Microsoft's workplace diversity mirrors that of other tech companies

Shawn Knight

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microsoft demographics diversity report diversity

Diversity in the workplace is a talking point in the tech industry. Several of the industry’s biggest players have published reports on the matter in recent months with Microsoft becoming the latest to do so this past Friday.

The Redmond-based company’s overall diversity – or lack thereof – mirrors what we’ve seen from virtually every other Silicon Valley giant thus far.

Microsoft’s workforce is dominated by men as 71 percent of staffers are male. That ratio jumps to 82.9 percent in favor of men when looking at tech-based roles and 82.7 percent for leadership roles. Things are a bit more even when looking at non-tech jobs as 44.5 percent of those are held by women.

In terms of ethnicity in the overall scope, Caucasians represent 60.6 percent of Microsoft’s global workforce while Asians account for 28.9 percent of all employees. The remaining 10.6 percent of those on Microsoft’s payroll fall into the categories of Hispanic, African American, multi-racial, American Indian and Pacific Islander – in that order.

Looking closer, 56.7 percent of Microsoft’s technical staff is Caucasian, 35.3 percent are Asian and just 3.8 percent are Hispanic. Nearly 70 percent of the company’s non-technical positions are held by whites while 72.2 percent of those in leadership positions are white and 20.7 percent are Asian.

Microsoft joins a growing list of tech companies to divulge workforce demographics including Pinterest, eBay, Apple, Twitter, Google and Facebook, in no particular order.

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I'm really tired of hearing about all this diversity garbage. You see more men in the tech industry for the same reason you see more women in the fashion industry. Each gender is predisposed to have certain interests. career path usually follows those interests.

If you look at people graduating with tech related degrees I'd bet you'd see the same type of spread. Women just aren't as interested in technology as men are AND THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT.

I'd like to see the spread of everyone that applied to the job, not just the ones they hire. If 50% of the people who apply are white while 60% of the people who work their are white then you have a problem.

When everyone started coming out saying "we don't have enough women working for us" I didn't really see it as a problem. I bet the readers of this site mirror gender diversity of these tech companies. Hell, I bet ratio of male to female on this website is higher than that of MS.

It seems to me that all these tech companies are spending too much time on tumblr. That or PR is run by liberal arts majors.
 
I'm really tired of hearing about all this diversity garbage. You see more men in the tech industry for the same reason you see more women in the fashion industry. Each gender is predisposed to have certain interests. career path usually follows those interests.

If you look at people graduating with tech related degrees I'd bet you'd see the same type of spread. Women just aren't as interested in technology as men are AND THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT.

I'd like to see the spread of everyone that applied to the job, not just the ones they hire. If 50% of the people who apply are white while 60% of the people who work their are white then you have a problem.

When everyone started coming out saying "we don't have enough women working for us" I didn't really see it as a problem. I bet the readers of this site mirror gender diversity of these tech companies. Hell, I bet ratio of male to female on this website is higher than that of MS.

It seems to me that all these tech companies are spending too much time on tumblr. That or PR is run by liberal arts majors.

I'm pretty sure that *most* of Microsoft is run by liberal arts majors. And yes, this is a tired old exercise in politically correct hand-wringing where the straight white male is used as a scapegoat for all of society's ills. Where's the outrage over most daycare workers being women? Or most pro athletes being black? Or maybe the indignation is really all about the fantasy that's been pushed since the early dot-com days, the idea of a "new economy" workforce that looks like the cast of Up With People. Well guess what - more men get into technical fields because that's just how their brains are wired. Beyond that its mostly cultural forces that drive people into particular careers. If you want a racially and sexually diverse workplace you need to have a LESS diverse culture...you have to homogenize your population so everyone is exposed to similar influences and opportunities. The same people who whine about the white male domination of tech are the same ones who support ebonics, multiculturalism and outcome-based education. Their the ones aggravating most of the social problems we've had for 100 years in this country.
 
I'm really tired of hearing about all this diversity garbage. You see more men in the tech industry for the same reason you see more women in the fashion industry.....[ ]......
I thought the fashion industry was more prone to having men that tend to act like women, or is that only in the upper echelons?:confused:

In the meantime, "you go M$"! You have an Indian CEO, that's gotta put you way ahead of Apple in diversity suck up points, the CEO of which is one of those damned old WASPS.

