Four times I felt discriminated against for being a female developer
I&#x27;m a light skinned male. I&#x27;m also a Choctaw Native American. In my senior year of college in 2004 I applied to dozens of companies. I never got a single response.<p>I decided to try an experiment - I applied to IBM and, for the first time, I selected &quot;Native American&quot; as my ethnicity. Within 24 hours I got an email inviting me to a special, all expenses paid IBM recruiting event held for Native Americans in Albuquerque, New Mexico. They followed up with several phone calls encouraging me to attend.<p>I didn&#x27;t want to go because I felt like the only reason they wanted to talk to me was so they could add another number to their diversity report. My Dad convinced me to go.<p>They had Native American speakers, food, performances and music. It felt so condescending.<p>On day 2 they had hiring managers from dozens of departments. It was like speed dating. One manager asked me &quot;What was it like growing up Native American? Was it hard? Tell me about how hard it was for you.&quot; It felt gross.<p>One hiring manager handed me an offer letter when I sat down. She hadn&#x27;t even spoken a word to me. She told me she had reviewed my resume and that was enough. WTF.<p>I got several offers from that event. I turned them all down.<p>I ended up getting a job at Microsoft. They didn&#x27;t ask me about my race when I applied.