and keeping it mostly to myself for fear of being called a bigot)
https://techcrunch.com/2020/06/05/alexis-ohanian-steps-down-...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/us/california-boardroom-g...
This isn't new news. Diversity hiring and promotion is all over, alongside the recent BLM relevance.
So claiming that it's a phenomenon of just the last decade as a way to justify suspicion of merit is very bizarre. Where have you all been?
If you think about it this is just one more layer of discrimination people face. If you are in one of those categories, no matter how smart, competent, and worthy you are, many people will assume you didn't get there on merit, and that you took the job from someone better. We ought to reject this.
Like, it's not quite as astonishing as a "government committee on women's health" in which every single member is a man, but it's getting up there.
Diversity is an attribute you want unless you've got some weird demographic quirk as focus for your organisation. Just as you shouldn't try to solve "Two is one and one is none" by just purchasing duplicate tools, but instead look to duplicate functionality, you want senior management (and hires throughout but this pattern matters most at the top) to each have a different range of skill sets and life experiences not just be carbon copies of each other. If the most notable difference between the senior management team is their golf handicaps then they are going to miss all the same opportunities so why are you duplicating their salary cost?
It stands to reason that there are going to be women (in particular) with the innate abilities you want, but with a different set of life experiences that are valuable. If your rivals won't hire them then it's even more likely you can find them available than their male counterparts.
Now, like a "Rust programmers, must have at least 20 years Rust experience" bogus requirement, if you hire based on what people already did, not what you assess they can do in the future then sure, you're going to conclude that there aren't many women, or black people, or whatever in a role that has not historically hired women or black people or whatever. But that means now you're bad at hiring people too.
The social and cultural shifts that would change this need years or even decades to play out before it stops becoming weird.
And, again, this doesn't mean middle-aged white men are just better or more suited for these kinds of positions – it's just that they've been in the best position, generally speaking, from an education, networking, and cultural position to get access to such positions in contrast to folks from a different background, race, or sex.
It's weird that Americans tend to cheerfully eat cow meat but not horse meat for example. Much of natural language grammar such as the adjective order rules in English - pretty weird ("My old blue hat" is OK but "My blue old hat" is wrong!). The fact that there are five Fermat primes but then no other Fermat numbers seem to be prime is weird.
Since when was hiring about innate abilities?
> if you hire based on what people already did, not what you assess they can do in the future
That’s literally how the majority of tech companies both hire and promote.
Good luck getting a promotion at Google (for example) based on potential.
If you can't help think it, it is probably because you believe it. If you look for excuse you will find one.
Maybe you could illuminate another forum with your wisdom.
So either your organisation is horribly sexist by not promoting these women or you are horribly sexist and think they are better because they are women.
