What grade do you give the Engineering Community for Diversity?

[Dean Agnostic]

I'll see you later @csb!

 

[csb]

I like that you think I needed your advice. 

 

[matt267 PE]

I'll see you later @csb!

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

All I want is professionalism, with respect for my qualifications, training, and experience.

As I joke with my friends who get frustrated with a racist, sexist society and who may or may not even send in their applications to jobs, because they lack the self-confidence and wonder if they're "good enough" for the standards of the mainstream meritocracy: "What would a mediocre white man do?"

If your competence is always questioned you begin to doubt yourself.

Here's a really good story about what happened when a male coworker signed email with his female coworker's name. I promise you both his and her perspective are worth a read. This is so true it's painful.

I'm very very late to this party but OMG-this is my career mantra and it has served me well. I don't overthink what I want to say before saying it. I rarely apologize unless I really do something wrong.

Women tend to over-apologize about everything so I never over-apologize. I give a lot of thought before apologizing. The last apology that I gave was from forgetting that my team stopped the design on a particular element of a project because of a perceived funding shortage. We actually have the money. My bad... so I apologized. Before that? I called the owner of a company a child. lol That actually felt good. That guy is a pain in the neck. It was unprofessional so I apologized.

I apply for jobs with a "why not?" attitude and it's how I got the job I have.  I also ask for ridiculous salaries. Worst thing that could happen is they say no. I've received one 'no'. One.

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

As a professional with an intersectionalist identity (Black and a Woman), I give the community a D. 

Have you gone to a professional engineering/construction orgs national conference, attended the opening plenary, and actually LOOKED AROUND!?!? Balding. White. Males. 

EVERYWHERE!

It's not nearly a fraction of representation of the population in no way, shape, or form. I'm in the room and at the table for a number of design reviews. And on more than one occasion, I've had to say "as a woman and a mom, I am telling you this isn't going to work. I'm not asking, I'm telling you." 

Slowly but surely, we're getting more people of color involved in the industry but I'm not meeting them on the executive levels. I'm also watching how young women join our ranks and they eventually teeter out into Business Development, Marketing, etc. and not really staying on the technical side. I can tell you that there's a lack of mentorship at many firms. 

I grew up with the old African-American soundtrack of "You need to work twice as hard to get half as far" because I'm Black and a woman. I knew that I had to work hard. But it wasn't until I had a mentor (wonderful Bald White guy lol) who told me to make sure I knew my stuff frontwards and backwards and nobody could mess with me. So when I was in the field, and new to engineering, I came up against lots of older men who didn't like receiving direction from a "kid" or someone who was "younger than their daughter". Instead of doubting myself, I leaned in and told them how many ways they were wrong and the one way to fix it. It helped me to build a level of confidence in my management style and in my craft that no one could break down. So I stayed. But watched a number of young women eventually shy away from the field to hide away in the office.

 

[Tiger15]

I'm very very late to this party but OMG-this is my career mantra and it has served me well. I don't overthink what I want to say before saying it. I rarely apologize unless I really do something wrong.

Women tend to over-apologize about everything so I never over-apologize. I give a lot of thought before apologizing. The last apology that I gave was from forgetting that my team stopped the design on a particular element of a project because of a perceived funding shortage. We actually have the money. My bad... so I apologized. Before that? I called the owner of a company a child. lol That actually felt good. That guy is a pain in the neck. It was unprofessional so I apologized.

I apply for jobs with a "why not?" attitude and it's how I got the job I have.  I also ask for ridiculous salaries. Worst thing that could happen is they say no. I've received one 'no'. One.

As a professional with an intersectionalist identity (Black and a Woman), I give the community a D. 

Have you gone to a professional engineering/construction orgs national conference, attended the opening plenary, and actually LOOKED AROUND!?!? Balding. White. Males. 

EVERYWHERE!

It's not nearly a fraction of representation of the population in no way, shape, or form. I'm in the room and at the table for a number of design reviews. And on more than one occasion, I've had to say "as a woman and a mom, I am telling you this isn't going to work. I'm not asking, I'm telling you." 

Slowly but surely, we're getting more people of color involved in the industry but I'm not meeting them on the executive levels. I'm also watching how young women join our ranks and they eventually teeter out into Business Development, Marketing, etc. and not really staying on the technical side. I can tell you that there's a lack of mentorship at many firms. 

I grew up with the old African-American soundtrack of "You need to work twice as hard to get half as far" because I'm Black and a woman. I knew that I had to work hard. But it wasn't until I had a mentor (wonderful Bald White guy lol) who told me to make sure I knew my stuff frontwards and backwards and nobody could mess with me. So when I was in the field, and new to engineering, I came up against lots of older men who didn't like receiving direction from a "kid" or someone who was "younger than their daughter". Instead of doubting myself, I leaned in and told them how many ways they were wrong and the one way to fix it. It helped me to build a level of confidence in my management style and in my craft that no one could break down. So I stayed. But watched a number of young women eventually shy away from the field to hide away in the office.

