Diversity & Inclusion Tips from Founders for Change

Here are tips from Founders for Change on how to improve balance and inclusion in the workplace. 

"Starting early is exponentially easier. A lack of diversity grows exponentially. For example, if you first 20 engineers are men, it makes it harder to recruit women because every woman you interview will now be very aware that you’ve never thought about diversity before and will question why she should be part of your company."

- David Rogier, Masterclass

"It is important to have diversity across all experience levels. In order to hire diversely, you have to have a diverse pipeline. In addition, people have a tendency to hire those who are similar to them, so we make sure we have a diverse set of team members assess the candidates."

- Laura Behrens Wu, Shippo

"From the beginning, get more women and persons of color on the capitalization table. Make D&I everyone's responsibility; and build a D&I culture from the beginning."

- Othman Laraki, Color Genomics

"Make everyone on your team do unconscious bias training."

- James Reinhart, thredUP

"Talk about diversity and inclusion on every call with executive recruiters. “We need a more diverse pipeline — diversity and inclusion is important to me and to the company, and I’m not satisfied with the diversity of our current pipe.” It’s an easy sentence to say, and that one sentence, repeated once per week, will go a long way."

- Jack Conte, Patreon

"An inclusive culture is composed of a million, tiny decisions that intentionally make way for voices often not heard. Co-create culture: make everyone in your org accountable for the planning of team events, the naming of conference rooms, the interviewing of potential hires, the stocking of your snack cabinet, the kicking off of your team meetings. Create opportunities (e.g. a Slack channel) for intra-team communication around topics such as family, children, vacations, hobbies, good reads, philanthropy, and even political topics. Observe nontraditional holidays (Int'l Women's Day, Indigenous People's Day). Recruit for passion, not just traditional experience."

- Chitra Akileswaran, LUCY

"If you have extra space, offer to donate it for underrepresented minority group events!"

- Andrew Ofstad, Airtable

"Have values that celebrate an individual's authentic self and then hire against those values."

-René Lacerte, Bill.com

"Make inclusion one of the stated, documented values of the company."

- Harry Glaser, Periscope Data

"Find a great HR leader, bring them to the table early, and empower them to build your company culture. Having that voice play a leading role in critical business decisions from day one has resulted in a people-focused culture where mission, vision, diversity, and inclusion are core to who we are and how we operate. At GA, that mission orientation informs how we approach hiring, partnerships, products - honestly, every aspect of how we do business."

- Jake Schwartz, General Assembly

"Actively hire for diversity by making sure your pipeline is diverse."

- Frida Polli, pymetrics

"Actively screen candidates you're hiring for support of diversity and inclusion initiatives, especially for leadership roles. Improving is real work and the team has to want it to make progress."

- Christine Spang, Nylas

"Be honest about the fact that we can do better."

- Ben Milne, Dwolla

"As two male founders entering a female-dominated industry, we proactively invested in creating an inclusive and diverse work environment. One of such initiatives was to provide our female team members with mentoring from external female role models. This mentoring model helped the team unleash its full potential and it led to our current all-female leadership team."

- Igor Lebovic, Kindly Care

"Diversity isn't just about gender or race/ethnicity. Age, educational, professional, and geographic diversity are just as important. It's true that more diverse teams build better products, but you're not going to get there when you're pulling from the same schools or companies. An emphasis on intersectionality should be top-of-mind when building your team."

-Daniela Perdomo, goTenna

"Diversity of opinion and tolerance for opposing positions are critical for developing great products, support and companies."

- Eric R. Mathewson, WideOrbit

"We talk a lot about culture when hiring and retaining talent. Within Rockets, culture is not defined as "the same" but rather likeminded values – with the perspective that having diverse POV's is powerful. That perspective when hiring and retaining talent has enabled us to create a diverse team. We are 68% women with 7 of our 8 senior leaders being women."

- Rachel Blumenthal, Rockets of Awesome

"Start building diversity early as it is more difficult to change it later. Hire culture add vs culture fit. Our three member founding team had already gender diversity and it was easy to move forward from there by selecting great women and men who have the skills and experience to help to build our vision. Our first hire travelled 6000 miles to join our team and spoke a different language. Today we have a 40 people team from 16 nationalities from all over the world. That diversity of thoughts and backgrounds is benefitting every discussion, brainstorm and a step forward that we take."

- Karoli Hindriks, Jobbatical

"Encourage international travel by giving our employees the opportunity to travel between our NYC and Paris offices so they can establish closer relationships with their teammates and better understand their cultural habits"

- Paul Michaux, Prose

"Hire people that think differently from you!"

- Amanda Bradford, The League

"For recruiting a diverse team, over-index on a diverse candidate pool at the top of the funnel. Sacrificing on quality of candidates is never an option, so you need to expand your footprint in the sourcing phase of recruitment."

