Women in IT 6

[glynis]

It seems that us women are out numbered in the IT Industry.
I also find that the men I work with honestly believe that women couldn't possibly know anything in the IT business and are condescending and chauvanistic.
I believe I can do my job as well as any man.Is this an IT thing or ,just a man thing.
The other point I'd like to make is that womens salaries in the industry are still not on a par with mens--WHY??????

 

[edfair]

Due to an education bias from the beginning of IT. An impression that women aren't as good with math and science.
As far as salary, due to failure of management to recognize the value of employees.
But it also requires the women involved to educate the bosses and to move to another job if their needs aren't met. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

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[gunthnp]

there are not a lot of women who want to be in IT just like there not a lot of women who work on cars, but the women work in IT do there job just as well anyone else. gunthnp
Have you ever woken up and realized you where not alive.

 

[SteveTheGeek]

As far as the salary gap, I don't think it's IT-specific, surveys have noted the difference in all job sectors for decades. I don't have an answer as to why.
-Steve

 

[Notbob]

In some environments it's a self-perpetuating cycle.

I've seen all male environments take a long time to change, despite female candidates being interviewed - and offered jobs - because the candidates have been reluctant to be the only woman on the team.

Nothing to do with a testosterone laden atmosphere, just that people - in general - don't want to stand out and be different.

I've seen the same happen with an all female team having numerous male candidates turn down positions, for fear of being the only man in the office.

Historically there's also been the perspective in education that engineering, hard sciences, mathematics and the like (all the related subjects for computing based disciplines) are more suited to men.

Hopefully we're at the tail end of this trend now, and things will balance out in time.

Regards,

Jon Wilson
Threespot Limited

http://www.threespot.co.uk

 

[elizabeth]

Women and men have been treated differently for thousands of years, and the only reason is -- because we can TELL who is male and female. Humans just love to create stereotypes; it helps them get through the day with less effort. We are not at the tail end of anything. Women's salaries as compared to men's are barely different now than they were when the first studies were popularized int the 1960's and it was determined that for equal work, females received approximately 69 cents on the dollar as compared to males. BTW, that was the reason there was the huge backlash against the way the hippies dressed and wore thier hair in the 60's -- it made it difficult to tell what gender they were. And this led to the popularity of beards among the men, too. But I digress. The real point is, don't worry about being dicriminated against because you're female. People also discriminate based on age, race, religion, physical handicap, emotional handicap, mental handicap, cultural differences, educational background, physical attractiveness, fashion awareness, clothing texuture, pattern and color, and a million other things. Unless you're into social action, all we can do is personally rise above these differences ourselves, and educate others about valuing diversity by becoming living examples of it. Think about this the next time you make a judgement about someone based on their appearance. For me that happens dozens of times per day. It's a big world. By the way, since you have both spelling and grammar errors in your post, glynis, not that I am perfect in those areas either. But I'll add that this may be as much of a handicap to you in the business world as your gender.

 

[butchrecon]

glynis:

Its a man thing. IT as a whole could care less if the employee is male or female. its the men that work in IT that have the issues. Unfortunatly in todays society many men still believe the woman should stay home and raise the kids. Many in the IT industry have issues with knowing a woman knows more or does a better job than them. Women have a harder time becuse men view them differently. You dont see Mikey trying to look down the front of Bobs shirt trying to catch a peek or Rick saying how sexy John looks in that skirt do ya? Men have a hard time not only consentrating around women but also dealing with the fact mentioned above in my post that a WOMAN knows more than he does.

Now before I have every male in the place breathing down my neck, let me say that this is not the case with ALL men. Some of us actually dont care if a person is male or female as long as they can do the job. but alas we are the minority in this group.

James Collins
Field Service Engineer
A+, MCP

email: butchrecon@skyenet.net

Please let us (Tek-tips members) know if the solutions we provide are helpful to you. Not only do they help you but they may help others.

 

[glynis]

Hey,Elizabeth,who's side are you on?I didn't start this thread to be scrutinised on my spelling,and this is not an English exam.
The point I was trying to make is that its about time that more women were encouraged to have careers in IT.Unfortunately,after working in the industry for 24 years I cannot see any improvement.How many women do you know who are the head of IT in a company?
Actually I was surprised at some of the remarks by men.It seems there are some allies out there after all.Thanks guys!