There are a large number of excellent points here. But the one that I'd like to specifically comment on is mentorship. Mentoring (both formal and informal) is an underrated aspect of career growth. It's extremely important to have a good mentor to help you and to advocate for you when you're trying to reach the next level. The best mentoring relationships happen naturally. In my experience those organic mentoring relationships rarely happens for black employees; I assume that's also true for women. Like I said in my previous post, people are most comfortable with and most identify with people that look like them. This creates a disadvantage for women and minorities because their white male counterparts are much more likely to have those relationships.

 

[csb]

As a professional with an intersectionalist identity (Black and a Woman), I give the community a D. 

Have you gone to a professional engineering/construction orgs national conference, attended the opening plenary, and actually LOOKED AROUND!?!? Balding. White. Males. 

EVERYWHERE!

My *favorite* is when they ask me what company I'm a rep for because surely if there's a woman at the conference she must be a marketing person. 

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

There are a large number of excellent points here. But the one that I'd like to specifically comment on is mentorship. Mentoring (both formal and informal) is an underrated aspect of career growth. It's extremely important to have a good mentor to help you and to advocate for you when you're trying to reach the next level. The best mentoring relationships happen naturally. In my experience those organic mentoring relationships rarely happens for black employees; I assume that's also true for women. Like I said in my previous post, people are most comfortable with and most identify with people that look like them. This creates a disadvantage for women and minorities because their white male counterparts are much more likely to have those relationships.

My best mentoring relationships happened naturally. I was very fortunate to run across people who just took interest in guiding me and giving me opportunities. All were men and almost all were white. I had a client who was a Black man - stern, retired Army Colonel who loved war history. Other than us both having brown skin, I never really thought much about us having anything in common. The one thing I really admired was how deliberately he made his decisions, and in the consultant world this was rare - he actually stuck with his decisions, unless more information was provided and he was asked to change his decision. So anyway, I was leaving my company and this project, and that man pulled me aside and gave me some amazing advice about leading senior level professionals and how to navigate on a few different levels, one being race. He actually told me to always look around and see if your team is as diverse as your community. If not, fix it. Everybody brings something to the table. I rushed to my car and started downloading everything he told me into OneNote on my phone. I never wanted to forget it. I had one formal mentor, a woman. She was okay. She mentored me into wanting a new job. I knew I didn't want to end up like her. She did that thing where she learned to mute herself and the things about her identity that gave her a unique voice. She just operated like everybody else and didn't want to make any waves. Boooo!

Even if I don't have a formal mentor, there's one thing that I always try to do. I pay attention to communication styles, and other stuff, and I pick up on it, try it on and see if it suits me. I learned de-escalation techniques from a woman that I worked with when I was an intern in construction. When things got heated in a meeting, she didn't use cheeky charm or anything like that. She used the word "we" a lot. "It seems like there's a miscommunication on what is being asked and what's being understood by everyone. We can work through it and figure out what we need to do." I notice that the CEO of my org asks a lot of questions before making a decision, similar to the client I mentioned above. He also takes physical time to think before asking another question. I've had other leaders think, and then say "I can't make a decision right now. When do you need it by?" Just that straight forward controlled honesty. Keeps everything clear.

So watch the people you work for and the people you work with. Pay more attention to the good qualities rather than the bad. 

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

My *favorite* is when they ask me what company I'm a rep for because surely if there's a woman at the conference she must be a marketing person. 

Say it louder for the people in the back. lol 

 

[Dleg]

@civilrobot will you be my mentor? Just kidding - but only partially - it sounds like you have picked up a lot of valuable wisdom that most or all of us could benefit from. 

The organization I am a part of has a formal mentoring agreement program for engineers, spread all around the country. I've never participated in the formal program, but have had several of the "naturally occurring" mentoring relationships you mention, usually as the mentee. Those have been great. I am not so sure about the assigned mentors. I know several "mentors" who are in it for promotion credit, etc. and knowing them personally, I am not sure I could get much of value from a mentoring relationship (I know that's terrible to say, but true).  A couple of them who tried to mentor me, ended up being like the woman you mentioned - they showed me what I did not want to end up like.

I think one of the things I have been learning from this most recent national discussion is that I need to step up, as an older white guy (not yet totally bald), and actively help those around me who are less privileged. Your post now gives me some great ideas on how to do that in the workplace, as a mentor. 

