# IT and the gender divide



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

as part of my teaching course i've been asked to look at inequality in my subject specialism an for me the fist thing that sprung to mind  is  the gender balance in IT classes.

on the course i teach in web design  the  classes are male dominated  with usually 80% or more of the students being male  and  we often have classes that are all male.  

my experience  at lambeth college  has been the same  and looking back on my own experiences  when i was at college  out of a class of 40 there was not a single female.

Uni was a bit better  but it was still the case than  most of the students were male.

i'm wondering what  causes this.  are the more techy subjects still seen  as a prodomanatly male domain.  do  women feel  excluded from  the subject?


i probably should have a chat with my mother who  ran  plumbing workshops for women  but she's on holiday.


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

Funnily enough, where I work about 20% of the developers are female, although one place I worked it was more like 70%.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

i would have though that  with the onset of home computing IT  would have become more gender neutral.  but maybe  the  more techy aspects of it  are still seen as having  a geeky aura   and i guess   the geek archetype is male


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

It's not easy to select subjects that none of your friends are doing, you have no role models for, you know you will be an outsider in and you know you will have to face both implicit and explicit discrimination and prejudice whilst doing.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

the no role models thing i kinda get  but it's a curious  question.  who are the male role models?  etc

as context  the course i teach on is jobcentre funded.  all students are passed along to us  via the job centre  so perhaps  hat is also an influence  as i don't know the breakdown of  JC stats


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> the no role models thing i kinda get  but it's a curious  question.  who are the male role models?  etc



Males don't really need role models since they already know they are going into something deemed acceptable for males.  They know all their peers will be male, their bosses will be male, nobody will look at them funny for doing the job and nobody will judge them for being male.


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## girasol (Apr 15, 2011)

.


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## magneze (Apr 15, 2011)

Do people really look at women in IT funny or judge them? I don't but then again I'm a programmer and also married to one.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

magneze said:


> Do people really look at women in IT funny or judge them? I don't but then again I'm a programmer and also married to one.


 
Some are explicit in their misogyny, some are implicit.  Some are just geeky everlasting bachelors who look at women like they are a separate species and make objectifying references that would make female colleagues uncomfortable.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

this is sorta taking for granted that IT is seen as being male...  i'm kinda curious why


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> this is sorta taking for granted that IT is seen as being male...  i'm kinda curious why


 
Because it is.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Some are explicit in their misogyny, some are implicit.  Some are just geeky everlasting bachelors who look at women like they are a separate species and make objectifying references that would make female colleagues uncomfortable.


 
but this would  be  what people  experiance  not the  perception of  the  area  right?


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Males don't really need role models since they already know they are going into something deemed acceptable for males.  They know all their peers will be male, their bosses will be male, nobody will look at them funny for doing the job and nobody will judge them for being male.


 
I don't think this is true.  Look at how many blokes end up on childcare course for example.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Because it is.


 
well thank you for that insightful comment


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

as an interesting counter balance i've noted that   the  law courses  were  all female.  does this mean  that law is seen as being female dominated? or  is  there  some other  diffrence reason  perhaps  about  what type  of work might be expected on the course perhaps


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

magneze said:


> Do people really look at women in IT funny or judge them? I don't but then again I'm a programmer and also married to one.


 
I'd say not, but I'm also in the biz.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

rather than  weather it actually  does happen  it's  more a question if  people think it might happen.

that's  why i was  curious about it's perception


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## FridgeMagnet (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> well thank you for that insightful comment


 
But it *is* though. It's a very male-dominated field with a lot of implicit and explicit prejudice, particularly as you go more into technical coding, and it is accurately perceived as being so.


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## girasol (Apr 15, 2011)

Sometimes it does feel like a boys only club...  Our team is a bit fluid, and lots of remote working, but at the moment I'm the only woman in it.  The other one has just left.  But I never really had a problem working with men, it's pretty ok most of the time.

