This news post highlights the importance of International Women’s Day 2023- Women in Technology and Innovation. It explains the key barriers that are contributing to creating and sustaining gender differences in technology and innovation, including the limited market awareness and investment that meet the needs of women. Read further to know more about how women are helping us in building a tech world.
Introduction
The world observes International Women’s Day 2023 on the 8th of march. It is no secret that women are persistently underrepresented in the ranks of technologists. Undeniably, with the scales conventionally tipped towards men, we may not always feel that many of the most remarkable inventions, breakthroughs, and discoveries that have transformed the course of history and formed our understanding of the world were made by women.
8th March is International Women’s Day 2023, and history month. It is an annual celebration of the women who have made history as trailblazers and pioneers. It’s also the perfect time for reflecting on the challenges – and opportunities – that are lying ahead of women in their professional lives today.
Over the world, the numbers show firm, however, slow progress in women’s participation in the tech industry. Considerable discrepancies are coming into notice when looking at individual countries. The percentage of women in the IT workforce is less than 20% in the UK and this figure has not changed in the last decade. The representation of women drops dramatically when looking at senior positions, to just 10%. EU countries are reporting similar numbers. On the other hand, the US has better results. According to self-reported data, women are representing around 24% of the technical workforce at Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Facebook. And the complete number across the tech industry was around 29% in 2020. This is considerable progress from just 8% in 1970 but very slow bearing in mind that fifty years have passed.
Consequently, India is doing comparatively better. Large technology services providers like Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Wipro, or TCS report around 30% of women in their workforce. They have shared plans for increasing the proportion to 45% to 50% by hiring women actively. The percentage of women engineering students is one of the highest in the world, approximately 30%. But the majority of women tech workers are unmarried and below 30, and a large chunk exits the tech industry after just five years of career.
Here’s Some Deep Diving into this Subject: International Women’s Day 2023
Diversity at Work – Research indicates that diversity builds business sense and aids in understanding varied business goals. Organizations with a more diverse workforce and leadership are having better business outcomes, attracting talent more easily, doing better with innovation, and are more probably to make products and services that fit with the market demands.
Fair, Ethical and Inclusive Digital Future – Making sure a better gender balance at the get-go is imperative for ensure that bias is minimized in the foundational algorithms of transformative technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Crypto, Augmented Reality, or the Metaverse. This goes beyond gender and incorporates other forms of diversity like culture, race, age, social background, religion, or sexual orientation. A future created by a small homogeneous group of people could be a very scary prospect, in all honesty.
Tech Jobs, Secure Jobs – Tech profiles are in high demand and most established tech organizations are looking to hire more women in the future to facilitate filling the resource gap and achieve better gender diversity. These are highly-paid jobs that are able to secure women’s financial independence, a major factor in decreasing domestic abuse but also in preventing the pauperization of the family when other sources of income are lost. Over the past two years, the world observed heart-breaking appeals about females being left to fend for themselves and their kids after the unexpected demise of their spouses. In single-parent household it is often a woman who provides for her children and close relatives like parents.
Gender-Neutral Tech Jobs – On this International Women’s Day 2023 observes tech jobs as usually gender-neutral by nature and they are done from the safe atmosphere of the office where intellectual skills matter more than physical strength and where “getting your hands dirty” implies writing code yourself. Moreover, they are also particularly well suited for supporting flexible and remote work, a crucial factor for women who still bear the brunt of elderly care, childcare, and household chores and responsibilities around the world.
Flexibility at Work – Two years of nearly universal work from home in the tech industry have amply shown that flexible work is a viable model, with high productivity levels. Adaptable working hours and less time invested in commuting are powerful enablers of work-life balance if managed properly. Rigid working hours and lack of remote work opportunities were frequently cited by women as reasons to leave a career in tech. Before the Covid 19 pandemic, a number of companies missed out on this retention opportunity, under the misconception that working from home would produce a lack of discipline and poor performance. The perspectives are changing, flexible work is now the new normal, and productivity or performance are no longer in question.
Avoid Stereotypes – We have all grown up in societies with strong gender norms and these are translating into unconscious bias in men and women alike. Unconscious bias is implying that without consciously doing it, we tend to provide fewer opportunities to women based on incorrect assumptions. For instance, we may not suggest the name of a woman with young children for an assignment abroad, presuming that she would not be interested, and without asking her the question. Moreover, training about unconscious basis can be very helpful to facilitate leaders in understanding these dynamics, questioning their own bias, and taking conscious steps for addressing it.
Wrapping Up…
Aeologic Technologies celebrates International Women’s Day 2023. We take into account the importance of gender diversity and inclusion, providing equal opportunities to everyone irrespective of gender. In our organization, women are ready to make a difference in the tech vertical as decision-makers, solution providers, and designers of the future. As we get out of the pandemic and re-invent the workplace, let’s make sure we, as people, create those conditions and attract more women to the tech segment. Everyone will benefit, the industry, the women, and society at large.