- John Kobs, Apartment List

"When hiring, ask yourselves - does this person bring a different perspective to the team? How might their experiences be different from the rest of the team? You'd be surprised how impactful it is just to ask this question of yourselves and the conversation it generates amongst your team."

- Christine Tao & Lori Mazan, Sounding Board

"On job descriptions, instead of listing required qualifications like "must have 5 years of software eng experience and a B.S. in CS or a related major," we list the job's responsibilities, like "will implement front-end designs for all aspects of our web and mobile applications." Research shows "men apply for a job when they meet only 60% of the qualifications, but women apply only if they meet 100% of them."

- Jamie Poskin, TeachFX

"For us, it's not simply about checking boxes from a list of experience on a resume. What does the candidate feel passionately about? What makes them excited to start the week? What do they want their legacy to be? If those things are aligned with the company vision and needs, then you are on the right track for that great hire."

- Nicci Levy, Alchemy 43

"Blind resume screening - have one person (not on an interview loop) handle inbound resumes, and before screening, remove name, photos or other personally identifiable information, and replace it with a number instead before being screened. Voila - blind screening."

- Andy Taylor, Approved

"Don't be afraid to talk about it openly. When looking at candidates, don't look at one characteristic in isolation. The intersections of race and ethnicity, gender, class, background, education are all part of the picture. Consider the whole person, not just one characteristic." 

- Molly Goodson, The Assembly

"Make room in your calendar for someone who doesn’t have the kind of network that allows them to access the advice they need. I get my share of ‘cold’ requests via LinkedIn from people who are launching non-profit or for-profit ventures and who request a meeting to get my input or help. I wish I could say yes to all of them, but given limited bandwidth, I say yes to the subset who’ve written a compelling description of their work and who are underrepresented."

- Charles Best, DonorsChoose.or

"In addition to ensuring that members of the Board of Directors and executive management team are diverse, company policies related to parental leave, corporate social responsibility, and transparency all contribute to the creation of an empowered and included workforce."

- Nirav Tolia, Sarah Leary & Prakash Janakiraman, Nextdoor

"As CEO, if you don’t have a diverse personal or professional network, then become intentional about cultivating one. Not only will it make you a better CEO by broadening your perspective, it will become a valuable source of talent."

- Chip Paucek, 2U

"Because culture fit is a vague and subjective concept, it can lead to biased recruiting and hiring. It can be used as a reason, conscious or not, to turn down candidates who seem different. Instead, hire for values fit, which ensures that you’re evaluating candidates who share the principles you care about as you grow."

- Amit Sharma, Narvar

"It is vital to understand how your employees think about diversity and inclusion. To know where you are, and where you want to go, it is important to ask deeper questions about what diversity means to your employees.
E.g. differences in location and culture and change the perception of what “diversity” means. In an international office, a variety of nationalities and languages spoken in an office might be perceived as diversity, while in the U.S. it may be viewed more in terms of race, gender and gender-identity."

-Sam Shank, HotelTonight

"As a consumer company, diversity isn't just the right thing to do, it's good business. We're creating a platform that appeals to a wide customer base so in order to do that successfully we have to start with a team and culture that reflects that. I firmly believe in hiring for potential, not just experience."

- Joe Fernandez, Joymode

"Diversity and inclusion are two separate things and both are essential to build the best products. Once you have a diverse team, you need to leverage it and include the right stakeholders in decisions."

- Afton Vechery & Carly Leahy, Modern Fertility

"Implement the Rooney Rule!"

- Lynzi Ziegenhagen, Schoolzilla

"Focus on this from day one. Early hires set the tone. Offer candidates a "test drive" so they can confirm that they feel the company culture is welcoming even if the team looks less diverse on the surface."

- Zouhair Belkoura & Philipp Berner, Keepsafe

"Diversity begins with hiring, so you must continually evaluate where your talent is coming from and actively seek out diverse candidates. Require women and underrepresented be groups be in the interview pool for every leadership role. Intentionally engage with diverse communities to build relationships with talent who might otherwise not know your company. While this approach requires more time and energy than waiting for diverse candidates' resumes to come across your desk, it's a critical component of achieving a more diverse team. At Hired, we're proud that our focused diversity efforts have resulted in a majority female executive team."

- Mehul Patel, Hired.com

"We make sure every interview committee is filled with a diverse group of team members from around the company. Every new hire interviews with the committee so that we get a range of different perspectives on the candidate."

- Chris Webb, ChowNow

"Every time you hire, make sure that the initial and the final candidate list is diverse."