When I first started a few years ago, I found out they had a rating system for the women in the office... All I could think was 'grow up', everyone was in their mid-twenties.  Now everyone is older and have had babies, different atmosphere.  I have been working with some of them for 10 years now 

I never really experienced any direct misogyny or discrimination, can't think of any incidents.  We all used to socialise together a lot, but now we don't.

I'd encourage more women to come into the industry, the job is interesting, the pay is good.  The only things that kills it is 'process' and wankers who don't know what they are doing, but that's the same everywhere.

p.s. I work with Java and web development - C++ is populated solely by men in our office.


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

FridgeMagnet said:


> But it *is* though. It's a very male-dominated field with a lot of implicit and explicit prejudice, particularly as you go more into technical coding, and it is accurately perceived as being so.


 
I really think it depends on the workplace.  Some might be like that, but by no means all.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> but this would  be  what people  experiance  not the  perception of  the  area  right?



Experiences and perception of experiences are deeply related though.



fractionMan said:


> I don't think this is true.  Look at how many blokes end up on childcare course for example.


 
Sorry, what are you saying?  That not many blokes are on childcare courses?  Well, yes -- that's why men would need role models in childcare and women wouldn't.  The situation would be reversed.



Shippou-Sensei said:


> well thank you for that insightful comment


 
It's the case though.  For various historical reasons, including what was traditionally seen as male work and an historic subjugation of women, we ended up in the situation we are in.  At this point, it is what it is because it is.  It perpetuates itself.



Shippou-Sensei said:


> as an interesting counter balance i've noted that   the  law courses  were  all female.  does this mean  that law is seen as being female dominated? or  is  there  some other  diffrence reason  perhaps  about  what type  of work might be expected on the course perhaps


 
I think that's just your law courses.  In my experience, law is quite evenly balanced at the junior level.  And I deal with lawyers a _lot_, so my experience is quite extensive.  At the senior level, like most professions, it is male-dominated though.


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## joustmaster (Apr 15, 2011)

out of the 40 technical people in our office there is one lady. 

I actually only remember there being 3 women on my uni degree course. There were a few that came in for the odd module as part of other courses, but only maybe 3 on the actual course.


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Sorry, what are you saying?  That not many blokes are on childcare courses?  Well, yes -- that's why men would need role models in childcare and women wouldn't.  The situation would be reversed.



I misinterpreted your point.  I thought you were trying to say blokes don't need role models to do stuff full stop.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> I really think it depends on the workplace.  Some might be like that, but by no means all.


 
Don't underestimate the impact of this kind of low-grade insidious misogyny and the effect it has on women's willingness to enter the profession:



girasol said:


> When I first started a few years ago, I found out they had a rating system for the women in the office... All I could think was 'grow up', everyone was in their mid-twenties.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

FridgeMagnet said:


> But it *is* though. It's a very male-dominated field with a lot of implicit and explicit prejudice, particularly as you go more into technical coding, and it is accurately perceived as being so.


 
yes  from the inside  you can  say that   but  i'm trying to get  the  idea  about how it looks from the outside.

see the coure i teach is meant  for  anybody   not   specifically IT people   it's going to be taken  by people  with no experiance of the IT world    so  i kinda need  external perspectives


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> I misinterpreted your point.  I thought you were trying to say blokes don't need role models to do stuff full stop.


 
Ah, no.  No, the point is that role models are needed to encourage people to do things in which they will be an outsider.  If they are the norm, the role model won't be so important.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> yes  from the inside  you can  say that   but  i'm trying to get  the  idea  about how it looks from the outside.


 
I don't understand why you think that IT is such a closed shop that experiences from inside it won't leak to perceptions from the outside?


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## girasol (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Don't underestimate the impact of this kind of low-grade insidious misogyny and the effect it has on women's willingness to enter the profession:



I don't think this kind of crap only happens in IT, and that's not the kind of thing that would put me off working somewhere - I think most women can handle this?  I worked in more sexually charged places (admin work), and I found that more annoying.

