Troy Carter: Tech should train minority talent like NBA players and start young
Steve Jennings/Getty Images for TechCrunch
There's a diversity problem in tech, and one side of it is the lack of a pipeline. Not enough minorities are entering the tech industry — getting companies to hire them is a second problem.
Contrast that to sports, says Atom Factory president and CEO Troy Carter, and you have to wonder whether the tech industry is taking the wrong approach to recruitment.
Take basketball, for example.
The program has come under fire for working its young athletes too much, but many coaches defend it. For one, the AAU has excelled at creating a system that can elevate kids out of underprivileged circumstances and put them in front of the scouts and college coaches that give them scholarships to a higher education.
More job openings than the NBA
Even with the large organization, years of training, and flashy tournaments, only a few of the talented recruits will ever make a professional career out of it.
"In the NBA, there’s only room for 450 jobs," Carter said. "In tech, it’s exponential."
Yet compare basketball's feeder system to the hodge-podge landscape of tech recruiting. Despite the number of jobs available to skilled and talented programmers, there's not a nationwide program to identify young talent, develop it, sponsor it with big names and scholarships, and lift kids out of unfortunate situations along the way.
There are some programs leading the effort, but they are few and far between. Black Girls Code, a program that offers free weekend workshops and summer programs to girls over seven, is a great example of one that is on the forefront.
Exposure is key to getting more minorities into computer science and developing their skills from a young age, argues Tristan Walker, an African-American entrepreneur who has raised millions for his Bevel shave system and who also spoke on the panel.
"The fact that I didn’t know Silicon Valley existed until I was 24 is a problem," Walker said.
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