New Book Sheds Light On Three Hiring Challenges Affecting Black Tech Talent
A new book that highlights how Black mid-career technology professionals are being pushed out of the job market has recently been published. The author, veteran career strategist and corporate executive Byron K. Veasey, argues that Black professionals are navigating a hiring market with several structural barriers.
The Triple Barrier
Locked Out: Proven Strategies to Navigate ATS Filters, Overcome Workplace Bias, and Win Senior-Level Roles in a Shifting Job Market for Black Professionals highlights what Veasay calls the Triple Barrier: a combination of algorithmic filtering, human bias, and the systematic dismantling of post-2020 DEI infrastructure that operates against Black professionals at every stage of the hiring process.
“The professionals I work with are not failing because they lack qualifications or effort,” Veasey says in a press release. “They are failing because the system was not designed to see them clearly. This book gives them the blueprint for navigating a process that was built around someone else.”
Black professionals affected by AI and DEI rollbacks
Audit studies documented in the book show that people with Black-sounding names on their resumes will receive 30 to 50% fewer callbacks than identical resumes with white-sounding names. This gap persists even after ATS systems have already screened candidates.
Black workers are also being affected by the anti-DEI wave that has swept across the country. Tracking data show that Black workers accounted for approximately 26 percent of major corporate layoffs in 2023, despite representing just 7% of the tech workforce.
Black women specifically are being affected by both AI and DEI rollbacks. Black Women’s unemployment rate reached 7.3% in 2026, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This group is more likely to be employed in the Department of Education, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development, which have been targeted for cuts by DOGE. Additionally, they have eliminated several DEI roles due to President Trump’s executive orders.
The book also includes a chapter that addresses organizations, including McKinsey Diversity Wins research and team decision-making studies.
“Most diversity conversations focus on moral arguments,” Veasey says. “This chapter speaks in the language organizations actually respond to: competitive risk, talent market positioning, and measurable return on investment.”
Locked Out is available in paperback and Kindle editions on Amazon.
Image: Nathan Aguirre
