2️⃣Diverse and Inclusive Hiring
👋 Introduction
We strongly believe that the strongest solutions (from technology and design perspectives) are made when a diversity of voices, opinions and perspectives are brought to bear on problems that our clients hire us to solve. Our hope is to fight the default of exclusion.
1️⃣ Increasing the hiring funnel responsibly
We believe it isn’t fair to apply different hiring standards for underrepresented groups. Instead, we actively reach out to make the “top” of our hiring funnel more representative of the world that we exist in by:
Removing gendered language within our job postings through Textio, for instance to ensure our job descriptions match our beliefs.
Actively publishing and promoting job posts to community groups that were either centered around or had better than average gender diversity (eg: WomenDroid, WomenWhoDesign, GirlsThatJavascript etc).
Actively encouraging underrepresented candidates to apply by having our people team call and motivate them to complete assignments or address any questions or reservations they might have about us as an inclusive organisation.
2️⃣ Minimising bias during the application process
Most CVs contain information that is prone to bias. For e.g.: photo, demographic information, education history. We ask applicants to not share CVs with pictures of any type, name-drop institutions or details about education (school, college, university etc), or share any demographic information (hometown, date of birth, etc.).
Potential hires are assessed only on their skills and pegged to a specific level on our growth framework, which translates to compensation levels. These levels are public within the organisation. Equal pay for equal work is a key tenet. This makes our compensation philosophy gender-, experience- and education-agnostic.
3️⃣ Maintaining D&I standards
Conscious communication
We encourage our employees to not speak in regional languages unless others around them understand it, to ensure no one feels excluded.
We do not use maxims that are inherently ableist such as “falling on deaf ears”.
We strive to create short, snappy sentences that can be easily read out by a machine for any visually-impaired visitors.
We do not specify genders where it is unclear or the preference of the person in question is unknown, and use “they” instead.
We also do not use slang or colloquial language that may inadvertently alienate readers.
Clear policies on discrimination, harassment and regular refresher workshops
We have an independent committee to address complaints about sexual harassment whose decisions are mandatory to be accepted by management, backed by Parity Consulting, who serve as the external member on our ICC.
We make our clients aware that they are also covered by our prevention of sexual harassment guidelines, and build termination clauses into our contracts that would automatically trigger in the event of any reported sexual harassment.
We conduct regular refresher POSH workshops for all our employees and ensure equal ownership across the org to uphold our culture strongly.
No late-evening events
The ability to travel safely and without hassle is heavily gendered. Transport for anyone who identifies as a woman/non-binary is usually less safe.
We try and ensure that our days in office end at consistent times.
We don’t organise meetings or work events late in the evenings, taking care so that nobody is excluded from valuable networking and career-building opportunities.
Inclusive physical spaces
Work spaces often stigmatise menstruation. We stock necessary menstrual supplies in our bathrooms for free, and we hope this makes our workplace more welcoming.
Everyone comes in different shapes and sizes. We’ve put in considerable effort and expense to ensure that everyone in the office has ergonomic, height-adjustable furniture, allowing for a workspace which everyone can adapt to themselves.
We were not surprised to find that office temperatures are benchmarked against the metabolic rates of an average — wait for it — man, leading to uncomfortable working conditions for most female employees. An awareness of these gendered biases which have been codified into “standards” allows us to avoid them, and helps us create an office space which is more productive.
We continue to challenge ourselves to go deeper into what diversity means, and look at it along other axes, including age, caste, religion and geography. If you’re from an underrepresented group, you can a) see what it might be like to work here, and b) exhort us to do better — we’re always open to suggestions and criticism.
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