http://www.techpageone.com/business/stud...dGf4ZyPx2E
First comment slams the entire field, says don't go into it.
Other comments are by women lamenting poor management and being shunned.
One female warns of foreigners from male dominated cultures making things worse.
One called io has this:
Interesting replies above, and when I was younger, I used to assign blame to the factors mentioned above as well. Now, I have more perspective. There is actually an influx of young female talent every year in high tech, but their ranks thin out quickly. Many either head towards management, or simply look somewhere else. After being subjected to the biases the PP mentioned, those women who managed to forge ahead, will at some point start a family. Chances are, they will have found a great spouse, someone responsible, bright and with an equally sparkling career. Problem. In many STEM jobs, the salaries are sufficient to support a family on a single income. Many folks in the industry are men, with home maker wives. They can afford to stay late and sometimes skip vacations. They can also demand the same from their employees. The problem for many women is that a family cannot survive with two parents away from home for 10 hours a day each. And since the father usually makes more (usual pay bias), it’s easy to fall into the more traditional roles after a few heroic years of effort.
Notice how there are hardly any principal software engineers that are women? By the time their skills reached that level, other obligations started to apply the pressure. And high tech jobs are unforgiving.
So if you want to see more women in STEM career, the machismo of over-scheduled projects has got to stop. It’s not a matter of brains or even of education. The fact is, there are not enough mid-career choices for the women who currently train for STEM careers. Why would I encourage my daughter to follow such a narrowly focused education when I know that her career choices down the line will dwindle to a trickle?
This is not about giving omen a pass and a shorter day. It’s about distributing work evenly, so that both women AND men can attend that band concert after school, and creating a culture where such activities do not jeopardize your reputation and career.
First comment slams the entire field, says don't go into it.
Other comments are by women lamenting poor management and being shunned.
One female warns of foreigners from male dominated cultures making things worse.
One called io has this:
Interesting replies above, and when I was younger, I used to assign blame to the factors mentioned above as well. Now, I have more perspective. There is actually an influx of young female talent every year in high tech, but their ranks thin out quickly. Many either head towards management, or simply look somewhere else. After being subjected to the biases the PP mentioned, those women who managed to forge ahead, will at some point start a family. Chances are, they will have found a great spouse, someone responsible, bright and with an equally sparkling career. Problem. In many STEM jobs, the salaries are sufficient to support a family on a single income. Many folks in the industry are men, with home maker wives. They can afford to stay late and sometimes skip vacations. They can also demand the same from their employees. The problem for many women is that a family cannot survive with two parents away from home for 10 hours a day each. And since the father usually makes more (usual pay bias), it’s easy to fall into the more traditional roles after a few heroic years of effort.
Notice how there are hardly any principal software engineers that are women? By the time their skills reached that level, other obligations started to apply the pressure. And high tech jobs are unforgiving.
So if you want to see more women in STEM career, the machismo of over-scheduled projects has got to stop. It’s not a matter of brains or even of education. The fact is, there are not enough mid-career choices for the women who currently train for STEM careers. Why would I encourage my daughter to follow such a narrowly focused education when I know that her career choices down the line will dwindle to a trickle?
This is not about giving omen a pass and a shorter day. It’s about distributing work evenly, so that both women AND men can attend that band concert after school, and creating a culture where such activities do not jeopardize your reputation and career.
