As HN: Am I being instructed to do something illegal? (DEI hiring practices)
by anon926310 on Hacker News.
I work in an engineering department at a tech company in the USA. I’ve worked on many hiring projects over the years but the latest project is different to the others. In the spreadsheet that lists all the open positions, there’s a new column next to open positions with DEI comments. It has a line like this: Senior Software Engineer ( must be female) If I follow this spreadsheet and exclude male applicants, then would I break any laws? Or if not laws, then would I violate other regulations or ethical standards in the industry? I ask because my understanding of anti-discrimination law is that there are certain classes of people that cannot be excluded from job openings. Things like sex and race. If this is illegal then what’s the right way to handle this? Are there other ways I should think about this besides legal/illegal or ethical/unethical? Does region or state within the USA matter? A little more context: As a SSE I would do interviews or screen candidates but now in a Sr Manager role I’m more involved in the early planning and management of the process. In the first meeting where I saw the comments I said nothing. I followed up a few days later with an email to VP eng to say I opposed. 2 days after that I had a call with VP eng where I raised the issue again and they insisted that the requirement remain. I’ve taken no more action after that.