[AISWorld] [External] Hiring Professor (Female Only) in Information Systems and Technology Management, UNSW Sydney

[Shailendra Palvia]

I fully agree with everything Dr. Cuellar has said, especially:

“I would hope that in 2022, women would  be fully competitive against men on a straight up basis making such preferences unnecessary.”

…Shailendra

From: Michael Cuellar <mcuellar at georgiasouthern.edu>
Sent: Saturday, June 11, 2022 1:27 PM
To: wombat <c.conway at ieseg.fr>
Cc: Shailendra Palvia <Shailendra.Palvia at liu.edu>; Barney Tan <barney.tan at unsw.edu.au>; aisworld at lists.aisnet.org
Subject: Re: [External] [AISWorld] Hiring Professor (Female Only) in Information Systems and Technology Management, UNSW Sydney

WARNING: This email originated from outside of Long Island University. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. - LIU Information Technology
As someone who has been the victim of age-related discrimination both implicit and explicit in academic hiring,  whose parents were subject to race related discrimination in housing and as someone who also benefitted from racial minority preferences, I have something to say about this subject.

I understand UNSW’s desire to have more women in the faculty. Part of the problems with recruiting women (and minority groups) into the IS field is the fact that faculties don’t have role models for those students among the faculty. It would be better for those students to have people they can look up to on the faculty. However, is the right way to do it by explicitly discriminating against male, trans and non-binary people?

Taking an act consequentialist ethical stance, Wombat calls this explicit discrimination a “moral good”, because it “alleviates the problem” of discrimination against women. However we need to complete the analysis of the consequences. It does make the gender ratio better in the UNSW faculty and can provide roles models for women in their programs. But at what cost? It unjustly injures men, trans and non-binary people who have done nothing against UNSW to merit such exclusion. It also teaches people that we can injure people in pursuit of worthy goals: the end justifies the means. It also means that potentially an otherwise less qualified candidate is hired solely because more qualified candidates are excluded because of an gender requirement.

The counter argument Wombat puts forth is that it strikes a blow against “male privilege” which stacks the deck in favor a male candidates. I understand something of stacked decks. The deck is stacked against older candidates in the USA. All things being equal, faculties will tend to hire younger candidates (in my experience). In Europe, it is explicit, if you are over 45 in certain countries you flat won’t be considered. I have fully felt the sting of that and don’t wish it on anyone else. I agree with Shailendra, " I am for absolutely no discrimination based on gender, age, religion, and so on”.

While I don’t know them, I believe that the UNSW faculty could make an unbiased decision without privileging males in the hiring process. Perhaps Wombat is saying because of male privilege men turn out to be more qualified than women and on a straight qualification basis women would tend not to be selected or that there are insufficient numbers of women who otherwise would wish to apply given competition with men. I would hope that in 2022, women would  be fully competitive against men on a straight up basis making such preferences unnecessary.

That being said, UNSW gets to do things the way that they want. It is, after all, it is their school. I wish they would find a better, more equitable, way to reach their goals.
----------------------------------------------
Michael Cuellar, PhD, PMP
Associate Professor,
Enterprise Systems and Analytics
Georgia Southern University

Parker College of Business
Enterprise Systems and Analytics Department
PO Box 7998
Statesboro, GA  30460-7998
email: mcuellar at georgiasouthern.edu<mailto:mcuellar at georgiasouthern.edu>
phone: (404)-405-4510

Editor-In-Chief Journal of the Southern AIS
Senior Editor, JISE


On Jun 10, 2022, at 11:57 AM, wombat <c.conway at ieseg.fr<mailto:c.conway at ieseg.fr>> wrote:

On 6/10/22 17:36, Shailendra Palvia wrote:

Why ugly head?
Only a person who was ignorant of, or falsely denying the reality of, the built-in discrimination against women in our societies would "just wonder" about the legality.

The rest of us don't care, because someone is doing something active to alleviate the problem, and thus the act is morally good, whether it is "legal" or not. And if you're annoyed because you feel it "isn't fair", then that's male privilege. You are unware of, or unwilling to admit to, the myriad ways that the deck is already stacked in your favor.

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