Mediaproxy’s Erik Otto on diversity, team-building and “securing your future growth”
Recruiting the finest potential talents from the greatest range of backgrounds is really a ‘no-brainer’ when it comes to building a winning team, suggests the CEO of compliance software innovator Mediaproxy
It’s now more than 20 years since Mediaproxy was founded, and since that time we have become a global leader in software-based IP compliance solutions. But although diversity, equity & inclusion (DEI) have assumed a greater industry profile in recent years, they’ve always been important priorities for us. Let me explain why.
It’s my belief that, as a company, you should always foster DEI. For a start, there is a surfeit of evidence to show that diversity brings a wealth of benefits to any team. Just read a few business books or interviews with major company founders or CEOs. Again and again, they will provide examples of how a diverse workforce has increased the range of expertise and influx of new ideas into a business.
By contrast, it’s clear that if you have a workforce where everyone is fundamentally of the same perspective and opinion, it’s very easy to get locked onto a particular pathway and end up becoming resistant to change. As we all know, that can easily be the death-knell of a business, especially one involved in a perpetually-evolving sector like media technology, where nothing ever stays the same for too long.
I’ve always been a firm believer in diversity and inclusion personally, so it’s not been a challenge to bring that emphasis to the way that Mediaproxy is run. At the same time, though, it’s been very satisfying to witness positive changes occurring more generally in the industry and wider world. Just think about the way in which awareness of the Paralympics has developed over the last decade, and the improved profile for people with disabilities in the media. Not only is it evidently long overdue that they have access to the same range of opportunities, it’s also by this kind of inclusion that people who may harbor prejudices can come to realize that they are completely unsubstantiated.
Moreover, in a period where divisions are being fueled again by some areas of politics and social media, the ability to access a wide range of perspectives is really important for the health of society, too.
‘Actively seeking diversity’
As a company we are always on the lookout for new talent, and in fact barely a week goes by without me interviewing a potential recruit. Finding good young engineers is part of the lifeblood of our company, so you absolutely need to reach out to the widest range of backgrounds if you are going to put together the best possible team. We are always actively seeking diversity and I am very proud of what we have achieved at Mediaproxy.
Of course, every company is a work in progress. In particular, I would like for there to be more women on our engineering team. For a long time it was very difficult to find female candidates who were interested in these roles. I am sure this is down in no small part to a failure of the educational system to present engineering as an option to females at school and college. It’s definitely been an issue in Australia, our home country, where access to media technology training as a whole is still much more limited than it needs to be.
That said, I do believe that things are slowly improving, especially on the software development side where there has definitely been a rise in female candidates in the last few years. I hope that, in the future, more prime movers in our field will reach out to schools and colleges to ensure that women perceive media technology not just as a viable career route, but a really exciting and rewarding one, too.
One potential obstacle I see on the horizon concerns the use of AI in recruitment. I am sure many of us have read reports about some of the earlier AI models, which were not trained in a way that is representative of society. My impression is that this is now improving and training models are increasingly based around a fairly level and diverse set of parameters, which is obviously welcome, but it’s something we need to keep watching closely as AI is still developing so rapidly – and sometimes in unpredictable ways.
Ultimately, we are an R&D-driven company. Everything we want to achieve is predicated on maintaining a commitment to innovation, keeping our customers satisfied, and working to add extra features and capabilities that will bring them value. To do that we need the most gifted people, which means reaching out to the largest potential pool of talent. Pursuing diversity and inclusion is therefore a big part of securing your future growth and the only logical pathway for a forward-looking company to take.
