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Doug has a post up regarding what some bloggers apparently feeling diversity is. Apparently you are only “different” if:

1. They can’t be male if they are white;
2. You must have five women and five men;
3. You must have at least three non-Americans.

*sigh*

This reminds me of my companys approach to diversity. Only look at the skin color, the sex…or anything else we can check off in a column. We’re diverse!! Because this spreadsheet says so!!!!

Wrong. For all you know those minorities were all raised in the same type of environment that all your whites were raised in. For all you know those females have had a more priveleged upbringing than your males.

It’s a common belief though.

But I did have a ray of hope awhile back. I’m not going to name names, but someone once expressed to me their exasperation with this policy and their view of what diversity SHOULD be.

They way we communicate. They way we think. They way we react to situations. They way we process information. The world views we have. For example, the Meyers-Briggs personality test was fronted as a much better alternative. If you know what type of personality someone has you are much more able to work with them. You know how they approach problems and you are better able to work together even though you view the world through different eyes.

Now you can nitpick all you want about the teachings of Carl Jung (upon whose teachings Meyers-Briggs is based on) all you want. And I’m not necessarily a big fan of his teachings either. But the point is this sounded like a hell of a more sensible approach than simply looking at someone’s skin color and making assumptions about them.

UPDATE: For the record, I have repeatedly tested as an ESTJ in the Meyers-Briggs test. Good descriptions of what that means are here, here and here. And even though I’m skeptical of the test, I have to agree that these descriptions are fairly accurate of me.