All Boys Club?
Boys Club
A recent article is Computing states that :
Less and less women are choosing to work in the IT sector, a move the government body Intellect has called “a worrying decline.”
According to research on behalf of Intellect carried out by e-skills UK, the Sector Skills Council for IT, women now only represent 16 per cent of the total IT UK workforce. The research benchmarked the UK against 33 other countries, including the US, and Australia. It found that the UK came seventh in terms of female representation in the IT sector.
Carrie Hartnell, private sector programme manager at Intellect, said: “The continuing drop in the number of women in the IT industry, though an international phenomenon, continues to have serious and far-reaching implications for the UK economy and can no longer be regarded as just a diversity issue. There are good initiatives, but these have clearly not resulted in the necessary improvements.”
Gillian Arnold, Chair of the Women in IT Forum, added: “Key companies in the sector have stepped up to tackle the inequalities that deter women from entering the IT industry.
“The existing culture perpetuates recruitment of identical candidates, excludes women and ignores their skills. When we have greater progress with these issues, we should see a rise in the retention rates for women within the industry.”
What are the initiatives needed? Should the culture of the indusy change althogether just to accomodate women? Lets step back a bit and wonder why IT is so unwelcoming to women. Is it an industry that was created by men, for men alone? Or are women so unadaptable? Do we geneteically lack the brain capacity to think “IT” ?
More Girls Please « Startup Downunder replied:
[...] The number of women in IT is falling. Are we ultimately destined for a monastic existence? Please don’t let this be true. Quick, someone do something. I will as soon as I level my Druid to 60. [...]
December 3, 2006 at 11:20 am. Permalink.
Martin Wells replied:
Eeek, this is scary. We don’t have enough girls as it is. How will programmers propagate?!
December 3, 2006 at 12:21 pm. Permalink.
dek replied:
Via one of em e-mail, trojan, spam virusy thingys?
December 3, 2006 at 1:26 pm. Permalink.
Jessica replied:
It’s certainly not a lack of brain capacity as that occurs in either sex, I do believe (and this is just a personal opinion) that it does require a way of thinking – mathematical, logical, analytic or whatever you like to call it. If you like stereotypes then this is a more ‘male’ way of thinking, but perhaps more females need to be made aware of this type of brain power and given to opportunity to exercise it, I found it came naturally for me but more and more practice helps. Education is a key factor here of course.
There is a delicate balancing act in trying to encourage girls to try new things out, without being patronising and turning them off further. I was asked a number of times while at University to participate in educational/advertising efforts to encourage more girls to consider studying in IT/Comp Sci areas but on any given day and taking my mood into account I could take it as a compliment and feel good about helping, or perhaps as an insult due to the fact they feel the need to shows me off and say ‘wow bet you never thought a girl could do this!’. I’ll stick with the former and continue to do my best to help where possible.
It’s good to know I’m not the only one concerned here, it’d be nice to have more opportunity for girl chat in the office, and the field in general.
December 4, 2006 at 12:57 am. Permalink.
giwells123 replied:
Thanks for the great comment Jessica, its always good to know that there are others out there.
I totally agree that education is a key factor here, which was why i suggested starting them early in my previous post. Being IT does require a certain mind set, a black and white view of problems, yes or no, on or off. You need to be somewhat “digital”.
It comes naturally to some but not to others. With repeated teaching it becomes easier through the years. So it is probably correct to assume that it can be trained.
December 4, 2006 at 10:00 am. Permalink.