2025 is the year we double down on gender balance at factor10
The fact that all of our consultants are men doesn’t tell the whole story—the results simply don’t reflect the effort. But it does tell us that what we’ve been doing so far hasn’t worked, which is why we decided to try something new. Instead of going at it alone, we’ve brought in a specialist who has done this journey before.
As you can imagine, finding the best people and asking for help is something that resonates with us. When we went looking for an experienced specialist to help us build a more heterogeneous team, people we trust pointed us toward Suzi Edwards-Alexander. And after speaking with her, we are convinced she’s just the right person to help us fix this!
The current political climate in the US regarding inclusivity is changing. It surprises me that initiatives like ours could ever be “out of fashion”. I don’t know much about politics and I certainly won’t pretend to understand fashion. However, after 35+ years in software development consulting, I believe I’ve learned a thing or two about building great teams and delivering value. For us at factor10, this initiative isn’t about politics or fashion. It’s about pure logic. (And, as is so often the case, doing the right thing is aligned with what is humane and ethical.)
You can probably find studies arguing both for and against heterogeneous teams. But from my own experience, having a variety of perspectives helps us deliver more value to our clients. We don’t develop systems in a vacuum—our stakeholders and users are heterogeneous, and our teams should mirror that. If you’ve ever held a strong opinion, only to completely change your mind when someone explains another perspective, you’ll know what I am talking about. If everyone’s the same, there’s a real risk of big areas of ignorance.
The best teams aren’t made up of identical skill sets, they’re built by people who bring different strengths and challenge each other to think in new ways. At factor10, we care a lot about delivering value to our clients and, therefore, aim to improve continuously. This initiative is one way of doing that.
Please have a look at the job advert and get in touch if you think that factor10 might be right for you: factor10 is hiring.
/Jimmy