“You must be the person who does all those beautiful designs.”
“No ma’am, this is Jessica. She’ll be the lead developer onyour project,” I said. Jessica and the client shook hands. (Jessica’s name—andthe names of others on the team—are changed here to protect individualprivacy.)
“Oh! I’m terribly sorry. I’ve never met a female programmerbefore. How did you get into that? Was your father a programmer?”
“This is Rustin. He’s going to be your designer,” Iinterrupted.
It would have been embarrassing, had the client’s assumptionnot been so common. Women are designers, men are programmers. This is Texas,after all…
About 10 years ago I was leading a development team of 12 inAustin, Texas. We were a small web development agency within a larger IT firm. Jessicawas one of the few females—and only African-American female—to graduate fromthe University of Texas’ computer science program that year. In fact, Jessicaknew only one other African-American female in the entire program while she wasat the University.
We were meeting a new client who managed marketing for a largechain of pet supply stores in Texas. The project was a large one for us—bringtheir entire inventory online and duplicate on the internet the success theyhad experienced in brick and mortar.
The meeting continued. The goal of the meeting was more orless to transfer the project over to the project team, and get myself “out ofthe loop.” I had sold the project. The contract was signed and the initialpayment made. My job was essentially done.
Perhaps the awkwardness of the initial introductionssensitized me a bit, but I could not help noticing that the client would talkto me and she would talk to Rustin. The client would virtually ignore Winnie, asecond developer assigned to the project and also ignore Jessica— who was to bein charge of her project.
As much as I tried to bring Jessica and Winnie into the conversation—andget myself out—the client continued as if they weren’t in the room. Awkwardnessgrew.
Two days after the meeting, the client canceled the projectand asked for a refund of her deposit.
“I just didn’t have confidence in your team,” the clientexplained.
The experience I described and others in my 20+ year careerhave led me to a few conclusions.
Women are underrepresented in technical fields becausewe’ve made the environment hostile. Unfortunately in a boys’ club, men act likeboys. Incidents of harassment against females in male-dominated techenvironments are embarrassingly common and too frequently dismissed. With fewwomen in the tech fields, a hostile environment has led to many dropping out oftech early to pursue careers in fields where the environment is morecomfortable.
To bring more women into technology, harassment must bedeemed completely unacceptable and dealt with swiftly, professionally, anddecisively. If men don’t know not to give shoulder rubs to work associates,they need to get a job back in 1986 where that type of behavior was largelyignored. No one should have the expectation that women will work in—and stayin—tech as long as these hostile environments exist.
College is not where we should be trying to get girlsinterested in tech. As a society we continue to (for the most part) give girlsa Barbie doll and boys a baseball bat. Societal structures and pressurescontinue to “genderize” fields to society’s disadvantage. We can’t expect womento get to college and all of sudden adopt technology as their discipline ofinterest.
As asociety we can make successful women in tech more visible, providing tech rolemodels for girls. Imagine if you heard about Ursula Burns (chairperson and CEOof Xerox), Ginni Rometty (chairperson and CEO of IBM), and Patricia Russo (ex-CEOof Alcatel/Lucent) as often as we hear about Steve Jobs, Michael Dell, and BillGates. I’ve been interested in computers since third grade because they wereintroduced to me by an older role model. We need to continue to support effortsthat do this for girls today.
The profession is worse off due to the lack of womenand other types of diversity. Game developers have recently caught on to theconcept of casual games. Billions have been made from players tending virtualfields, rescuing virtual royalty, and “Flappy”ing Birds. These games,increasingly played by women and girls, have changed the concept of the videogame industry. Some research in 2014 even indicated that more females areplaying games than males.
How did this entire market get missed? Why was thevideo game industry obsessed with in-depth violent epics, combat, and misogyny?Count the number of female execs in the gaming industry and you might have someclue. Part of the irony is that the (up till now) ignored casual-game categorytends to be more profitable than other categories because the games can bedeveloped by individuals or small teams. Women are largely responsible fordriving the growth of this category.
Societal attitudes and social mores concerning genderare changing and tech will be left behind if we don’t change too. To discussgender with a progressive teenager today is very different than the binarydiscussion we would have had thirty years ago. Discussion includes seeinggender as a continuum and that few are “all boy” or “all girl.” Many teensbelieve that they have the right to pick the pronouns by which others refer tothem. They often describe nontraditional genders, non-genders, and a wholedifferent relationship between gender and sexuality.
Today’s 15-year-oldswill be entering the workforce in seven years or less. They’re not going toconform to gender-based dichotomies. We’ll all have to adapt or get leftbehind.
Solutions must come from cooperation between men and women(and as some would argue—everyone on the spectrum of genders) and not simply asa result of women being more assertive. I have had the opportunity to traindevelopers in India several times. I don’t think anyone would argue that Indiais more egalitarian than the United States—however, 30 to 40 percent of thedevelopers I encountered there were female.
At the risk of stereotyping, I have found Indians to be morepractical in their career choices than Americans. I do remember a conversation withone Indian programmer on a flight from Bangalore to New York. With lots of timeto kill, we began to chat. Asked why she decided to become a programmer sheresponded, “No one told me I couldn’t do it.”
That sounds like agood place to start.
