The conversation around diversity in tech persists. One effect of this has been the creation of executive positions designed to oversee a company\u2019s approach..<\/b>
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The conversation around diversity in tech persists. One effect of this has been the creation of executive positions designed to oversee a company\u2019s approach to inclusion. That\u2019s great.
TechCrunch Sessions: Justice brought together activists, union organizers, advocates and tech leaders to for lively conversations examining the intersection of justice and tech. Leslie Mac, DeRay Mckesson, Maxine Williams, Tony Prophet, Malkia Cyril, Matt Mitchell and Nicole Sanchez joined folks from the ACLU, the Last Mile, Measures for Justice and the Hidden Genius Project to examine criminal justice reform, diversity and inclusion, tech and the so-called pipeline problem that hiring managers like to bandy about. You should have been there. TechCrunch Sessions: Justice
If you weren\u2019 t among the lucky ones to have the privilege of attending, we have you covered. Below is every single panel that made up TechCrunch Sessions: Justice. Watch them, share them and continue the conversation.
Why did Elon Musk wait until it was about the climate to pull out of Trump\u2019s councils? Why shouldn\u2019 t a tech CEO run for governor? Federal policies affect local constituencies and people in tech have an opportunity to fight for change at the local level. Erica Baker, soon-to-be director of engineering at Kickstarter, and Catherine Bracy, co-founder and executive director of TechEquity Collaborative, discussed the interest the tech industry has taken in social justice issues. soon-to-be director of engineering at Kickstarter TechEquity Collaborative
When you\u2019 re a first-time founder of color trying to get funding, what do you have to do? According to Michael Seibel of Y Combinator, you have to be 20 percent better at everything. Monique Woodard of 500 Startups and Laura G\u00f3mez, CEO and founder of Atipica, debate whether an aspiring founder needs to be in Silicon Valley and offer practical advice to getting that first meeting. And the second. Michael Seibel Atipica
You might not know that you need a big crypto hug, but Matt Mitchell of Crypto Harlem has one for you. But why for the black community in particular? Crypto Harlem
\u201cSurveillance is a tool of oppression, and black folks have been surveilled since before the slave ships. You look at a manifest of a slave ship and people were numbers and cataloged. You look at an overseers diary and it\u2019s basically a CCTV camera but written out in handwriting. All the way up to COINTELPRO where a who\u2019s who of civil rights and racial justice leaders from the 60s and 70s [were surveilled] . It\u2019s part of a program, especially in this country, to dismantle those organizations because they\u2019 re disruptive.\u201d COINTELPRO
That\u2019s why. That\u2019s why.
It\u2019s no secret that Silicon Valley has a diversity problem. But who doesn\u2019 t? \u201cThe legacy of this country \u2014 we were founded on slavery and stolen land and genocide, \u201d says Nicole Sanchez, vice president of social impact at GitHub. \u201cSilicon Valley alone isn\u2019 t going to be able to upend that.\u201d This question is impossible to answer unless those who are asking it are willing to go far deeper than the numbers from a diversity report.
Wayne Sutton of Change Catalyst, Rachel Williams, head of diversity at Yelp, and LaFawn Davis, global head of culture and inclusion at Twilio, talked about what it takes for tech companies to get at the root of their diversity problems.
Cognitive diversity + programming: That is the \u201cyes-and\u201d equation that Maxine Williams, head of diversity at Facebook, employs at the company in its pursuit of a more diverse workforce. When you have cognitive diversity, a foundation where people think differently, that is where you achieve diversity of thought. At that point, Williams says, is when the \u201cand\u201d part of the equation emerges. \u201cWhen I say it\u2019s yes-and, we lay the foundation with cognitive diversity as a principle, and then we talk about the programming, and the programming does in fact go heavy on things like gender, race, ethnicity.\u201d
She also touches upon hiring practices in tech. You know when you tell the people you know about the jobs open in your company? Williams isn\u2019 t a fan of that. \u201cI\u2019 m not in the people you know thing; I\u2019 m into skills you have.\u201d
Many of us will never serve time in prison, and many of us will never serve time in the military. Yet, those who have will sometimes find themselves suddenly thrust back into society, forced to make livings that they might not be prepared to make.
