Twitter HQ in Singapore. (Image via CNBC)

Solving Diversity Problem, Twitter Unveils Apprenticeship Program for Women and Minorities

Kinanty Nadia Putri
Business & Industry
Internet & IT
Jul 11, 2019
2237
Just like several other tech giants in Silicon Valley, Twitter is facing criticism for the lack of diversity in its workforce—an irony while they are trying to build products for diverse voices on its platform. But to improve this situation, Twitter has taken a step further through an apprenticeship program designed to bring more women and minorities talent to the company’s engineering and data science teams. The program was announced on Wednesday (7/11).

Twitter admitted that it has been hiring too many white and Asian to fill the high-paying technology positions in the company, saying 70% of its global workforce composed by men and 90% in the US alone. According to Twitter’s diversity report in June 2019, the company filled with 41.2% women, 4.7% black, and 4% Hispanic employees overall. While in the technical jobs, women only stand at 21.3%, black employees at 2.9%, and Hispanics at 3.3%.

With this engineering apprenticeship program, Twitter hopes it will boost the representation of women to 43% and 5% for black and Hispanic employees each.

Twitter also said that the program is not limited to women and minorities, but also for people from non-traditional backgrounds like veterans and caregiver coming back to the workforce, who are self-taught to have programming skills.

The apprenticeship program will last for up to 12 months and offer full-time employment benefits. Participants will work at Twitter’s offices in San Francisco, New York and Boulder, Colorado, while also rotating throughout the company’s technical teams. If lucky enough, participants can be offered a full-time position in one of the engineering teams after graduation.

In 2014, a civil rights activist Jesse Jackson with his Rainbow PUSH coalition were pressuring major Silicon Valley companies, including Twitter, to diversify their workforce since the booming of the technology industry is expected to be a big source for employment for upcoming years.

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/10/twitter-unveils-engineering-apprenticeship-program-to-boost-diversity.html

Twitter , Internet , SiliconValley , Tech , Business , Diversity , Workforce , Women , Minority , Apprenticeship