This should give M$ a mandate to distribute Windows free to developing nations, and overcharge the rest of of us for it...:D
 
I'm really tired of hearing about all this diversity garbage. You see more men in the tech industry for the same reason you see more women in the fashion industry.....[ ]......
I thought the fashion industry was more prone to having men that tend to act like women, or is that only in the upper echelons?:confused:

In the meantime, "you go M$"! You have an Indian CEO, that's gotta put you way ahead of Apple in diversity suck up points, the CEO of which is one of those damned old WASPS.

This should give M$ a mandate to distribute Windows free to developing nations, and overcharge the rest of of us for it...:D

They don't count no matter how fabulous they might be.
 
Def. Diversity -

Perseverance in circumventing public face of a commercial body with artificial racial equalization. It is an attempt to engage minority races in places where their input is superfluous, inefficient or outright waste of time and money.

The term is a charade for incompetence and advocated by politicians and minority representatives to cover their own insecurity under the blanket of political correctness.
 
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Def. Diversity -

Perseverance in circumventing public face of a company with artificial racial equalization. It is an attempt to engage minority races in places where their input is superfluous, inefficient or outright waste of the company’s time and money.

The term is a charade for incompetence and advocated by politicians and minority representatives to cover their own insecurity under the blanket of political correctness.
A portrait of Al Sharpton by Richard Avedon:
ASharpton_pop.jpg
 
Oh, good grief, not more of this garbage. Affirmative action has given us nothing but a sh!tty POTUS.

If some "minority" person wants a good job, work hard to get it. Stop asking for handouts in the name of equality. Perhaps all persons are created equal, but all persons do not utilize equally the potential which they have.
 
Def. Diversity -

Perseverance in circumventing public face of a company with artificial racial equalization. It is an attempt to engage minority races in places where their input is superfluous, inefficient or outright waste of the company’s time and money.

The term is a charade for incompetence and advocated by politicians and minority representatives to cover their own insecurity under the blanket of political correctness.
A portrait of Al Sharpton by Richard Avedon:
ASharpton_pop.jpg
... is where u lost me :)
 
Workplace diversity isn't a bad thing but like many things it's become more of a political talking. That said all of the garbage about working hard to get a decent job is just that...garbage. Many people have gotten jobs based on who they know not what they know. And it's hypocritical for anyone to speak about "minorities" needing to work hard, or harder, given that fact that this country has a history of working enslaved persons to death while those who enslaved them sat on their asses and reaped the profits.

Yes there are individuals out there that do not work hard or realize their potential because they are lazy or just uninterested but let's not pretend that hard work alone will net you a job at Microsoft or any other company.
 
"And it's hypocritical for anyone to speak about "minorities" needing to work hard, or harder, given that fact that this country has a history of working enslaved persons to death while those who enslaved them sat on their asses and reaped the profits."

Please tell me about all the handouts that my Scottish and Irish forefathers have received. Tell me about how easy they all had it when they came over here and were welcomed with open arms. Tell me about how 400 years prior to my family coming here in the 1850's, my family was being treated like royalty and not being squashed under the boot of an oppressive monarchy.

You need to pull your head out and take a big dose of reality.
 
"And it's hypocritical for anyone to speak about "minorities" needing to work hard, or harder, given that fact that this country has a history of working enslaved persons to death while those who enslaved them sat on their asses and reaped the profits."

Please tell me about all the handouts that my Scottish and Irish forefathers have received. Tell me about how easy they all had it when they came over here and were welcomed with open arms. Tell me about how 400 years prior to my family coming here in the 1850's, my family was being treated like royalty and not being squashed under the boot of an oppressive monarchy.

You need to pull your head out and take a big dose of reality.
I could say the same about you. I was talking about what happened in this country's past not what occurred in Scotland. And I'll say it again: to act as though all one has to do is be willing to work hard in order to get hired at company is fallacious. Who a person knows also plays a role in getting work and advancing within the workplace; industry alone is not enough.
 
... is where u lost me :)
To say that the "reverend" Al Sharpton is a "minority advocate", is an understatement worthy of the typical FAA press release. At a press conference an FAA official might say, "the airplane made involuntary ground contact", suppressing the actual truth. Which would be something along the lines of, "the plane went straight in from 30,000 feet, exploded on contact, killing all 300 souls aboard".