- John Borthwick, betaworks

"Prioritize diversity not only because its the right thing to do, but because its mission critical to your success. If your employee population doesn't reflect your customer population, then how can you effectively serve them? The business case is important to communicate at all levels."

- Zach Goldstein, Thanx

"We are actively looking for old habits and cultural practices that are creating a hostile or unaccepting environment for gender and culturally diverse place. For example we recently found a team member who was having a problem reporting to our VP Engineering (woman), or a customer who constantly addressed me instead of my co-founder (woman). We have publicly denounced that sort of behavior and addressed it directly with the employee or behaved in a way that restored the power to the 'ignored' employee (ignore customer email and have them resend it - this time addressing my co-founder)."

-Gil Allouche, Metadata

"Sourcing and recruiting is key. Ensure your qualified candidate pool and the candidate group you bring in for interviews for each position are as diverse as you want your company to be. Your company will only be as diverse as the people that interview and apply."

- Aaron Bird, Bizible

"Always choose the best employee for the job - but insist on always having a diverse set of candidates to choose from."

-Jager McConnell, Crunchbase

"Titles impact who applies for roles. Startups often have inflated titles in comparison to mature companies in our industry. Our experience is that women often times opt out of applying for a job if the title is too far beyond her current title. Men tend to be more confident in their ability to make a leap of several levels."

- Davis Smith and Stephan Jacob, Cotopaxi

"Get diverse angels and advisors."

- Alex Yancher, Passport

"Cross-pollination is where all the great ideas come from. Being inclusive is not only the right thing to do, it builds stronger companies. Every founder must believe that statement intrinsically in order to build an inclusive culture. If you have doubts, spend more time traveling the world, meeting people with different backgrounds, and visiting companies that have fostered that culture from day one."

- Stephan Ango, Lumi

"Treat the hiring of a D&I executive with the same priority that you treat the hiring of any other mission critical function in your company -- not as an afterthought that you "bolt on" later. The earlier you hire a D&I executive, the more those values will be a part of your company as it grows."

- Lindsey Haswell and Brad O'Neill, Depot Global

"We believe that creating the most family-friendly work environment ever helps all our employees succeed, both parents and non-parents. We don't expect anyone to work nights or weekends and we're flexible with how you spend your days. Childcare duties, doctor’s appointments, and other to-dos can help you pause throughout the day. Taking care of the necessities helps you focus even more when you’re at work."

- Sara Mauskopf, Winnie

"Grade all technical interviews and interview questions with a structured rubric so as to avoid subjective or unconscious bias. Strip job descriptions of superfluous or-non specific requirements as minority candidates may be more deterred from applying."

- Ashwath Rajan, Bodega

"Offer the same length for maternity and paternity leave."

- Arnaud Plas, Prose

"Discuss with recruiters, hiring managers and leadership team members about the importance of diversity and inclusion -- that ensures everyone's on the same page."

- Andy Pflaum, Astro

"Early-on, develop a hiring strategy to ensure that your workforce resembles the community you wish to foster." 

- Alison Pincus, One Kings Lane

"Don't let company culture be an excuse to squash diversity. Keep tech weird!"

- Parag Chordia, Telepathic

"Recognize your own implicit bias."

- Shannon Spanhake, LUCY

"Before any decision is made, big or small, make sure you are asking yourself if this reflects who we are and what we want to represent."

- Patrick Herning & Kathryn Retzer,            11 Honore

"Judge people’s abilities based on what they contribute for work at work. While team-building events outside of the office are important for building trust and for team morale, they should never overshadow true contributions in the office during working hours."

- Spencer Rascoff, Zillow Group

"Ask about pronoun preferences during onboarding. It may not be something your think about already, but it's important to creating a welcoming diverse culture."

- Shana Tellerman, Modsy

"Simply put, hire more people from under-represented groups, and put more of them in positions of power. How? Take a more structured approach to hiring, to overcome implicit bias and more evidence-based decisions vs. “gut feel.” Proactively source women (and other under-represented groups) to build more diverse pipelines. And consciously build a more inclusive workplace."

- Daniel Chait, Greenhouse

"Don't just say diversity is important. Really believe in it yourself and if you do, talk about it with concrete examples of how it's important and what impact it can have on your business."

- Yunha Kim, Simple Habit

"Encourage ongoing learning and introspection. For example, invite experts in the field of unconscious bias to inform hiring managers and interview panels; spotlight innovators of all backgrounds, genders, and orientations; work alongside economists to better understand wage gaps and areas of improvement; and actively participate in organizations dedicated to the advancement of diversity and inclusion."