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

@civilrobot will you be my mentor? Just kidding - but only partially - it sounds like you have picked up a lot of valuable wisdom that most or all of us could benefit from. 

The organization I am a part of has a formal mentoring agreement program for engineers, spread all around the country. I've never participated in the formal program, but have had several of the "naturally occurring" mentoring relationships you mention, usually as the mentee. Those have been great. I am not so sure about the assigned mentors. I know several "mentors" who are in it for promotion credit, etc. and knowing them personally, I am not sure I could get much of value from a mentoring relationship (I know that's terrible to say, but true).  A couple of them who tried to mentor me, ended up being like the woman you mentioned - they showed me what I did not want to end up like.

I think one of the things I have been learning from this most recent national discussion is that I need to step up, as an older white guy (not yet totally bald), and actively help those around me who are less privileged. Your post now gives me some great ideas on how to do that in the workplace, as a mentor. 

It sounds like you've got it figured out but if you ever want to bounce anything off of me, I'm here. Shoot me a message and we can chop it up! 

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

I thought a lot about this during my 2.5-hour lawn mowing yesterday.

I'll start by saying I think as a whole the country has come a long way in a relatively short time.  My wife was shocked to learn my elementary school played "Song of the South" in class.  We sang songs in school talking about putting down "injun" uprisings.  I clearly remember my teacher explaining that "injun" was just another word for Indian when in reality it's pejorative.  I remember my grandparents talking about the "coloreds" and using the N-word.  Obviously none of this would be acceptable in open society, let alone in school, any more.  Granted there is still plenty of overt racism out there and there probably always will be, but society is changing and recognizing it's out there and isn't acceptable.

On the other hand obviously there is still a long way to go.  I also remember my grandparents talking about how their parents were invited to KKK meetings and attended a couple but decided it wasn't for them.  My grandparents seemed proud of that, but didn't draw a line from that to their own racism.  I think we're in a similar situation when we say things like we don't see color.  That is great, but it doesn't mean there isn't more that needs to change.  My wife's grandfather said he didn't see what the problem was--that there is no color to him.  Which knowing him I know he truly lives that.  But at the same time he can walk down the street and not have to worry about being killed by a police officer or a group of vigilantes like in Brunswick, but a black man can't.  (And I don't blame the police for that per se, but it's a real societal problem.)

I don't pretend to have any answers, but my point is we should be proud that we've come a long way, but at the same time recognize we have a long ways to go yet.

Turning to engineering specifically, I used to feel like my group was really diverse--we have, or have had, quite a few women and minorities--up to 50% of our group.  But in the marathon lawn-mowing it started to dawn on me that all of the minorities I've worked with are foreign-born.  We've had Africans, but no African-Americans.  We have Asians, but no Asian-Americans, we've had middle-eastern people, but none born in the US.  Which got to me thinking about why that is? 

I do a  lot of recruiting for my company and when we go to universities we talk to lots of foreign students, but the American students are almost all white males, with a few white females in the mix.  It's not for a lack of looking because we go to every diversity event we can find for engineering and still have a hard time coming up with a diverse candidate pool.  Why is that?  I don't know really, but suspect it is a combination of a lack of opportunity for minorities coupled with bad schools.  But I can't pretend to know what it's really like growing up as a minority.

I mirror what others said above, that in general in engineering if you have the skills to get the job done, you're accepted into the community.  I give engineering an A for accepting diversity in that respect.  But as far as actually being diverse, I think we're more like a D (but not for a lack of trying.)

*brakes*

So, I can answer this (rhetorical) question. You're welcome in advance. lol

I've mentioned mentoring before and to be honest with you, it starts before college... or at least the encouragement part does. It's so important for kids to see themselves in our profession. I try my best to speak at events for middle schoolers and high schoolers as much as I can. I'm also involved in hands-on volunteer opportunities, going into city schools and introducing kids to the fun side of our industry. Last Fall, I went to a high school and introduced a bunch of young Black and Brown girls to aviation by building gliders, and having a contest to see whose could fly the farthest (tbh, I have way more fun than they do). I talked to some of them about their kids (yep! some of the 15 year olds had kids) and I just treated them like...people and not a charity case or anything. I also talked about where I grew up, what inner city schools I went to and what it was like in college. I'm honest. I tell them that it was hard and I didn't see many people who looked like me. I also told them that I was one of two Black women who graduated in my program and that I didn't let it stop me because I was focused on my goal. Kids sometimes feel defeated before they even start so I try to offer them a real life version of a possibility. I'm the "what if?" factor.

I also tell them stories about all of the lovely microaggressions from other White people who "didn't see color". Why? To show them that it happened and I survived it. I didn't run away.

Here's some of my favorite hits:

1. I had a Calc 3 teacher write a letter of disapproval in place of a requested letter of recommendation for college. I went to a predominantly Black STEM high school btw. I was 17.

