The Power of Diversity

Are you a diverse speaker? Are you part of a minority? Did you ever feel discriminated against? Are you a white, middle-aged man who has never felt discriminated against?

In this chapter, we’ll talk about why diversity is essential, and how to work around diversity issues, find engagement, find mentors, and why it’s vital to support others, regardless of their gender, age, race, religion, etc.

Lack of diversity is a business issue, not just an ethical problem

Let’s first be clear about this chapter. In most fields, even worse in the technology one, lack of diversity is a huge problem. It’s a huge problem because gender, sexual orientation, race, and religious groups are often discriminated against, or are undervalued. Sometimes, a member of a marginalized group speaking at a conference might not be held in as high regard as other speakers because of a misperception by attendees that the speaker was only invited based on gender, race, etc., when the speaker is actually well-qualified.

For most people, ethical issues are important, but since they’re mostly personal, it’s rare that they lead to a persistent change, at least in the short term. What should change is the perception of these kind of issues.

Together with being ethically important for a lot of people, diversity can also be a great business driver. Having a team with diverse skills and values often results in improved performance. And this can lead to greater changes in a shorter time.

Note: Before doing a keynote that talked about various themes, including diversity, I spoke with a friend who told me the story of a bug in the banking software his company was developing. It was related to the different ways most men and women did an operation. Their all-men team didn’t catch the bug before going into production. After that episode, he worked even harder to find women to increase the skill level and the abilities of the team, including diverse thinking. That story helped my keynote deliver the message.

Today, having conferences with all white males as speakers could be a problem for the brand of the conference, for the speakers (and their employers), and for companies that sponsor the events, even months after the conference ends.

  Note: I always tried to improve diversity in the tech field by mentoring people from diverse groups, by doing sessions together with people younger than me, by helping people applying and being selected for conferences, sometimes emphasizing their diversity. Some years ago, I sent a submission for the call for papers (CfP) for a conference and was accepted. I was working hard in that period, so I didn’t notice that all the speakers were white, middle-aged men. I went to the conference, did my session, and then went back to work. After some months, the conference organizers and employers of many speakers were mentioned in many tweets about the lack of diversity in that conference. That was a lesson I’ll never forget: you should always check for diversity and actively work for that. After that episode, I was selected for another conference that had the same diversity issues, but that time I worked with the conference organizers to find some alternatives, to improve not only diversity, but also the business value of the conference itself.

More diversity and inclusion change lives

Talking about these topics is always problematic, especially when doing it in abstract ways.

It’s one thing to work for more diversity and inclusion because you care and because you see real value, but it’s another thing when it directly impacts your life. Here are two stories that were told during Global Diversity CFP Day in Milan, an international conference created to help members of underrepresented or marginalized groups to become tech conference speakers, at the beginning of 2020:

• Diversity and Inclusion in IT Conferences—a post by Codrina Merigo.
• When Inclusion Can Change a Life—a post by Sergio Meloni.

If you’re an aspiring speaker, especially if you’re part of an underrepresented group, try to find a local mentor you trust, look for experienced speaking mentors, follow Twitter accounts such as Diversify Tech, QueerJS, Women in Technology, Women Who Code, Global Diversity CFP Day, Black Girls CODE, and many others.

More diversity is a process, not a destination

The main problem when talking about diversity and inclusion is related to people saying something along the lines of “those speakers were selected ONLY because they belong to that particular group.”

These kinds of comments are responsible for having speakers from an underrepresented minority thinking that they were selected only because they belong to the minority, leading to (in some cases) or increasing an impostor syndrome (we’ll talk about it in Chapter 7).

The best way to overcome these (and other kinds of arguments) is by doing an excellent job preparing the speaker, especially for people new in the role. If you’re a conference organizer, or if your role is to select speakers and ensure the quality of the sessions, you should do dry runs and ensure that the sessions will be the best possible. This is true for every speaker, but it’s even more important for new speakers coming from minority groups, because they have all eyes on them. Also be sure that the speakers tell some stories related to their experiences, giving a personal touch to the sessions, making them unique.

Note: If I attend a conference and the speaker is not at the expected level, I don’t blame the speaker, I blame the organizers, unless the speaker is a famous one and that day was a bad day. Mandatory dry runs for new and, if the stakes are high, also for seasoned speakers is a way to improve sessions’ quality.

No excuses

Sometimes conference organizers say that they tried to improve diversity, but they couldn’t find anybody. It’s not enough to post the call for papers for the conference and wait. Organizers should take an end-to-end approach, where they also measure the results of their diversity and inclusion efforts.

In 2019, I wrote a long post about the topic, and I want to share it here.

In my career, I often discuss metrics and how they shape business and results.

There’s no “good” metric, per se, since when there’s a metric, people start behaving to maximize it. So, a good metric alone can polarize your business and lead to worse results. Therefore, most companies use a balanced scorecard with different metrics that in the end should lead to more balanced business results.

I’ve been thinking about diversity and inclusion in the communities and events world for some time, and I’ve concluded that you cannot merely “measure” one of the outcomes, for example, the number of diverse speakers over time, or the number of new speakers, or the number of young speakers, and so on.

Measuring only one of the outcomes can tell you that you have a problem. For example, an event with an all-men speaker line-up for several editions, for sure, has a diversity problem. A community where the same people speak at all the events has a problem.

But, if you only measure the output, you don’t consider the process, the context, and the difficulties of finding the right balance.

An event should be successful, so you need the right number of experienced speakers who will attract people. But you should continuously search for and find new talents, to ensure diversity, but also to guarantee the survival of the initiative in the long term.

