Diversity leads to better products: Apple updated on 'Your Voice' initiative

September 3, 2014

Apple is following up the very public commitment to diversity and inclusivity they made last month with lots of work behind the scenes. Denise Young-Smith, vice president of global human resources, recently updated everyone on the feedback they'd received from the "Your Voice" initiative, sharing comments, motivations, and goals.Mark Gurman posted the contents of the memo on 9to5Mac, including:

You told us where Apple could be doing better. You said that your teams and your managers could do more to be inclusive. This often manifests itself in subtle ways — from the words we choose, to how we hire, to how we engage one another and develop others. We all bring with us a life experience that makes us unique, yet colors how we view others and the world around us. We can all benefit from enhanced awareness of how our actions affect others.

And:

We believe to our core that inclusion inspires our very best innovations. As one of you put it, "Diversity is essential to making sure our products are great for all humanity. When our teams are diverse, we make noticeably better products for the world."

The original report was the easy part. This is the hard work. Apple is among the best in the world at achieving what they set their collective corporate minds to, and Tim Cook's Apple has set it to diversity and inclusivity.

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out over the next few years.