Women & Feminism in the Technology Realm

Comparing the number of women to men working in the tech field leaves a lot to be desired. Even though women working in the tech industry continue to grow, with a lot of them taking up jobs in systems administration, software development, and business seo service, to name a few, there is still room for improvement.

Taking a rough look at the CEOs of top tech giants across the globe such as Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, and Google’s Sundar Pichai shows how male-dominated the tech world is. Apart from the top bosses, a study across top tech firms revealed that women represent a small percentage. For example, only 20% of Google’s engineers are women.

Questions are being asked about the primary cause of this gender gap in the tech industry. Multiple scientific reports have been published claiming to point out variances in cognitive abilities between male and female. A study in the UK revealed that only a few number of girls selected to learn Computer Science at GCSE level.

Harassment

Even after making it into the male-dominated tech world, women still struggle to make their mark. Women within have claimed to be treated differently than their male counterparts.

A case example is that of Whitney Wolf, a former employee at Tinder. Wolfe filed a lawsuit against Tinder for sexual harassment while she was working for Tinder when it was a startup. This case was a representation of the alpha male stereotype significantly linked with tech startups.

Unfair Treatment

Regarding climbing up the corporate ladder in the tech business, opportunities are hard to come by for women. Several women in the IT industry have claimed that they have been overlooked for top positions, in favor of their male colleagues. This has, of course, led to entry-level female employees hitting a wall regarding career advancement in the tech world.

Work-related Fear

A survey dubbed “The Elephant in the Valley” was carried out in 2015 at Silicon Valley. The main agenda of this study was to view the extensiveness of the gender issue. The interview focused on women with 10 or more years working experience, either in a startup or a big tech company.

From the research, 87% of the women claimed to be victims of demeaning comments from their male counterparts, 47% claimed they had been relegated to perform menial jobs when their male colleagues were not, while another 66% said they were not included or invited to crucial social networking functions.

A surprising revelation was that 99% of the women who took part in the study said they had seen chauvinist behaviors within company premises. 66% of the women surveyed reported sexual advances from senior officers. One-third of the women said that they never felt safe because of these circumstances.

Despite there being a host of programs and initiatives to inspire young women to pursue careers in tech, there is still a lot to be desired. With the insecurities stated above playing a huge role, a large chunk of women quit their careers in tech midway, compared to only 17% of men.

Thanks to Ethan Clark