2. I had a Chemistry prof in college accuse me of cheating on my labs because I "couldn't possibly write that neat". Again, I went to a STEM high school where it was DRILLED in us to write in block lettering for everything...even non-engineering/architecture classes. She ran it up the flag pole and demanded that I receive a failing grade. I was dumbfounded. I was 18.

3. I had a the University Police Officer stop me on a college campus where I was taking summer classes because someone "reported that a Black woman was casing the offices and looking for something to steal." I was trying to find the badging office so that I could get my campus ID before classes started and I was lost. I was shaking and crying and the police kept yelling at me while their hands rested on their holster - "CALM DOWN! CALM DOWN OR WE WILL HAVE TO TAKE YOU IN!!!!" I was 19.

4. An oldie but a goodie! (and please, if you do this, just stop)  "OMG! In the summer, I almost get as brown as you!" (whips out arm and places it up to my arm to compare and giggle). Cringe-worthy for sure.

Btw, I'm not even 40 yet so these incidents didn't happen that long ago. 

Back to what I was saying before... so I know that sitting in a room where nobody looks like you isn't easy. It should go without saying but for those of you who are saying "everything is great! I don't see color!" yeah, it's awesome...for... you. But for those of us who have to face these ridiculous micro-agressions every day or almost every day, well, it's exhausting. We have to stay calm, don't make everybody uncomfortable, do our work, be the best, in some cases represent an entire race of people or a particular gender, and act like nothing bothers us. It's a lot.

 

[csb]

We have to stay calm, don't make everybody uncomfortable, do our work, be the best, in some cases represent an entire race of people or a particular gender, and act like nothing bothers us. It's a lot.

I feel this in my bones.

 

[Tiger15]

I saw this and thought of our discussion. (Which has been surprisingly good by the way).

"Diversity" is a great first step, but it's not the finish line.

 

[Audi Driver P.E.]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/doj-accuses-yale-discriminating-against-white-asian-american-applicants-n1236680

 

[squaretaper LIT AF PE]

micro-agressions

Um, your examples don't count as microaggressions. Those are regular-sized aggressions!

But for those of us who have to face these ridiculous micro-agressions every day or almost every day, well, it's exhausting. We have to stay calm, don't make everybody uncomfortable, do our work, be the best, in some cases represent an entire race of people or a particular gender, and act like nothing bothers us. It's a lot.

I can relate! As a POC in a not-very-diverse office it's just easier to keep quiet, keep my head down, and be the "model minority" I'm expected to be...but the comments I hear (on multiple current event topics) are pretty cringe-y. My personal (and online) demeanor is pretty different from my office/professional one and I kind of wish I could be more outspoken in my professional life. I guess I'm not convinced that it's worth the effort/exposure yet.

Yeah, impostor syndrome affects a lot of people, but can be particularly bad among women and minorities.

@jean15paul_PE I definitely struggle with this in my professional life. I'm still a work in progress...

Aaanyway, regardless, I'd just like to reiterate that we are all scum. :rotflmao:

 

[civilrobot PE etc etc]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/doj-accuses-yale-discriminating-against-white-asian-american-applicants-n1236680

I listened to a podcast about this. Disgusting. I'm angered by this. Why feign diversity by easing standards for one group and raising them for another? Kids are out here dealing with mental illness, anxiety, stress, and depression while trying to meet their goals and this is what's happening? I would be outraged if I was one of the rejected students knowing I did everything and more. 

 

[Dean Agnostic]

LOL! I didn't mean it like that. It was actually a term of endearment/greeting, and I love her, respectfully. 

 

[Tiger15]

LOL! I didn't mean it like that. It was actually a term of endearment/greeting, and I love her, respectfully. 

Respectfully @Dean Agnostic.

There was a whole lot of "man-splaining" in response to what I'm pretty sure was a rhetorical question. I think that's what the gif was in response to.

It depends on the situation and context (e.g. body language, tone, aesthetic-perhaps these men like what they see, or maybe their digging your style,  and most men can see through your bones, etc.). 

You said these men dominate the conversation, discounting your experience, and in person they dominate the conversation and calling you sweetie. The way I would address it is to preemptively refute in  middle of the conversation, not in the beginning because that will put you in a defensive posture. Another way is  to change your mindset immediately and in your internal thoughts would be like: 1) OK mo$her$uc&e#! I got this. I'm gonna refute somewhere in the conversation , or 2) OK mo$her$uc&e#, I love this, or 3) OK mo$her$uc&e#, I am the GOAT. Also, to be less agreeable in that situation will work. You get my point @csb.

Very Respectfully Yours,

Dean

 

[csb]

This again?!