I agree with your "how utilitarian the hiring process is" but be aware that this starts earlier. As a CTO I was wondering how to hire more women for more diversity [1]
because not enough women applied. After going to girls camps, meetups, talking to women with not much success (not due to the women), I asked some female engineers - especially one from Soundcloud, thanks! They told me my job ad is already wrong. This opened my eyes and the world was no longer the same.
It caters to males with: We give you 1,2,3 and want you to have skills 4,5,6. Having having several job ads targetting several audiences helps a lot e.g. fresh from university, senior developers who have seen it all, women, dads who want 9-5.
[1] essenially more diversity results in better ideas and market fit with a tradeoff of less productivity measured in quantity
(These are generalizations as happens with marketing personas [1] - individual targetting with ads would be better, also for real I would spend more than 5 min to create those personas)
Many women are more self-critical than many men. So if you have a huge list of needed skills, women might apply less often. Do write only the really relevant skills, don't copy and past from previous apps. Do not require what can easily be learned (e.g. JS frameworks). Add more about they why of your company, why do you exist? What makes your company really unique? Women might think about maternity, are you especially equipped to handle this? Women - again generalized - be interested in social interactions, how does your company provide them? They might fear sexism, how do you deal with that? Write one ad for this persona.
Students from university are eager to try out the stuff they've learned, they want to learn new stuff and use the shiniest toys. They don't care if working longer. Write one ad for this persona.
35 year old dads have different priorities, and the job might not be their biggest priority to spend time on. So they might prefer 9-5 jobs. Write one ad for this persona.
Senior developers might be older, have seen it all. They've been in the mill of new shiny toys for years, and everything looks the same. Write one ad for this persona.
A bit off topic, but I think the whole "shiny toy" perspective misses a lot. Both junior and senior developers are fundamentally thinking about maximizing the value they get from their employment. The value generally isn't "fun" and "shiny". I suspect that maps somewhat accurately to what a junior developer wants, but mostly because they don't have enough context (yet) to distinguish between "shiny" and "great for my career".
Anyway, the pitch for all of the above is "This job will be great for your career". Describe to junior developers what their next resume will look like. Lists of shiny tech probably work, but honestly think about what a great 3-5 year resume looks like and help them blow that out of the water. Describe to a senior developer how they'll have more agency and autonomy, how they'll be helping steer the organization at a strategic level, etc. A senior developer wants to be working on promising tech, but they need to be able to call shots at the same time. Otherwise, they're just a more experienced associate developer.
Or maybe the job won't be amazing for their career. I guess that's fine, but in that case you should be describing other benefits that make up for that.
All of that goes for all candidates: Male, female, married, single, junior, and senior. "Here's why this will be the best job you can take right now."
Other than the hostile and draining work environment, Pao's biggest complaint was that her employer wasn't giving her the career opportunities she thought she deserved. It wasn't tech but the major differences is what a shot looks like in an investment role versus a development role.
I have seen a local city event going through several iterations of marketing for what is practically the same form of event, and it has been personally very interesting to see how depending on the wording the participants end up being dominated by either women or men.
(Generalizations clause applying), marketing that focused on adventure and competition caused more men than women to sign up. Marketing focus on self improvement and social engagement did the opposite. The data has a low sample size (<10), so take that for what it is.
Were there less than 10 participants in total or less then 10 iterations of the event? In the latter case, the sample size would be much bigger. Every single person deciding whether to go or not provides a data point.
10 iterations. The number of participants was set at maximum 15 women and 15 men, where the first event had 15 men and 4 women and the second event had 15 women and 2 men. I don't recall the exact numbers for the later events, but it was interesting to watch the observed experimentation in the marketing material, and I was there for all but one of the events.
It caters to males with: We give you 1,2,3 and want you to have skills 4,5,6. Having having several job ads targetting several audiences helps a lot e.g. fresh from university, senior developers who have seen it all, women, dads who want 9-5.
[1] essenially more diversity results in better ideas and market fit with a tradeoff of less productivity measured in quantity