This 'company' is blatantly discriminatory and unnecessary and taints the success of their hires by making it appear they took a shortcut into their positions via their race/sex .
One of the side effects of entrenched racism and sexism is that competent women and minorities tend to be underemployed more than competent white men, and so as the biases are being broken down, you'll see way more women and minorities (compared to the ratios in the general population) being hired or promoted to the right place compared to white men. Out of people who are competent to be senior developers, way more white men than women or minorities already have a good job fit, and in turn, way fewer of them are on the job market or easily poachable.
So the market, as a whole, can be biased in favor of hiring and promoting women and minorities without it being any easier for the individual developer who happens to be a woman or minority.
Not sure. But I don't think it's helping.
Better education for all has been previously mentioned as the ideal solution, and it's the one I stand behind and support.
https://www.reddit.com/comments/3du1qm/
In a few years, I want Jopwell to not exist anymore. Not that I'm rooting for them to fail, but rather that I hope every job site is equally diverse. But for now, we need to be intentional about this.
Most companies hire from within their networks. So, this problem will solve itself eventually, as minorities start bringing their networks of potential hires to companies and the companies start naturally hiring from that new pool. However, it's a chicken-and-egg problem that needs a kick start.