 

[elizabeth]

Glynis, I apologize if I offended you. I'm not on anyone's side, and I think that taking sides is the actual problem. The many women I've met who head an IT company started it themselves. It is apparently much more effective than trying to get someone else to promote you. I find that IT is not more sexist than other businesses; women do not head many non-IT companies either. On the other hand, is the only definition of success running the company? Many females reject the values that are needed to drive one to become wealthy and powerful in this culture. And I think that's OK. I recently read a very interesting book, "Talking 9 to 5" by Debra Tannen, PhD. It gives a lot of examples of how people inadvertantly misunderstand and misinterpret each other based on thier stereotypes, and self perceptions. I guess my point is that developing stereotypes about others (males, IT people, etc.) does not help solve the problem. As I mentioned earlier, the only 2 solutions that I know of are (1) social action and (2) rising above it on a personal level.

 

[Voyager1]

Several interesting points here. The "whose side" from glynis is actually part of the problem - sides.

A couple of observations: I have been working in IT since 1985 and have always maintained that this industry needs to attract more women. I think we are making strides in that direction, but not fast enough.

Women tend to be much more detail-oriented, and much better planners than men - even given the same level of IT expertise. Men, given a task or problem, tend to go straight for the keyboard - I call it "testosterone engineering". This is not always the best way to proceed. Women tend to plan and analyze better. Sure, there are exceptions like in anything else, but this has been my experience.

I've held a number of positions with different companies over the past 15+ years. In at least 2 of these occasions, my direct supervisor has been a woman. These have actually been my favorite jobs.

As for the salary gap - sad but true. Don't have an answer for that one.

So, anyway - hang in there ladies. Keep working as hard as you have been and hopefully the rest of the industry will come around soon.

- Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[monkeylizard]

Time for an pretty un-PC view...

Elizabeth wrote above:
"Women and men have been treated differently for thousands of years, and the only reason is -- because we can TELL who is male and female."

Maybe men and women have been treated differently for thousands of years becasue we ARE different. Bill (Voyager1) points out that women tend to be better at planning and analyzing, while men can tend to be "testosterone engineers."

I'm going to get in touch with my CaveMan side and say that this stems from ancient males having to run down an antelope and beat it in the head. Although I've never had to run down an antelope in the meat aisle of my local grocery store, I do believe that my brain and body chemistry is still designed to do just that (although adapted to modern life).

Since I don't have a CaveWoman side, I can only guess at the inner workings of a woman's mind (my wife can attest to this). I do suspect however, that valuable modern skills that many women posses (communicating, planning, listening, etc) stem from family life in the caves/huts/burrows that ancient CaveWomen once inhabited and cared for with other CaveWomen. I suspect also that CaveMen were bad communicators since those lightning fast antelope would hear Ug and Og if they started chatting too much about which is better, wooden club or mammoth bone club.

On with the discussion and how male/female differences relate to I.T.

It is a proven clinical fact (not just an unpopular opinion of yours truly) that more men than women think in logical patterns and that more women than men think in disjointed emotion driven patterns. (I'd find the links to these studies, but I'm sure any interested parties can find some themeselves)

Because of this, more men than women will be drawn to the I.T. world. As has been mentioned before, the I.T. world is based on science and mathematics...LOGICAL patterns. There are of course exceptions to this generalization (see previous para.). I have known and worked with several female programmers who worked well and wrote excellent code in a very logical format and flow. I have also worked with women that couldn't figure out how to take the cover off of a tools free PC. On the flip side, I've also worked with men that fit both examples above.

Now, since most women will not have an inate desire to participate in mathematics/sciences (take a look at the Male:Female ratio at your local college's advanced math/science programs for proof of this), there will be fewer women than men in fields like I.T.

I'll continue on in another post since this one is getting long...

Monkeylizard
-Isaiah 35-

 

[monkeylizard]

To quote Bill (Voyager1) again:
"So, anyway - hang in there ladies. Keep working as hard as you have been and hopefully the rest of the industry will come around soon."

Ladies, don't get upset about my prior post. I am with Bill on this one. I have actually enjoyed working with and for women who are capable in the I.T. field.

Now, let me give a thought to Glynis about why this chauvanistic attitude has perpetuated in I.T. perhaps more than in most other career fields. I think we need to go back about 30 to 40 years or more. In the early days of computing, it was completely male dominant (as were most professions). Not only was computing dominated by males, but dominated by those males least likely to be able to run down the antelope and win the tribe's prize CaveWoman's attention (well, at least that's how we stupid men THINK we get attention. Again, ask my wife). If you disagree with my statement that they were the least likely candidates, take a look at some old pictures of PaloAlto's HomeBrew club and see how many of them you think were out on hot dates on Friday nights. Let me come right out and say it: Until very recently, I.T. and computing has been a field for nerds and social losers. Yes there were/are exceptions, but hey we can't debate everything.

I beleive that this "nerd bonding" led to an anti-woman sentiment as the rest of the business world moved ahead with women's rights. Not only did these early pioneers in computing have to stick together at work since nobody else (male or female) understood what in the world they were doing, they also had to stick together outside of work since all the CaveWomen were busy feasting on the antelope their CaveMen had brought home. Again, simply furthering the "nerd bond".

