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Firm's 'biased to hiring women' job postings aim to fill a void

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MALMO, Sweden, March 5 (UPI) -- The head of a Swedish firm said job advertisements saying the company prefers female candidates stemmed from the company's lack of women.

Hampus Jakobsson, chief executive officer and co-founder of Malmo startup Brisk.io, said the job listings for a blogger/marketing position and an outbound junior sales position were targeted specifically at women because the company currently only has one woman among its 10 workers, TheLocal.se reported Wednesday.

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"The position is in Malmo [Sweden] and you are fluent in English and are proficient with the technical tools. Preferably you are a woman. Yes, we are biased to hiring women for all positions," the job postings state.

"The idea behind the advert[isement] was a collective one. I wouldn't say that it is a policy but a philosophy as we want to create a non-homogeneous work environment," Jakobsson said.

"Men tend to be more T-shaped and less willing to give things a try, whereas women are the opposite," he said. "In general I'd say that women are more tenacious and function better in teams."

A spokesman for the Swedish Equality Ombudsman said a gender bias in a job posting does not violate any laws.

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"When an employer wants to hire a specific person for a job, they need to state that preference in the advert[isement]. In this instance it could be that the company is mainly made up of men and they want it to be more gender balanced," the spokesman said.

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