- Jeff Glueck, Foursquare

"To create a more diverse and inclusive workplace, taking a data-driven approach to your recruiting process is key. This worked well for us recently when we achieved a 50:50 gender ratio for incoming software engineers at Duolingo. We started by revisiting the standard list of universities from where we've typically recruited, and opted to only recruit from universities that had more than 18% of female undergraduate computer science majors (fun fact: the national average of female computer science degree graduates is 18%). This – in addition to more public outreach, company wide D&I workshops, and unconscious bias training for interviewers – was crucial in helping us reach this important milestone."

- Luis von Ahn & Severin Hacker, Duolingo

"Remember the cultural moments that say to your diverse team members "you, too, belong." For example, Eid Al-Fitr, celebrating the end of Ramadan, is as important to some people as Christmas is to others."

-Jaleh Bisharat, Naked Poppy

"Flexible work accommodations so everyone can live full personal lives, whether that is exercise, friends, caring for pets, new babies, hobbies." 

- Blair Pircon, The Graide Network  

"Commit to having at least one diverse (of color, LGBTQ, women, disability) candidate in every interview loop."

- Olly Downs, Amplero

"Collect interview feedback independently from each interviewer on a consistent scale to prevent groupthink."

-Howie Lu, Airtable

"Set a core value around D & I such as 'Bring your whole self to work'"

- Jinal Jhaveri & Forum Desai, SchoolMint

"As part of our core values, Recurly will hold ourselves, as well as our Board, investors, and partners accountable for demonstrating a track record of supporting diversity and inclusion. This is a core tenet of our integrity."

- Dan Burkhart, Recurly

"A rewards program for meeting diversity goals is a must."

-Justin Spraggins, Beep

"It can be difficult for a start up to focus on top of funnel D&I. We tend to prioritize finding the best person we can, as quickly as we can. But D&I is not just about hiring, but about creating an environment that allows minorities and all genders to thrive. We pay close attention to meeting dynamics and team dynamics, and make sure each person gets a fair share of speaking time. We also make sure that we're promoting both genders at an equal rate, and constantly thriving for diversity in our leadership team."

- Jonathan Regev, The Farmer's Dog

"Talk is cheap - lead by action. I have yet to meet the founder who doesn't say some version of "We are totally focused on hiring more minorities / women / people from LGBTQ community in 2018!" and then nothing changes. Address the situation head on, be intentional by publicly discussing D&I with your team, and take concrete steps (i.e. - double the referral bonus for D&I hires) to spur action. It's easy to keep preaching, but it's time to start practicing."

-Sahil Mansuri + Chris He, Bravado

"Open your ears! Are you making time for everyone's voice? Lead from behind the community."

- Betsy Corcoran, EdSurge

"Look for diversity not just at the workplace, but how your product can serve all ages, all genders and all individuals."

- Jessica Chang, WeeCare

"We actively try to go to women in tech and D&I events to increase our funnel for women engineers. Likewise, we are not restricting D&I initiatives to just women but trying to figure out ways we can make our pipeline more diverse."

- Vishal Joshi, Joy

"Diversity and Inclusion are more than slots to fill on a spreadsheet. These are values that need to be in your company before hires are even made, and implemented in and outside of your  workforce to reflect the company you want to build and the talent you want to retain. Build relationships with industry colleagues who aren’t homogeneous with your social circle. Identify and support difference in the background, outlook, and experience of the staff and partners around you, and ask how those differences can sharpen the company’s position, strategy, and products. It can also often be transformative to just expand the description of your company’s ideal customer."

- John McPheters & Jed Stiller, Stadium Goods

"Force-function the top of the funnel. In our experience, on average hiring managers meet 5-6 candidates before making a hiring-decision. As a leadership team and hiring manager, commit to meeting at least half if not more than half diverse candidates within the first 5-6 who make it to the hiring manager stage of any position."

- Erin Wilson, Hirepool

"If you care about diversity, put in the time to read and research on your own instead of expecting people to teach you. There is a plethora of writing and knowledge about diversity and inclusion and some simple googling will yield great results"

- Benny Wong, Timehop

"Early rapid growth means rapid hiring, and the fastest way to hire is often through internal referrals, whether via current employees or investors. Be intentional about hiring outside of these channels. As you build an inclusive culture from day one, diversity will beget diversity, so that when stellar candidates from underrepresented backgrounds interview, they will be able to literally see themselves reflected in your team and your commitment to inclusion and diversity will be abundantly clear."

- Joanna McFarland, Carolyn Yashari Becher, Janelle McGlothlin,
 HopSkipDrive

"To attract and retain diverse teams, hire a diverse management team. You can use the Rooney Rule to ensure you are considering diverse candidates for your executives (or other positions too!) For every open position, be sure to interview at least one candidate with the diversity you are seeking."

- Bonnie Crater, Full Circle Insights

"We use the Rooney Rule when hiring for senior leadership. This has helped us increase our diversity."

- George Arison, Shift