We need more positive role models of women working in IT and I'm one of them   I know other women working in the field and they all have good careers out of it.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 15, 2011)

kabbes said:


> I don't understand why you think that IT is such a closed shop that experiences from inside it won't leak to perceptions from the outside?


 
i didn't go as far as that  i just feel  that seems  like  a full answer  

i was  wondering if it   was more to do with a general stereotype  than  an active fear of discrimination


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

girasol said:


> I don't think this kind of crap only happens in IT, and that's not the kind of thing that would put me off working somewhere - I think most women can handle this?  I worked in more sexually charged places (admin work), and I found that more annoying.


 
Yes, I agree that it happens too much in all workplaces.  Nevertheless, because IT has a very high proportion of young males -- and young _geeky_ males, at that -- it is inevitably more prone to it.


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

girasol said:


> I don't think this kind of crap only happens in IT, and that's not the kind of thing that would put me off working somewhere - I think most women can handle this?



Would anyone say working in a pub, shop or restaurant is male dominated?  I doubt it.  It's wrong, but that kind of shit goes on there too.

(saying that, chefing seems very male dominated now I think about it)



kabbes said:


> Yes, I agree that it happens too much in all workplaces.  Nevertheless, because IT has a very high proportion of young males -- and young _geeky_ males, at that -- it is inevitably more prone to it.


 
Anywhere you find young males, you find them rating the women around them


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> i didn't go as far as that  i just feel  that seems  like  a full answer
> 
> i was  wondering if it   was more to do with a general stereotype  than  an active fear of discrimination


 
I gave a host of issues, though.  You've concentrated on a few of them.


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## girasol (Apr 15, 2011)

Also women get a lot more sexist bullshit working in the services industry, to be fair.

I mean harrassment, ogling, etc

The reason more women don't go into IT is the same reason they don't go into maths, engineering - we're not encouraged to do so.


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## sensible_shoes (Apr 15, 2011)

There are around 100 employees at my work, and I'd hazard a guess that roughly 75% of us are technical. Out of this group only four of us are female, although I've certainly never felt my gender to be an issue here, nor felt any different to my male colleagues. However, working as an analyst/programmer at my previous employer (a very large mobile phone company), I had a couple of stupid comments. Each time these were made by men who seemed to have a chip on their shoulders about a "girl" or a "bird" having a more technical job then they did. 

I have no idea why there is such a huge gender gap in IT though, especially as plenty of women played an important part in computing's history (Ada Lovelace, Grace Hopper, the women who worked at Bletchley Park and Hedy Lamarr to think of just a few)


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## miss minnie (Apr 15, 2011)

I started as a trainee and in my first two companies (spanning five years) it was 50:50 male/female programmers.  All of the senior project managers in those companies were female and did the hiring.  The ones I knew were fab, came from the days of punch cards working for British breweries and newsagents etc..

Every job I've had since 1995 I have been one of the very few women in a tech role, usually the only one.

I have met quite a few women who have been pushed out of tech roles.  A favourite one that we have to fight is managers doing appraisals and wanting us to move into 'soft skill' roles.  Good techie women who are pushed into training and documentation, often because the guys won't do it and the women are shown a glass ceiling in the dev department.

Can't remember how many companies put my desk at the door of the development department (as recently as 2004) where I had to sign for parcels and people would leave their coffee cups.  My desk phone number would sometimes crop up in the company phone books as the receptionist. /sigh


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## Ivana Nap (Apr 15, 2011)

During my career I've found that far more women work in technical roles in software house environments then in end user IT departments, I'm not sure why this is though.


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## girasol (Apr 15, 2011)

Ivana Nap said:


> During my career I've found that far more women work in technical roles in software house environments then in end user IT departments, I'm not sure why this is though.



This I have also observed.  Never met a woman in IT support/hardware.


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## Ivana Nap (Apr 15, 2011)

girasol said:


> This I have also observed.  Never met a woman in IT support/hardware.


 
My sister does IT support/hardware, however she works in a school and the pay grade isn't much better then a teaching assistant


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## fractionMan (Apr 15, 2011)

girasol said:


> This I have also observed.  Never met a woman in IT support/hardware.


