Swedish firm defends 'ladies only' job ad

Article here. Excerpt:

'Malmö start-up Brisk.io, which creates tools for sales organizations, recently advertised two positions within their company. The firm has been on the lookout for a blogger/marketing position and an outbound sales junior role, and stated in the job listings that they had a preference for female candidates.

"The position is in Malmö (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," stated the advert.

At present, Brisk.io employs one woman in its 10-strong workforce. Co-founder and CEO Hampus Jakobsson told The Local that the lack of females in the office had been the motivation for the biased job posting.

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

"However, an employer cannot discriminate on grounds on ethnicity or race as that would illegal."'