It’s no secret the technology industry doesn't measure up in terms of workforce diversity. Tech giants such as Microsoft, Apple, Google and Facebook have all released statistics (either voluntarily or via an EEO-1 form — a federally mandated filing that outlines employment data by race and gender according to job type) that show the companies are primarily dominated by white and Asian males.
Last year, GigaOm released infographics showing the ethnic demographics at several of the largest tech companies. According their data, 91% of the staff at Google and Facebook were either Asian or white. HP had the highest percentage of white people on staff, with 71.5%. Apple appeared to be the most diverse, but GigaOm pointed out that’s simply because it included retail store employees in its data.
In mid-December 2014, Microsoft released its EEO-1 form. While the company has an African-American board chairman, an Indian CEO and a female CFO, overall statistics revealed the company was 60.6% white and 71% male.
A business risk?
The issue of poor workforce diversity in technology has garnered so much attention that President Obama addressed it during the inaugural White House Demo Day on August 4. He said businesses must become more inclusive if the tech sector is going to continue to thrive.
"We've seen again and again that companies with diverse leadership often outperform those that don't," Obama said. "That's the market that is out there — not just here in the United States, but globally. So that lack of participation from everybody isn't good for business."
Indeed, experts say that a lack of diversity is not only “bad form,” but it can actually be a business risk.
"Technology is a core capability for all organizations, so if you are not attracting 50% of the population, that is a problem," Liz Jones, director of the technology practice at Deloitte, said during an event in May.
Judy Edwards, of Gartner, added, "If you have diversity, you get better business results."
Educational challenges
Experts say a primary challenge to attracting a more diverse workforce is the limited number of black and Hispanic graduates emerging from computer science programs. According to GigaOm's reporting, 6.5% of recent computer-science bachelor grads were Hispanic, and 4.5% were black. Meanwhile, 60.6% were white and 18.8% were Asian.
As part of the White House event last week, President Obama also announced commitments from universities and businesses to try to help improve the situation. Intel, for example, pledged to invest $5 million to fund projects aimed at drawing more women and minorities into engineering.
Different ways of delivering technology education may help, too. Earlier this month, Capella University announced it has created one of the nation's first online Master of Science in analytics programs. The university is working with SAS, a software analytics company, to deliver the program. Students will be able to enroll in the two-year program starting in October.
CIO strategies
Beyond these efforts, what can CIOs do to help their organizations attract more diversity?
Experts suggest CIOs team up with their HR departments to develop a hiring strategy to increase workforce diversity. They should start by determining where they are now, and where they want to go. Does their workforce match the demographic they serve or want to serve?
Also, they can ask current IT employees for referrals — as they are likely to have peers in the industry or know qualified candidates — and offer rewards for successful referrals.
Finally, some companies are using data analytics tools from companies such as Visier, Workday or PeopleFluent to identify gaps in diversity and measure how their recruitment strategies impact the makeup of their IT teams.