 
Really?  Half our support team (including the team leader) are female where I work.


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## Ivana Nap (Apr 15, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> Really?  Half our support team (including the team leader) are female where I work.


 
That is unusual, what's the industry?


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## hiccup (Apr 15, 2011)

Based entirely on personal experience, there seem to be more women in IT in the civil service than in the private sector. The (civil service) web team I work on is 2/3 female, including all the managers. The DB admin, IT support and sys dev teams are all at least 1/3 female. More like 1/2 for the first two actually.


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## spanglechick (Apr 15, 2011)

girasol said:


> Also women get a lot more sexist bullshit working in the services industry, to be fair.
> 
> I mean harrassment, ogling, etc
> *
> The reason more women don't go into IT is the same reason they don't go into maths, engineering - we're not encouraged to do so.*


There may be some truth in that, but girls now *are* actively encouraged to go into scientific and technical subjects, and they still choose not to. Not only because IT puts them off, but because there are other things they want to do more. 

You've a whole lifetime of cultural reinforcement that what's fun and positive for a girl to do is things like art and design and on the other side, health and social care (the far and away most popular option subject at gcse and 6th form age at my girls' school).  Even when you have very high achievers, the girls are overwhelmingly more interested in law than medicine... not because medicine is especially offputting, but because law appeals - it appears to be about communication and language, and the girls enjoy that.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

We have a difficult-to-count army of hardcore IT support staff.  I would guess somewhere between six and ten.  One of them is a woman.


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## kabbes (Apr 15, 2011)

spanglechick said:


> There may be some truth in that, but girls now *are* actively encouraged to go into scientific and technical subjects, and they still choose not to. Not only because IT puts them off, but because there are other things they want to do more.
> 
> You've a whole lifetime of cultural reinforcement that what's fun and positive for a girl to do is things like art and design and on the other side, health and social care (the far and away most popular option subject at gcse and 6th form age at my girls' school).  Even when you have very high achievers, the girls are overwhelmingly more interested in law than medicine... not because medicine is especially offputting, but because law appeals - it appears to be about communication and language, and the girls enjoy that.


 
Don't underestimate peer appeal, though.  People tend to have a preference for things that their peer group are also doing.  If none of your friends are doing maths, there is a subconscious (as well as possibly a conscious) tendency for you to reject maths too.


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## Sue (Apr 16, 2011)

I think a lot of it is to do with parents as well, probably more so than schools. Knew a number of girls at school who ended up doing biology rather than physics because their parents thought it was a 'boy's' subject.

Most of the women I studied engineering with had a parent who was a scientist/engineer who therefore thought it was prerfectly normal when their daughter wanted to do physics at school and go on to study something techy.


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## wtfftw (Apr 16, 2011)

certainly when I was at uni nearly a decade a ago I was one of about two women in a room of over 100 studying computing.

(parents from physics and maths backgrounds).


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## stuff_it (Apr 16, 2011)

They see me coding, they hatin...


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## Quartz (Apr 16, 2011)

The gender divide in IT seems pretty interesting to me: IME most technicians seem to be male (but with at least one female on every team) but most junior managers female. And senior managers are more often male, but not by much.


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## Gavin Bl (Apr 17, 2011)

this is an interesting thread - I've spent about 17 years largely in the IT shops of big financial institutions - and they are heavily male, but as Quartz says there is often a sizeable female presence in junior/middle management. There is sporadic ridiculous sexism, but it doesn't seem to be overwhelming - but that very male thing of having to be right, does fit absolutely with that very intolerant scorn you get from techies, about being right about something. But as others have suggested, I think by the time you get to a job in IT, a long line of structural influences have driven an entry group that will be largely male.

Since working as a contractor, I've got pulled more into change management roles, and they seem to be much more heavily female - I'm guessing this is due to promotions from the customer services/general business environment.


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## N_igma (Apr 17, 2011)

Bill gates is male. End of debate...