Avedon, a famous fashion photographer, presents Sharpton as a double talking, finger pointing, bully, Which after all, he pretty much is. The photo, when interpreted thus, effectively mirrors your sentiments about the current state of minority advocacy in the US..
 
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And I'll say it again: to act as though all one has to do is be willing to work hard in order to get hired at company is fallacious. Who a person knows also plays a role in getting work and advancing within the workplace; industry alone is not enough.

Your second sentence does not make the first fallacious. However, working hard is a necessary but insufficient component to getting ahead (are you saying that a person does not need to work hard in order set themselves apart from others?).
 
And it's hypocritical for anyone to speak about "minorities" needing to work hard, or harder, given that fact that this country has a history of working enslaved persons to death while those who enslaved them sat on their asses and reaped the profits.

Are you saying you have been held back because others have been held as slaves whereas you have not?
 
. And it's hypocritical for anyone to speak about "minorities" needing to work hard, or harder, given that fact that this country has a history of working enslaved persons to death while those who enslaved them sat on their asses and reaped the profits.
I think it's a little late in the game to fall back on the old, hackneyed, lament, about slavery in the US. The Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1865, so I think it's fair to say, that no one living today in the US, has ever owned another living soul. (At least no in any legal sense or mandate). Judging by the African Americans I live with, I have no use for possessing one, or are they worth "owning", in any sense of the term.

All this talk of former "slavery", completely omits the part about why our Civil War was fought, and who fought and won it. The industrial Northeast fought the South, in order to bring about the ABOLISHMENT of slavery. So, whatever you have to say about slavery, rings very hollow and duplicitous to someone from Pennsylvania. (Which as you may or may not know, is the home of the Battle of Gettysburg, and President Lincoln's famous speech on the topic).

What we do have in abundance, are the descendants of slaves.living off the "fat of the land". This in the form of social entitlements passed down from federal, state, and local governments.

The pendulum has swung completely the other direction.Instead of paying nothing and being, "worked to death", our governments now are obligated to pay people NOT to work, thereby maintaining their own jobs in the institution(s) of governmental social services. What I have personally witnessed is those living on social entitlements, dealing all forms of deadly drugs, to others less fortunate, thereby stripping them of their own pittances, and being held in high esteem for it. I believe the term would be, "gettin' ovah", or "bein' fly". I seen recidivist drug dealers being patently ignored by local police for god knows what reason.

I suppose this is because these, "poor things", are not being patently handed lucrative jobs in the tech sector. News flash, you have to be willing to graduate at least grade school, before it's tasteful to complain about "no jobs", or, "no opportunities".

I haven't heard it spoken about recently, but there was a movement for granting 6 trillion dollars, "in reparations for slavery", to the African American community. As if the government hasn't spent at least that much already on entitlement handouts.

In any case, we formed the country of Liberia to accommodate former slaves who wished to return to their native continent.

When I go outside, I see an ever and rapidly growing community of Liberians, most of whom are illegal aliens back here in the good old U.S.of A.. Oh, and by the way, don't forget to thank Liberia for me, for its newest export to this country, Ebola.

Just be thankful, I'm not in charge of anything to do with the military, I'd put a up naval blockade, and shoot down or sink, anything attempting to leave Liberian soil. The Liberians allegedly have a democratic government, let them stay there and live under it.
 
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Are you saying you have been held back because others have been held as slaves whereas you have not?

That's not what I'm saying and I apologize if that's how it came across. The point I was making is that it is disingenuous to say that all someone has to do is work hard and they too will be hired a Microsoft or Google, as examples, when such a statement ignores the realty that many people get jobs because of who they know as well. I certainly wasn't attempting to derail this thread but to point out that factor when it comes to a company's demographic.
 
Your second sentence does not make the first fallacious. However, working hard is a necessary but insufficient component to getting ahead (are you saying that a person does not need to work hard in order set themselves apart from others?).

I agree that an individual must work hard to get ahead but as I've stated, in many cases it is also who you know moreso than what you know that gets you hired.
 
I agree that an individual must work hard to get ahead but as I've stated, in many cases it is also who you know moreso than what you know that gets you hired.

