In the introductory post for Women in Technology week over at SQL University, Jen McCown (Blog | @MidnightDBA) asks some good questions, which I’ve reprinted here and will attempt to answer. I do want to state that I think that there are too many factors to consider when determining the cause-and-effect of social interaction in such an area of conversation. I’m not saying that it isn’t possible to write a book or a lengthy term paper, because many people have done just that, but that the space given within a blog post is limited. As such, I’m certain that many of my answers will only be more questions for consideration.

Jen’s questions were as follows:

• There are many more men in technology than women. Why? What are the issues around the decline in numbers?
• How do these numbers hurt the industry? How will more women in technology improve the industry?
• How can we make technology a more viable career for women?

Men vs. Women

Fun fact time: I’m 26 years old. I know, I know: I’m a baby still. Interestingly, while my license says 26, I often feel as though I’m 62. Physical versus mental age aside, I disclosed to make my next point: while my generation isn’t the first to be able to buck gender roles, it’s something that we’ve not had to deal with at all. My mother, whose age I will not disclose, had many career paths that she hoped to explore as she came to graduate high school. But her advisor pushed her towards secretarial work. She was told that the other options weren’t really options.

This kind of talk is surprising to many in my generation because we’ve never dealt with it. Who knows why she was pushed to become a secretary: it could have been purely a gender thing. Maybe it was a socio-economic thing as her family lived in a lower-middle class neighborhood that was on it’s way from bad to worse. Maybe it was just a crappy advisor at a public school. But a good portion of her life’s energy was spent in this direction because she didn’t feel as though she had other options. Those options weren’t being presented and were off the table.

Flash forward to my college days: anyone, man or woman, could take any class provided one had the prerequisites. And intererstingly still, there were more women in the Literature courses and more men in the Computer courses. We claim to be beyond gender roles and so I can only wonder why this occurred. I don’t think that we’ve run into the same junk from our advisors. I’ve never been told to become a doctor or a construction worker or a football player or any other type of job that were once associated as masculine. I’ve always been told to find a job doing what I want to do.

If we all did what we love, would the numbers be any different? While it’s politically correct to ignore all differences between the genders, the fact of the matter is that men and women are different. We’re different biologically. We’re different psycologically. But that isn’t to say that equality is impossible or that gender roles are absolute. While I think the talk about groups can be interesting, the real focus ought to lie on the individual.

The Industry

Do a lack of women hurt the tech industry? Does more men help it? Should the tech industry be concerned with the gender of its personnel? Personally I don’t think it matters. Ideas are what ought to count. When we begin to question whether or not certain numbers are helpful or hurtful of the industry, I don’t think we’re talking simply about men versus women, but rather the traits and qualities that are associated with each gender. Remember: in an equal society where we’re free to make our own choices in regards to our career, it shouldn’t matter if there are more men or more women in any given field as long as each person made that choice of their own volition.

Once we begin talking about specific traits, however, we run into the gender roles wall and political correctness again. The only way to ensure that we can get past that wall is by looking at individuals and not at genders. That’s why there are so many blog posts about professional development and working on soft skills. I think it’s that we admit to working in different ways on a base level. As individuals, someone may be more patient and caring, and someone else may be a good communicator, and someone else might have the talent to manage and nurture others into greater roles. And yet we’re all working on these skills ourselves, not seeing them as gender-based, biologically driven attributes, but simply as skills. The fact that there are people in the industry working on these kinds of skills and regarding them as gender-beyond is more important than simple stacks of gals and guys.

Technology is Viable

Again, I don’t think the question is how can we make technology a more viable career for women. I think anyone that has his or her eyes open can see that technology is growing at breakneck pace within our society and all over the world. And for the time being, these machines that run our lives are going to need support. Besides, what isn’t viable about technology? The jobs tend to pay a bit more because it’s specialized skills, the professional development is always going to be interesting because technology evolves all the time, and we always seem to get the cool toys before the rest of the world. These are gender neutral qualities.

The honest question is how do we make technology more appealing for women. What is that thing to help the number rebound and begin to grow again. But I’ll ask again: does that ratio matter in an equal society? Where I work three of the thirteen IT position are filled by women. I know that in other work environments that ratio is more stark. But these are just numbers and numbers can be misleading. I would ask other questions instead.

Real Questions

I think that if we can move beyond gender, there are real problems that can be raised for discussion. One such problem is access to work in technology. I’ve always wanted to work in IT, but heretofore I’ve not had the access. It seems that even most junior positions require two to three years experience, and that’s always been funny to me. Aren’t I applying for a junior position so I can get the experience, you jerks? And while some joke that recruiters don’t always actually mean what they write in job descriptions, I would posit that not everyone has the tenacity to go after positions regardless.

Another biggie is opportunity to work in technology. My mother didn’t work in technology because it wasn’t presented as an opportunity. But there are other issues in regards to opportunity, such as timing. Maybe someone wants to work in technology, but the market is currently down and no one is hiring IT staff. That person will desperately find work anywhere and maybe he or she won’t come back around to fulfill that IT dream. Or maybe it has to do with location: I’d like to think there are more opportunities in Seattle, Washington, than Ipswich, South Dakota. Or perhaps it’s an economic reason, such as not being able to afford a computer and softwear, or the tuition for a tech school, or any school at all.

Namely, what can we do to foster those individuals that want to work with technology regardless of their gender? How can we help them get into and pay for school? How can we help them make the right professional contacts? As Jen said, and I believe as well, we’re on the precipice of overcoming gender inequality. But this last bit isn’t going to come any quicker or any easier than the rest that has come before. We will need leaders and examples to continue to blaze that path. But as long as we’re admitting to near equality, we can’t allow for the conversation to stop there. We must talk about how we can ensure that we draw the best candidates to careers in technology and we need to be able to foster that growth in our children when we see that first spark.

It’s part of the American mythology that any child can grow up to be president. Can anyone grow up to be an IT professional?