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## Johnny Canuck3 (Apr 17, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> as part of my teaching course i've been asked to look at inequality in my subject specialism an for me the fist thing that sprung to mind  is  the gender balance in IT classes.
> 
> on the course i teach in web design  the  classes are male dominated  with usually 80% or more of the students being male  and  we often have classes that are all male.
> 
> ...



Math


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

Gavin Bl said:


> this is an interesting thread - I've spent about 17 years largely in the IT shops of big financial institutions - and they are heavily male, but as Quartz says there is often a sizeable female presence in junior/middle management. There is sporadic ridiculous sexism, but it doesn't seem to be overwhelming - but that very male thing of having to be right, does fit absolutely with that very intolerant scorn you get from techies, about being right about something.


"Sexism" means different things to different people and while these days a lot of people can recognise overtly sexist behaviour and situations there is an entire other level of 'hidden' sexism that goes undetected by many.  Language, gestures, some of our most innate behaviours have been sculpted in a world that values men and women differently.  Women are as much affected by it as men.  I mentioned earlier in the thread that in one company my number appeared in the phone book as the IT dept receptionist, I later discovered that the CEO's female PA was responsible for that.  When she walked through the IT dept she would see only one female at a desk and assume that she must be the receptionist.


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## Gavin Bl (Apr 17, 2011)

Yes I agree, minnie, meant more that I don't think it is particularly sexist in IT environments - compared to other workplaces that I've been in.


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

Gavin Bl said:


> Yes I agree, minnie, meant more that I don't think it is particularly sexist in IT environments - compared to other workplaces that I've been in.


Yeah, you're probably right about that.  Having only ever worked in IT as a "proper job" (other than a bit of bar work etc. when young) I have nothing else to compare it with.

Not sure what you meant by 'There is sporadic ridiculous sexism, but it doesn't seem to be overwhelming' though.  I found that small bouts of overt sexism are quite easy to deal with, its that daily, grinding, 'institutionalised' sexism that did me in.


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## Gavin Bl (Apr 17, 2011)

I guess that being a guy means I don't really get, or feel the wear, of the low-level stuff. 

The 'ridiculous sexism' is to be honest what I have heard 'between men' - and largely revolves around women not understanding technology, being unsuitable for pressured project deliveries, and so on - nonsense caveman stuff. Most often to be heard if there are a number of women in leadership positions - so any failure or problems in the delivery are attributed to the absence of a Y chromosome. 

Strangely, fiascos in all male teams are not attributed to gender...

That said, to be fair, where women I've met are very strong performers - they are usually given credit for that, even by the more sexist guys. Being perceived as someone who can cut it technically, seems to knock alot of this stuff on the head - at least from a male perspective. Though it doesn't address general boorishness, and so on.


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

Gavin Bl said:


> Strangely, fiascos in all male teams are not attributed to gender...


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## stuff_it (Apr 17, 2011)

Johnny Canuck3 said:


> Math


 
That and we can only get to work on the bus due to lack of driving skillz....


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## Sue (Apr 17, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> "Sexism" means different things to different people and while these days a lot of people can recognise overtly sexist behaviour and situations there is an entire other level of 'hidden' sexism that goes undetected by many.  Language, gestures, some of our most innate behaviours have been sculpted in a world that values men and women differently.  Women are as much affected by it as men.  I mentioned earlier in the thread that in one company my number appeared in the phone book as the IT dept receptionist, I later discovered that the CEO's female PA was responsible for that.  When she walked through the IT dept she would see only one female at a desk and assume that she must be the receptionist.


 
Worked in a small software house once where the only women were me, the support manager and the receptionist. Was asked by the receptionist if I could cover her phone when she was off one day. I asked why she'd asked me and she said the big boss had suggested me. Politely declined. Turned out the only other person who'd been asked was the support manager who'd also declined. My colleagues all thought it was really shit and were up in arms about it.

Have to say that's the only place I've ever had a problem and it was senior management rather than my immediate colleagues (who were good guys) that were the problem.