Now although these original pioneers for whom I have great admiration professionally are long since retired or are dead, they trained the next generation of computer pros, who are quite imbedded in middle/upper management today.

I believe that we will see more equality (esp. in $$$) as we get more removed from the early generations of computer pros. Kind of like racism in America is becoming less of an issue with each generation, yet still gets passed on to each new generation.

OK, enough ranting and please, no comments on the lengthy posts...slow week in the office. Monkeylizard
-Isaiah 35-

 

[monkeylizard]

Bill, you mentioned 15+ years...are all of these in I.T./D.P.? If so, could you eitrher support or destroy my idea that the chauvanism dies a little with each new generation but still gets passed on in some form? Monkeylizard
-Isaiah 35-

 

[edfair]

I can speak for 40 years, and 100% of the field service people were men at that time, at least in Atlanta. Same for programmers in every place I had reason to have dealings with programmers. There were women machine operators and managers, led in the main by the telephone company. IBM didn't have any women in field service (in Atlanta) until the early 70s. And it was kinda funny because I carried all the tools I needed in a 40 pound tool bag and the women would have to go back to their car to get a hammer if they needed one. So, who do you think took more service calls, and who made more money? The problem there was mis-management by the employer. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

A few years ago I joined a local Council on their HelpDesk. I had just moved, was desperate for work, and knew I was too good for the position (excuse the macho self-inflation, I will pop my bubble later...).

I had been there for a few months, and more than proved my worth, when suddenly a job came up at a high admin level.

I applied, thinking I could use my current position as a lever. Everyone in the department agreed that I should get the job no problem (it's coming...)

But I didn't even get called to interview.

The reason? At the time, I didn't drive. No-one told me that until it was too late, and someone had been appointed. A woman of the same age as myself.

After a lot of asking around, it turned out that HR had excluded me from interview, even though my bosses had asked me to apply. My managers thought I hadn't applied, since they didn't get my application form from HR.

Anyway, I got my driving test, and re-applied, after the managers said that they would create a new post for me at the same level (after I complained a lot to them and HR!!!).

It turned out that the woman I ended up working with was utterly brilliant in many areas in which I lacked knowledge, and I also had useful, technical experience to share with her.

It was one of the most successful and rewarding working relationships I have had to date. Until then, I must admit, I always thought that IT was a male aptitude thing.

From my experiences I can state categorically that it isn't.

I think that any talk of "nerd-bonding", as if it only happens to others, needs to be scrutinised, in case it's actually being perpetuated from within. We may laugh at inexperience, but wait until you (male) meet a female with more experience than yourself.

It's the community that tends to have a strong male streak, not the work. I put this down to the large numbers of males already in the arena, not that IT is essentially a man thing - how so? It shouldn't be exclusive, because, in my experience, women can and do make an important contribution to any IT department - in any role.

 

[Voyager1]

Monkeylizard (I love that...)

I started as a programmer in the early 80s (Clipper - yuk) and moved into networking a little later. I have worked with and for many fine colleagues who happen to be female, and have had little problem in that regard. But you are correct in that there is still a large "good ol' boys club" at work and yes, it seems to be getting smaller. Who knows, perhaps things will reach a bit of equality soon - I hope so.

Interesting thing just occurred to me. I'm currently working in a HUGE IT environment, with NT and Unix as the main systems. The entire NT team here is male, and the entire Unix team (including VP level management) is female! I had never looked at it in those terms - to me we are all teammates, but what's up with the split?

Things that make you go Hmmmmmmm..... - Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[CitrixEngineer]

That IS odd - every UNIX admin I've ever met has not only been male, but tended to share these values;
(see if you recognise anyone you know...)

Beer (real ale, none of your lager)
UNIX
More Beer
Star Trek, The Simpsons, Blues Music
More Beer
Hates users with a passion, and thinks colleagues are incredibly stupid too.
More beer
Complains about long hours and will always have worked longer hours than you ever have. Last Night, in fact.
More Beer
All managers are meddling and stupid and don't know anything about IT.
More Beer
WIFE stands for Washing, Ironing, Feeding, Etc., is something to be avoided if possible and excessively polite to when avoiding is not possible.
More Beer


I've never actually met a female UNIX admin.

 

[Voyager1]

Strangely, sounds like a lot of the developers I know...

Good observations! - Bill

"You can get anything you want out of life, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want" - Zig Ziglar

 

[LesleyW]

Re Unix developers,

You forgot to mention the beard.

 

[edfair]

Or if you remember the unix guy from Dilbert, the suspenders.
And a lot of windows people refer to them as "unix bigots". Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.