I hate when I ask the organizers if they’re working to ensure diversity, and they say, “We have a call for papers.” In the corporate world, when you have a metric, you cannot just say, “We did a Facebook campaign.” You have to work on different strategies, and you should measure the results and work to reach your target.

I think that in the community and event world, people should do the same.

Do you have short- and long-term metrics? Are you actively working to reach them? Do you really care about them?

Here are some example metrics, covering outputs and process:

• Number of first-time speakers over time.
• Number of diverse speakers over time.
• Number of diverse speakers who were directly invited to apply for the CfP.
• Number of first-time speakers who became regular speakers.
• Number of diverse speakers you’ve nurtured and grown over time.
• Evaluations for recurring speakers vs. first-time speakers. How to improve both.
• Number of channels that can be used to attract new and diverse people.
• Networking with other communities to exchange people and grow together.
• Activities to attract and to increase the value of new, diverse, and recurring speakers.
• How many dry runs you have done over time.
• Rough number of people from underrepresented minorities attending your conferences[1].

These numbers don’t happen using magic. They require work. They require dedication. But these are topics for some upcoming posts.

Sharing the results with the community

I like it when people share the metrics and results with the community from time to time. Community members or event participants can see the whole picture, and they can also suggest new people or new ways to reach new people.

Sometimes, I hear complaints about how a community is managed, but most of the time, people change their minds once they know the numbers, the process, and the hard work behind those numbers.

Think about sharing not only your code of conduct, but also what you are doing to improve the situation.

Note: Don’t share only numbers and what works well. Please share also what doesn’t work, and what could be improved.

If something seems controversial, do a dry run!

Different people have different sensibilities around diversity and inclusion. You can’t, of course, please everyone, but you can try to gather a lot of different feedback from different people.

Note: Dry runs are not only for sessions. As I’ve already done many times on my public-speaking-related blog, I’ve also discussed this chapter with different people before sending it for review.

Code of conduct

The first thing I check for when submitting a proposal to a conference is the presence of a code of conduct (CoC), and whether the CoC is inclusive, respectful, and open to anybody.

It’s so easy to have a good CoC that I don’t trust it when a conference or an event doesn’t have one.

If you’re a conference organizer and need some suggestions to create a CoC, you can look at this post from Flavia Weisghizzi: https://publicspeaking.dev/diversity-inclusion/why-and-how-to-create-a-code-of-conduct-for-your-events/.

Having a proper CoC can’t prevent inappropriate behaviors, like mansplaining (see Chapter 8) and other subtle, or not so subtle, biased behaviors. The CoC can be used as a reference to explain to offending people that their behavior is a violation of the CoC and won’t be tolerated.

Sometimes presenters don’t feel that something is offensive until they’re told so. Always try to talk to people about the issues, before taking proper actions.

Every conference, physical or virtual, should have a way to report CoC violations. Those should be evaluated according to the CoC, to local laws, and to common sense, whenever possible.

Always use inclusive language

Language used in presentations, slides, blog posts, and documentation should be inclusive, respectful, and should promote equal opportunity.

There are many guidelines that you can follow:

• Guidelines for Inclusive Language—Linguistic Society of America.
• Bias-free communication—Microsoft.
• Inclusive Chromium code—Google and others.

English has the concept of a singular they that can be useful in this context.

Having inclusive language is not related only to the English language; for example, this article talks about a guideline for the Italian language.

Most of these guides refer to gender-neutral language, but race-neutral is a critical point, too. Terms such blacklist, whitelist, master, slave, etc., should be replaced whenever possible, as many companies are already doing:

• Inclusive Chromium code on racially neutral language.
• GitHub abandons 'master' term to avoid slavery row.
• George Floyd: Twitter drops 'master', 'slave' and 'blacklist'.

If you think that awareness on these topics is something recent, there are articles from 15 to 20 years ago discussing the ban of offensive technical jargon. Perhaps it’s the right time now.

Other cultural differences

Being inclusive and respectful of diversity involves many different and unrelated fields that are sometimes difficult to know in advance.

Therefore, it’s always better to do a dry run of material with somebody who could be sensitive to the topic.

Note: Since I started doing presentations for an international audience, I discovered that there are many things that could upset people. In one slide, I said that “bullet points kill people,” with my avatar lying on the floor. That slide was tweeted by a friend and received a negative comment. Another time I was at a conference, one of the speakers came to me, knowing that I’m Italian, asking if the joke that he had on a slide was funny or could be disrespectful to Italians.

If you can’t do a dry run, you should try at least to look up cultural differences and things to avoid with people from certain audiences. The internet is full of articles about cultural differences, like this one.

If you’re doing a virtual session for a global audience, you should be prepared to explain things that you don’t even expect to regarding the content, or even worse, the perception of your talk.

Now it’s our turn!

What can we do to improve diversity and inclusion (at least in the tech field)?

We can help conferences give free tickets to people from minority groups.

We can help (aspiring) speakers from minority groups to create, improve, and submit their proposals.

We can help those speakers do dry runs and give them honest feedback.

We can avoid participating in conferences where the speaker line-up is not diverse enough (for small meetups and events, you can look at their speaker line-up over time), or we can offer help to the organizers to improve diversity and inclusion.

We can avoid taking part in conferences that don’t have a code of conduct, politely asking the organizers to add one.

We can mentor aspiring speakers.

We can invite aspiring speakers from underrepresented minorities to submit proposals to our conference.

We can ask famous speakers or organizations to help us spread the message that our conference is open for proposals from underrepresented minorities.

We can do a round of blind selection for sessions, without knowing who submitted the sessions, to see if there are biases while selecting them, and work to reduce those biases.

We can talk about diversity and inclusion until our industry has overcome this problem.

“We” is the most important word. We the speakers, we the organizers, we the attendees.