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

ms grit I dont think has ever really experienced any negative sexism, her only issues as a female software developer were dealing with men who obviously had no idea how to interact with women (funny thing is she is marrying one of those guys  )


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> ms grit I dont think has ever really experienced any negative sexism, her only issues as a female software developer were dealing with men who obviously had no idea how to interact with women (funny thing is she is marrying one of those guys  )


And you speaking on her behalf, ofc


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> And you speaking on her behalf, ofc


 
I did actually verify that has been her experience.


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> I did actually verify that has been her experience.


"I don't think" doesn't imply that you know it for fact though.


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> "I don't think" doesn't imply that you know it for fact though.


 
I always leave myself a get out clause


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

There is a lot of stuff we turn a blind eye to, a lot of women don't like talking about it, don't want to be seen to be complaining, its better to fit in, be seen as one of the boys.  Even me, I did that too.


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## Edie (Apr 17, 2011)

What JC said. As a generalisation men are better at maths.


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## sleaterkinney (Apr 17, 2011)

I'm not so sure it's maths per se, it's more the technical stuff. I'm not sure women are worse at it but they are less likely to like it.


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## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)




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## FridgeMagnet (Apr 17, 2011)

Math is hard. Let's go shopping!


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## sleaterkinney (Apr 17, 2011)

How did you get from "I'm not sure women are worse at it"

to 



> Math is hard. Let's go shopping!




btw


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

Edie said:


> What JC said. As a generalisation men are better at maths.


 
A broad sweeping generalisation with no basis, FTFY.

The most gifted mathematician I ever met was a very cute/sexy woman


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## stethoscope (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> A broad sweeping generalisation with no basis, FTFY.
> 
> The most gifted mathematician I ever met was a very cute/sexy woman


 
What's her cuteness/sexiness got to do with it? Are brains only relevant when you're pretty too?

Way to undermine your own point


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

stephj said:


> What's her cuteness/sexiness got to do with it?


 
Nothing, just is one of the first things that comes to mind when I think of her.


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## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Nothing, just is one of the first things that comes to mind when I think of her.


 
Je reste ma valise, as a good friend used to say.


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## stethoscope (Apr 17, 2011)

Never mind how clever/capable she is, let's place emphasis on her looks


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

I'm not going to apologise for finding women attractive, sorry 

It doesn't undermine the point, you just prefer to parse it for your own gain, thats ok, lots of people do it, dont feel bad.


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## stethoscope (Apr 17, 2011)

Well yes.


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## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Yes, I'm afraid so.


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## stethoscope (Apr 17, 2011)

You still don't get it do you grit! No one is saying you've got to apologise for finding someone attractive, but you couldn't make a point about a woman you know being good at maths without also referencing her looks.

This is exactly the problem that women find in both the workplace and when they are progressing through their careers from their male peers.


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

stephj said:


> You still don't get it do you grit! No one is saying you've got to apologise for finding someone attractive, but you couldn't make a point about a woman you know being good at maths without also referencing her looks.
> 
> This is exactly the problem that women find in both the workplace and when they are progressing through their careers from their male peers.


 
I do get it, I get that Urban75 is not a professional situation, its an internet forum. This is a casual discussion, not the practice of whats being discussed.


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## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

The fact that it comes unintentionally in the middle of a discussion where people are denying that women in tech industries face a particular kind of low grade, background misogyny is, of course, a particular irony.


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## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> I do get it, I get that Urban75 is not a professional situation, its an internet forum. This is a casual discussion, not the practice of whats being discussed.


 
People's attitudes are their attitudes.  They don't suddenly have a completely different set of thoughts just because they are in a workplace.


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## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> background *misogyny* is, of course, a particular irony.


 
Thats where you are missing the point. My comment was in no way misogynistic


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> People's attitudes are their attitudes.  They don't suddenly have a completely different set of thoughts just because they are in a workplace.


 
Then they are very unprofessional and I wouldnt want to work with them. I cant say too much but my last job required a completely different attitude than my own personal beliefs would lead me to.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Thats where you are missing the point. My comment was in no way misogynistic


 
Sigh.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Sigh.


