Diversifying Your Candidate Pool

Summer of Tech helps develop New Zealand’s future tech talent. We are constantly striving to be more inclusive, and support underrepresented people within our programme and into tech careers. Gender diversity has been a focus, and we're proud that 41% of our 2020 intern cohort identified as non-male (with an industry average of 30%). In 2021 we have refocused our diversity initiatives. Our aim is to improve employment outcomes for M?ori and Pacific students and graduates, as well as other underrepresented groups including International Students, LGBTQIA+, and mature students.We are doing this because it's the right thing to do and because it aligns with the goals of many of the employers that we work with.Here are some tips if you are keen to diversify your team:

Safety first

Before you can make meaningful changes regarding the diversity of your team, you need to make sure your work culture and behaviours are safe for EVERYONE - including current and future staff. This might take some time, and there are a bunch of organisations that can help if you need it. Check out Ally Skills NZ for some free resources to help get you started.You should be hiring for diversity at all levels of your organisation. If you've got a monoculture situation going on, then hiring an underrepresented intern may not go well unless you can ensure they feel genuinely safe and welcome. If you don't have a mentor or manager or buddy who can relate to your intern's life experience, then we suggest you find someone outside of your organisation to act as an additional mentor alongside your team.Your entire recruitment process should be safe and respectful, and you should have strategies to help reduce the impact of bias. Again, there are a bunch of resources out there and experts to help with this.At Summer of Tech, we are seeking advice and partnering with M?ori-led organisations and initiatives to understand how we can support more students of M?ori background into tech careers. This seems a great time to do a shout-out to JT from Mana Mind and the M?oriland Tech Creative Hub in ?taki. JT has released a series of insightful videos on LinkedIn about attracting, retaining, and supporting rangatahi into the tech industry. Check out the first in the series here, where JT talks about "How to Create an Environment They Don't Want to Leave".

Inclusive & Accessible

The information you put out in your profile & job ads - both on our platform and your website - can inadvertently turn off some candidates.  We suggest you run the text of your job ad through a gender bias decoder (here's a link to a free online one), to make sure you're not inadvertently alienating some of your best candidates.The tips below are given on the assumption that you want to be inclusive and cast the net wide to find well-matched candidates for your role(s).  As an internship programme, we expect that you're hiring on POTENTIAL rather than experience, so our search algorithms are designed to help you find candidates with the right attitude & aptitude for your role(s).We encourage you to make a proactive online search of profiles, AND to participate in our offline recruitment events - it's hard to judge someone's potential from a photo & some text.Recruitment takes time, and hiring interns is no exception! Going through the steps of our recruitment season will take at least 10 hours of your team's time, more if you have multiple roles! If this is your first year hiring interns, please reach out to our team, we can help make the process easier for you.

React: Respond to Applications

On our website, you can see if students have "applied" for your role(s).  That can be a good starting point to review profiles and select interview candidates.Students are limited to 15 "applications" through our website.But if you're wondering why diverse candidates don't apply for your roles, which might be a problem right across your vacancies, then you might want to go back and make sure that your work environment is safe and your communications material is inclusive and accessible. It could also be that there's a whisper network amongst candidates who have had poor experiences with your recruitment process or past employees. If you've got a bad reputation amongst students, especially amongst underrepresented candidates, then you will have to do the valuable work to fix that first.

Be proactive: Search

Employers often find more diverse candidates through a proactive search.  Advertising through different channels is a great starting point. Remember that many people won't apply for roles that they don't think they're 100% qualified for, and internships are no exception.  (If you want to do more reading on this phenomenon, start here. We see a reluctance to apply as a very clear factor for ALL underrepresented groups applying for intern and grad roles, not just women. That's another reason to be proactive and shoulder-tap candidates that you'd like to talk to, don't wait for them to apply!On our web platform, you can filter by your job requirements, or open up the database to search by technical skill.  If there's a skill missing, let us know!But wait, there's more...!

Anonymised Search

For extra awesome search results, we encourage you to try our anonymised search feature, which is our version of "blind" recruitment. You can switch off candidates' personal information and search by skill. We've had FANTASTIC feedback from employers on this feature:

The anon feature... it's amazing.  85% of the people I pick turn out to be women, which tells me they write compelling blurbs that attract me to click their profile"

To anonymise candidate profiles, tick the box in your search view:From here, you can bookmark candidates who sound like they're interesting. You could run these candidates through a test without reviewing any more of their profiles if you like! You'll need to de-anonymise profiles at some point, to invite them for an interview, but we highly encourage you to try the anon search first!

Bias and Barriers

Some organisations expect a certain GPA or visa status or qualification or institution, and some will look closely at the number of bootcamps and SoT events that students have attended. Remember all of these things may be more difficult for people from underrepresented groups to achieve. These things bear NO relationship to their worth and potential as an intern or employee.

Meet & Greet

Students will come and talk to you & your team at Meet & Greet, and that's a great way to get an initial impression. However, remember that not all students can attend our in-person M&G, and not all will shine in this noisy, busy environment. Consider attending our online event to reach out-of-town candidates. But again, some people don't have time available in the evenings. If you see an interesting profile on the website, feel free to reach out to them for a quick chat. This is a great way to find a hidden talent that other employers may not have discovered!