Kenyatta Leal, having served 19 years in prison, was released from San Quentin and immediately began working for RocketSpace. Donald Coolidge, a veteran of the Marine Corps., is the co-founder and CEO of Elemental Path. Organizations like Chris Redlitz\u2019s The Last Mile and Katherine Webster\u2019s VetsinTech help bridge the gap for those who want to break into the tech industry as a returning citizen. The panelists have stories that I\u2019 m sure not many of you can relate to. Elemental Path The Last Mile VetsinTech
Living in the Central Valley of California and commute two hours each way to Cisco taxes your time, energy and bank account. Do this as a low-wage worker and your life is dramatically impacted in ways most people will never understand. Jennifer Morales, who works in a cafeteria at Cisco, kicked this panel off by talking about her job before and after she and her colleagues organized a union. kicked this panel
Derecka Mehrens of Working Partnerships for her part is trying to challenge the narrative that Silicon Valley is working for everyone. Because as she says, it isn\u2019 t. \u201c Silicon Valley Rising came out of this idea that we had to not only push to create middle wage jobs we had to upgrade the conditions of low-wage work especially in profitable industries.\u201d Guess what industry is profitable? And Y-Vonne Hutchinson of Project Include flipped the conversation to the 1099 workers whose roles aren\u2019 t all that great, either. Oh, and Morales is just getting started. Working Partnerships Silicon Valley Rising Project Include
\u201cYou cannot inject technologies into a condition or situation of white supremacy and expect anything but white supremacy to be the result, \u201d Malkia Cyril of the Center for Media Justice says about the role that technology plays in the quest for racial and economic justice. It\u2019s a grim reality; when body cameras focus their gaze on black and brown bodies and social media platforms readily police the words of black activists, the pursuit for justice becomes harder. Center for Media Justice
Cyril says we need to shift the power dynamic and demonstrate more directly what communities of color want. Silencing voices and limiting action is not the way to achieve that goal.
Hiring reps at tech companies will tell you the reason their companies\u2019 demographics lean heavily toward the white, cis and male is because there is a pipeline problem. Karla Monterosso from Code 2040, Michael Essien of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Academic Middle School, and Brandon Nicholson of The Hidden Genius Project will tell you differently. It\u2019s about access and it\u2019s about opportunity. Code 2040 The Hidden Genius Project
We\u2019 re in a time of resistance. If you haven\u2019 t felt it, social activist DeRay Mckesson of Campaign Zero and Pod Save the People broke it down for you. He talked Twitter\u2019s role in activism and what it\u2019s like to walk the resistance road in 2017 and beyond: \u201cI try not to let the fear get to me too much, because I know that people want to see me too afraid to do the work.\u201d Campaign Zero Pod Save the People talked
Salesforce Chief Equality Officer Tony Prophet told the Justice audience members to think about \u201cself ID\u201d before they watched a video clip he brought. What does it mean at your workplace to say \u201cI\u2019 m ____\u201d? How many of you have thought about having to do that? Prophet is working to ensure that Salesforce employees can show up every day and feel comfortable \u201cbringing their entire self to work. \u201dIt\u2019s never too early to think about company culture, inclusion, how diverse your workforce is, and how inclusive your advisers and boards of directors are. \u201cWhat\u2019s the essence of the endeavor that you\u2019 re embarking on?\u201d he asks founders and people in the early stages of starting a company. Sound advice. Chief Equality Officer Tony Prophet
Data is playing a significant role in identifying the racial disparities in our criminal justice system. Ana Zamora of the ACLU says that at all levels \u2014 from the police, to prosecutors, sheriffs, corrections system, probation\/parole, etc. \u2014 we need to see who is doing what in order to reform the criminal justice system. It\u2019s in the data.
As Amy Bach of Measures for Justice says, \u201cno data, no change.\u201d The voters want it, too, Zamora says. Through data, narrative and social media and technology, we can bring these issues to the voters so they can understand what the issues are and who is in charge. Don\u2019 t boo, vote. Measures for Justice
Diversity reports break down the racial, ethnic, gender and sexual orientation demographics of those companies that choose to release them. However, often overlooked are the number of people with disabilities who work at these companies.
In this panel are Matt King, who works on the accessible engineering team at Facebook, and KR Liu, director of advocacy and accessibility at Doppler Labs. They discuss the importance of engineers to adhere to the needs of people with disabilities so that tech is available to all.
Requisite sentence about Uber\u2019s rough year. On the day the company fired 20 people, Bernard Coleman, the company\u2019s newish head of diversity, talked about diversity, inclusion and whether he regrets taking the job. (He says he doesn\u2019 t.) Among his ideas for making Uber less Uber-like are developing an \u201cinclusion index\u201d to understand what inclusion looks like across all groups. And workshops. Lots of workshops. Coleman said he went to Uber for the challenge. He got one. fired 20 people talked about diversity, inclusion and whether he regrets taking the job
\u201cWhite supremacy is insidious. One of the most insidious pieces of it is that it\u2019s meant to be obscured by those who benefit from it most.\u201d Leslie Mac, an activist, writer and entrepreneur, telling the sad, plain truth.
The Safety Pin Box co-founder and activist, who was banned by Facebook in December, spoke with me about the role that white privilege plays in the persistence of our racist society and how white folks can be true allies (without calling themselves allies) in the fight for racial justice. She even had jokes: Two white allies walk into a bar\u2026 because it was set so low. Zing. Safety Pin Box banned by Facebook
\u201cOur criminal justice system is horribly broken, \u201d began Shaka Senghor, a former prisoner, best-selling author and founder of just-launched Mind Blown Media, in this panel. \u201cIt\u2019s not designed to ensure men and women come home healthy and whole. It\u2019s designed to ensure men and women cycle in and out of prison.\u201d Shaka Senghor best-selling author in this panel
Senghor wants to not only tell his own stories but he also wants to give voice to incarcerated individuals who are among the \u201cover-incarcerated.\u201d The personal is political and everyone has a story to tell.
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