US enterprise data cloud company Cloudera has just filled its newly created role of Director of Culture & Inclusion. Dominique Hollins, who has founded several diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) organisations in her career, gained the role. Her business experience will no doubt come in useful in delivering the job’s ambitious aims.

Cloudera hires DEI entrepreneur Dominique Hollins

Hollins brings over a decade of professional DE&I experience, focusing on the tech industry, to the position and no doubt stood out from other candidates with her proven entrepreneurial background.

She is the Founder of WĒ360, a D&I-focused consulting business, and co-founder of Our Collective, an organisation that furthers the inclusion and career progression of Black and Latinx professionals in the tech industry. She has also worked for multinational firms, including eBay and Google.

According to a shared statement about the appointment, Hollins will be expected to build and deliver “a global DE&I strategy” to make Cloudera a “more diverse and inclusive organisation.” She will also be required to create measurable objectives throughout the business globally and help bring these goals forward via a series of “educational, professional, and social programmes.”

Speaking on Cloudera’s new appointment, Hollins’ new line-manager, Sarah Shin, Chief Diversity Officer
said: “As a leadership team we are passionate about creating an inclusive and representative workplace for all. We’ve made great progress in the last year, but there is still much that we want to accomplish. Dominique will be invaluable as we enter the next phase of our journey.”

Hollins added: “How we engage Clouderans, the opportunities we provide to our employees, and the support mechanisms we put in place are vital to achieving a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace. When we look outwards to the societies we work in and the communities we serve, it’s clear that driving change has never been more needed or important. Cloudera is truly committed to driving change – together, we’re ready to create the future.”

Diversifying Silicon Valley

Hollins’ appointment is a move in the right direction for Cloudera and the tech sector more broadly in Silicon Valley, which continues to fall short of expectations where diversity and inclusion are concerned.

While the tech community here remains largely white and male-dominated, especially in executive positions, businesses are creating more roles, such as Hollins’, to open up the industry to different types of candidates and prevent obstacles to diversity, such as unconscious hiring bias, from holding back diverse applications.

However, critics have said that simply hiring a D&I head won’t necessarily foster D&I across an organisation. Yet a candidate like Hollins stands out as she not only brings her lived experience as a Black woman in tech to the table, but she is also experienced in delivering business outcomes as a serial entrepreneur.

As her role at Cloudera is based on creating measurable D&I goals for the business to pursue across all levels and throughout the company’s different geographical locations, it’s already more than a titular DEI role, however, only time will tell if these objectives are delivered.