Microsoft declines again in percentage of women employees, blames Nokia layoffs

Kit McDonald

Microsoft always tries to pride itself on growing diversity in the field of technology and within its own ranks. However, according to a diversity report for updated as of September 30, 2016, the company’s female employee rate is continuing to fall (via ZDNet).

This is the second year in a row that Microsoft has noted a significant decrease of women in its global workforce. Three years ago, the company had a solid 29% but the Nokia shutdown in Finland left Microsoft with a declining feminine influence. Originally it dropped down to 26.8% and this year it is continuing that decline to 25.8%.

With only a quarter of the company identified as women, Bloomberg Technology does point out that at least Microsoft is having a ‘very modest’ increase of minority individuals. African American employee numbers went up from 0.2% to 3.7% and Hispanic/Latino numbers gained from 0.1% to 5.5% among the workforce.

Gwen Houston, the company’s chief diversity and inclusion officer, assured Bloomberg that the decline in women employees was a temporary setback. According to their interview, women make up 27.7% of new hires since the report. Most of them were hired for technical jobs. Also, 6.6% of them were African American and 7% of them were Hispanic/Latino.