Microsoft has published its most recent workforce numbers, revealing slightly more male and racially diverse figures.
The statistics recorded the current employees based in the United States as of Sept. 30, 2015. Overall, Microsoft's personnel are made up of two-thirds Caucasian, where Asians count up to 29.3 percent, Hispanic/Latino 5.4 percent, African American 3.5 percent, Multi-racial 1.3 percent, American Indian/Alaska Native 0.5 percent and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander 0.3 percent.
On a global scale, the number of women dropped from last year's 29 percent to 26.8 percent, where the number of men this year reached up to 73.1 percent. In total, there are 31,064 female employees and 84,695 males.
This considerable decrease is reportedly the result of the 8,000 layoffs that Microsoft had to make when it bought the Finnish phone maker Nokia for $9 billion.
"Even with this explanation, I want to emphasize that we are not satisfied with where we are today regarding the percentage of women in our workforce. Our senior leaders continue to be deeply committed to doing everything possible to improve these numbers," Gwen Houston, general manager for global diversity and inclusion at Microsoft, says in a blog post.
Satya Nadella, Microsoft's CEO, is dedicated to improving the numbers, promising to bring in a more diverse workforce back in December.
"We are focused on ensuring that Microsoft will be the best place to work for smart, curious people across cultures, genders, ethnicities, and lifestyles. We will make progress every year towards building a more diverse workforce and creating opportunities at every level of the company for all of Microsoft's employees," he told shareholders at the company's annual meeting.
In a bid to get more individuals into the industry, Microsoft pledged $75 million for computer science education in the United States to improve, which could possibly create a conduit of opportunities for every person.
It seems that the best numbers are found in the non-technical positions, where 41.7 percent is made up of females and 58.1 percent males. However, in the technical roles, a huge difference remains, where 16.9 percent are females and 83 percent are males.
Diversifying the workplace proves to be quite a challenge for Microsoft, but the company says it continues to work fervently to fill that tall order.
