Do we still need exclusive Women Groups in Tech?
Companies are striving for diverse teams and want to see more women joining the tech industry. Joining is the first step, but we also need to ensure that people have the same opportunities and don’t leave the industry due to frustration and lack of career perspectives.
Let me provide some background to this discussion. When I first joined a local mentoring group for programming woman in Stockholm Sweden, that is organising tech events for female and non-cis gender participants, we had a discussion about the gender distribution during our events. Women are still a minority in the tech industry and our mentoring group wants to provide a place, where we are for once the majority. So, we decided to restrict cis-male participants to ensure that we ALWAYS have the female and non-binary majority during meet-ups.
Why? Because the gender constellation of the group has an effect on its dynamic. Ask your female friends in tech and you will hear ridiculous stories. Especially woman in male-majority teams experience frequently that they are overheard in discussions, “corrected” during presentations, not considered for a leading position over a male candidate, rigorously examined about their skills, questioned about their career choices or requested to take administrative tasks that are untied to a promotion.
Are we oversensitive? No, we have data!
Having more women joining the tech industry is great! It’s an industry that desperately needs board perspectives, but also provides good salaries and career opportunities. We cannot stop with woman joining the industry. They also have to have the chance to stay, to grow and to lead!
Being the only woman in a male-majority can be an advantage since one naturally sticks out. However research shows, that female confidence and leadership aspirations decrease in those male-majority teams because they not only realise themselves that they have less influence in decisions, but also receive less support from the rest of team [1]. Especially token women will have a harder time in being recognised and trusted in their leadership skills, which can have effects throughout their careers, since it’s harder for them to get face time with bosses, decision takers and clients, that might lead to new opportunities and increased reputation [2]. You might think that in female majority teams, women naturally take up the lead. But I have to disappoint you.
It’s not only the female aspirations that have an impact here, it’s male behaviour as well. As Born et al., 2020 state “Men in female-majority teams are the most willing to lead, the most overconfident, the most influential, receive the most votes, and expect this to be the case.” [1]. Guys, with that mindset, there is no place for woman to step up.
We can change this! You and me, whatever gender you identify yourself with, we can break that cycle and to increase the chance to equal opportunities.
What I want all of us to do:
- Call people out. If you see diminishing behaviour, raise your voice and support your colleague.
- Learn about leadership styles and theories. We are in the 21st century, the days of the great mean leading by authority are gone and there are different and more successful ways to lead.
- Check and prevent bias in the recruiting process. Diverse recruiting teams recruit diverse and ensure that recruiters got sufficient training.
- Don’t give out fake leadership positions with no executive power. It’s nice to have a fancy title, but if we don’t have the possibilities to implement our ideas, the title is worth nothing.
- Distribute administrative tasks that tend to end up more on desks of female employees [3].
- Don’t enforce gender stereotypes on the next generation and encourage leadership early on.
To my female peers: Let’s be brave, take more space, dare to lead, have high aspirations and support each other.
Change is happening, but it happens slowly. Societies and cultures don’t change over night.
To conclude my opening question in beginning: “Do we still need exclusive Women Groups in Tech?”. Yes! For now, we still need our exclusive spaces, where we can try out, fail, learn and lead, so that we can take this skills with us into our work lives.
