Women in Technology

Why diversity matters for your business, and why the lack of women in your company is not a pipeline problem, but rather a result of the culture in IT.

Transcript

1. Women in Technology
2. Yes, I am as tired as you with all the talks about diversity
3. Why diversity really matters?
4. Likelihood of financial performance above national industry mean, by diversity quartile, % https://goo.gl/ssMdUZ
5. https://goo.gl/ssMdUZ
6. Why such results?
7. • More talent available • Strengthen customer orientation • Company image: social responsibility and legal reasons (e.g. UK Equality Act 2010) • …
8. • … • Diverse groups often outperform experts https://goo.gl/QrnsX9
9. https://youtu.be/YJjv_OeiHmo
10. • Diversity increases employee satisfaction
11. In 2015, software engineer Kate Heddleston commented, "Women in tech are the canary in the coal mine. Normally when the canary in the coal mine starts dying you know the environment is toxic and you should get the hell out. Instead, the tech industry is looking at the canary, wondering why it can't breathe, saying "Lean in, canary. Lean in!" When one canary dies they get a new one because getting more canaries is how you fix the lack of canaries, right? Except the problem is that there isn't enough oxygen in the coal mine, not that there are too few canaries." https://goo.gl/yyqMCM
12. “Gosh, you’re imagining someone restricts you from doing something”
13. Using this opportunity to publicly pay my respects to my childhood hero
14. Sofia Kovalevskaya (1850 - 1891)
15. Third+-wave feminism
16. An anti-suffragette poster image from 1908
17. Why there are so few women in tech?
18. "The Computer Girls," 1967 Cosmopolitan magazine article on women working with technology
19. https://goo.gl/gC38HX
21. Gender-biased choice of toys
22. https://goo.gl/bP4TZY Children and gender inequality: evidence from Denmark Henrik Kleven Camille Landais Jakob Egholt Søgaard
23. Terminology Standard terminology for tree structures is taken from the second form of family tree, the lineal chart: Each root is said to be the father of the roots of its subtrees, and the latter are said to be brothers, and they are sons of their father. The root of the entire tree has no father. […] Some authors use the feminine designations “mother, daughter, sister” instead of “father, son, brother”; but for some reason the masculine words seem more professional. Other authors, wishing to promote equality of the sexes use the neutral words “parent, offspring, sibling” instead. D. Knuth “The Art of Computer Programming” 1968
24. Terminology In examples with accounting software the author talks about a female programmer using the pronoun ‘she’. Perhaps this is a consequence of the principle of political correctness. But in the Russian translation this creates certain inconveniences, unlike in English, where the difference is only in the pronoun. And since this is a hypothetical example, I considered possible to replace a hypothetical woman with a hypothetical man. - TN Translation into Russian of Eric Evans’ "Domain-Driven Design”
25. A lot of girls (around 80% of the staff), but they don’t code (fortunately). A company in Moscow is looking for a Senior PHP developer
26. https://goo.gl/HKjYdW Females threatened by social exclusion will reject others first
28. Unconscious bias
29. Reverse discrimination • Paternity leave • Stay-at-home fatherhood • When men have lower income than their wives • Career choice • …
30. What to do?
31. 0. More role models
32. 1. Avoid masculine language and overall pay attention to your job descriptions https://goo.gl/swDHnT Women working at HP applied for a promotion only when they believed they met 100% of the qualifications listed for the job. Men were happy to apply when they thought they could meet 60% of the job requirements.
33. 2. When hiring remember that the candidate’s previous employer might have been biased
34. 3. Parental leave and flexible work
35. 4. Pay gap (women are as likely as men to ask for a raise, but less likely to get it, source: https://goo.gl/umXzzF)
36. 5. Inclusive environment: • Team players • Mentorship (women are 24% less likely than men to get advice from senior leaders, source: womenintheworkplace.com) • Feedback and support from managers (average: women are 18% less likely to get promoted to manager, source: womenintheworkplace.com) • Promote people based on both technical and people skills • Reminding people about possible biases at key moments • …
37. 6. Company image
38. 6. Company image. Case study https://www.facebook.com/groups/pz.zntu/
39. 6. Company image. Case study
40. 6. Company image. Case study
41. 6. Company image => Female/ally candidate is biased.
42. 7. Don’t bother hiring women if you won’t do what it takes to keep them (80% of women who plan to leave their company in the next two years intend to stay in the workforce, source: womenintheworkplace.com)
43. 8. Allies, we need you!
44. Any other ideas?