That' a rather cynical way of looking at things. Everyone didn't get to where they are by simply knowing people.
 
I think it's a little late in the game to fall back on the old, hackneyed, lament, about slavery in the US. The Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1865, so I think it's fair to say, that no one living today in the US, has ever owned another living soul. (At least no in any legal sense or mandate). Judging by the African Americans I live with, I have no use for possessing one, or are they worth "owning", in any sense of the term.

All this talk of former "slavery", completely omits the part about why our Civil War was fought, and who fought and won it. The industrial Northeast fought the South, in order to bring about the ABOLISHMENT of slavery. So, whatever you have to say about slavery, rings very hollow and duplicitous to someone from Pennsylvania. (Which as you may or may not know, is the home of the Battle of Gettysburg, and President Lincoln's famous speech on the topic).

What we do have in abundance, are the descendants of slaves.living off the "fat of the land". This in the form of social entitlements passed down from federal, state, and local governments.

The pendulum has swung completely the other direction.Instead of paying nothing and being, "worked to death", our governments now are obligated to pay people NOT to work, thereby maintaining their own jobs in the institution(s) of governmental social services. What I have personally witnessed is those living on social entitlements, dealing all forms of deadly drugs, to others less fortunate, thereby stripping them of their own pittances, and being held in high esteem for it. I believe the term would be, "gettin' ovah", or "bein' fly". I seen recidivist drug dealers being patently ignored by local police for god knows what reason.

I suppose this is because these, "poor things", are not being patently handed lucrative jobs in the tech sector. News flash, you have to be willing to graduate at least grade school, before it's tasteful to complain about "no jobs", or, "no opportunities".

I haven't heard it spoken about recently, but there was a movement for granting 6 trillion dollars, "in reparations for slavery", to the African American community. As if the government hasn't spent at least that much already on entitlement handouts.

In any case, we formed the country of Liberia to accommodate former slaves who wished to return to their native continent.

When I go outside, I see an ever and rapidly growing community of Liberians, most of whom are illegal aliens back here in the good old U.S.of A.. Oh, and by the way, don't forget to thank Liberia for me, for its newest export to this country, Ebola.

Just be thankful, I'm not in charge of anything to do with the military, I'd put a up naval blockade, and shoot down or sink, anything attempting to leave Liberian soil. The Liberians allegedly have a democratic government, let them stay there and live under it.

The North won the Civil War because there were also 210,000 African-American troops that gave their lives to end slavery as well, something many people don't know or conveniently forget (and I'm not implying that you fall into this category).

That said, diversity in the workplace isn't a bad thing but it politicization makes it appear so.
 
....[ ].... in many cases it is also who you know moreso than what you know that gets you hired.
Ultimately, as well as unfortunately, it's rather a combination of the two that gets the highest paying jobs. If you have a renowned family name, an aptitude for a given field, and the education for any given field, you're more than likely to do well. "Stockbrokers most often beget stockbrokers", and janitors reproduce in their kind as well. Also, being a sociopath can be quite a blessing. Many true sociopaths are also charismatics. A notorious, or perhaps infamous example, would be Adolf Hitler. He only lasted about 4 years in total command, but he certainly made the "most" of them. The people that believed in his cause, committed the most heinous of atrocities for his banner, und das Vaterland".

And now more bad news, the "American way of life", is not sustainable, without very lowly paid workers on foreign soils. This is a burden categorically shared by all races, creeds, and religions of the US population.

I think RCA corporation is out of business in the US. At one time, RCA was building the electronics subsystems for the "Aegis" guided missile cruisers. An engineer casually mentioned to me that, "we've got to do something about the Indians". I laughed it off, but soon realized that RCA was importing engineers from India, and paying them maybe half of their American counterparts.

Wages that Americans expect and jobs they will not do, place them at risk for a destitute future.. I'm not saying our people should starve to death, But I'm trying to illustrate that our current economic problems are as much of a caste struggle, as they are a color issue.

A very salient illustration of this is the guitar industry. Asian built instruments are getting better by the year. American instruments are pretty much they same as always were, simply 10 times the price of guitars coming out of Indonesia . American luthiers can trumpet their supposed superiority to the four winds, but in reality, Asian luthiers are getting a whole lot more practice, and are damned good also.
 
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