Episode 36
How to Diversify Tech: Start with the recruiters! | with Alison Daley
Diversity in tech stalls at glacial pace—not because companies don’t want change, but because they prioritize speed over intentional hiring. Alison Daley reveals why reimagining recruiting structures, not just publishing data, is the real lever.
Episode Key Takeaways
The tech industry is structurally homogenous: 80% white, 74% male, median age 27. Every hiring system—from job descriptions to interview design—is built to perpetuate this archetype. Until those structures radically change, publishing diversity reports alone won’t move the needle.
Seven years of experience is arbitrary. Alison points out that when you require years-based qualifications, you automatically exclude groups who were never given the chance to accumulate them. Outcomes-based hiring—defining what the role actually needs to deliver, not who typically delivers it—opens the aperture to non-traditional talent.
Cognizant Accelerator hired 32 full-stack developers in two months: 40% women, 30% people of color. They did it by writing job specs from outcomes first, restructuring interviews to pair programming with both senior and junior devs, and keeping the entire process to 90 minutes on-site. The process works when you design it to.
Diverse recruiting teams naturally source from diverse networks. Because people gravitate toward those like themselves, a homogenous TA team will pull homogenous candidate pools. Representation in recruiting is the fastest way to create representation in hiring.
The Ernestine McClendon Talent Grant trains underrepresented professionals to become certified tech recruiters—80% Black talent, 70% women in the first cohort. Building diversity in the recruiting industry itself is the lever to building diversity in tech.
Frequently
Asked
Questions
How do I find diverse candidates when the pipeline is mostly male or mostly white?
The pipeline myth assumes qualifications are fixed. Instead, define outcomes and abilities required, then look beyond years of experience. Consider boot camp graduates, career changers, and non-traditional backgrounds. Cognizant proved you can hire 40% women engineers by rethinking what ‘qualified’ means, not by accepting scarcity as fact.
What's the difference between outcomes-based hiring and traditional job descriptions?
Traditional specs list years of experience and credentials—arbitrary filters that exclude underrepresented groups. Outcomes-based hiring starts by asking: What will this person actually do? What problems will they solve? What qualities matter? Then you source for those abilities, not a resume template.
Why should I hire a junior engineer when I need a senior?
Question whether you actually need seniority or just the outcomes. A high-performing bootcamp grad 18 months in can outpace a senior with 4+ years in the same role. If seniors aren’t mentoring juniors, they may not be truly senior. Build versus buy talent—it’s faster and cheaper than waiting for scarce ‘perfect fit’ candidates.
How does diversity in recruiting teams help diversity in hiring?
Affinity bias is real: people source from networks like themselves. A diverse TA team naturally reaches into diverse communities and candidate pools. You don’t have to force inclusion conversations—it happens organically when your recruiters reflect the talent you’re trying to attract.
What's the Ernestine McClendon Talent Grant and how do I get involved?
It’s a five-month certification program training underrepresented talent to become tech recruiters. Mentors, sponsors, and nominators are actively recruited. Visit recruiting-innovation.com/grant. The next cohort runs August–December. It’s designed to build diversity in recruiting itself, which cascades into tech hiring.