 
Just so we are all on the same page:

"Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women. Misogyny comes from Greek misogunia (μισογυνία) from misos (μῖσος, hatred) and gynē (γυνή, woman)"


----------



## fogbat (Apr 17, 2011)

Why would anyone think I hate women? I love women.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

I give up, you need to get out of that persistent persecution complex. It makes the world look worse than it really is.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Apr 17, 2011)

I wonder why it is that I know far more female statisticians than female programmers. I suppose it could be connected to maths not actually being gendered, and the statisticians I know coming from scientific backgrounds that are (relatively) more appealing to and supportive of women and having learnt their stats there.

For that matter most programming requires pretty much bugger all mathematical training, particularly these days where people look at you blankly if you talk about bitfields.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Just so we are all on the same page:
> 
> "Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women. Misogyny comes from Greek misogunia (μισογυνία) from misos (μῖσος, hatred) and gynē (γυνή, woman)"


 


And homophobia is a literal fear of gay people too.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> And homophobia is a literal fear of gay people too.



Doesnt match my definition.

Paranoia will destroy ya 

Edit: Do you work in HR or something kabbes because your attitude is so strict it seems like you deal with this at work.


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 17, 2011)

the whole maths things is a bit of a myth too 

somehow implying you have to be  good at maths  to  do a computing is  rather ridiculous


----------



## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> the whole maths things is a bit of a myth too
> 
> somehow implying you have to be  good at maths  to  do a computing is  rather ridiculous


Indeed, my first employer said the same thing, he thought being good with language was more beneficial. 

Btw Shippy, went to the PHP UK Conference and the opening keynote speaker ran with the theme of "take my mother, she can't use a computer har har".  He seemed to think this would be funny, peppering his speech with "anecdotes" about how his mother can barely find her way around an iPad.  It was reassuring to find that the Business Design Centre auditorium packed with geeks mainly of the male persuasion didn't share his sense of humour.  A few polite titters but clearly this old chestnut has gone stale.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Doesnt match my definition.
> 
> Paranoia will destroy ya
> 
> Edit: Do you work in HR or something kabbes because your attitude is so strict it seems like you deal with this at work.


Yes, that's right, I'm an HR director.  Any previous indications to the contrary are just vicious rumour.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Yes, that's right, I'm an HR director.  Any previous indications to the contrary are just vicious rumour.


 
Figures.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

I don't work in HR, you frickin' cretin.  I work in one of the most mathematical of all the professions.  As does my sister, my wife and her brother and his girlfriend (as well as most of my friends).  That gives me a pretty deep personal insight into what women face that men don't when working in such a career.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> I don't work in HR, you frickin' cretin.  I work in one of the most mathematical of all the professions.  As does my sister, my wife and her brother and his girlfriend (as well as most of my friends).  That gives me a pretty deep personal insight into what women face that men don't when working in such a career.


 
Fun deliberately mis interpreting other peoples posts isint it ? I know what your job is.

I'm surrounded by women in my life in a similar situation, so what? It makes you as qualified as me (or anyone else) to discuss it.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Except that you seem to have so little insight into the insidious and institutionalised nature of the sexism that you don't even understand why it is offensive to focus on a woman's looks _even at the time that_ you are trying to address her intelligence.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> insidious and institutionalised nature of the sexism


 
Just went downstairs and had a brief chat with two female software engineers, both agree that they nor any of their friends or colleagues, have encountered negative issues with regard to being a woman in IT. Thats probably over 100 years collective experience between the group, a decent sample no? Granted its not complete, nothing is, now if we were talking about a female bricklayer it would be a different story I'm assuming.

Edit: They did concede that having a child can negatively impact but only because you are a year behind everyone else in experience.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Oh grit, grit, grit.  Really.  That's as deep as you go?

People who grow up within a culture and have internalised the messages of that culture rarely even notice the basic assumptions that culture operate on, even when they themselves are negatively affected by them.

And that's even if I really believed that you had a proper conversation about the matter all within the 16 minutes between your posts.


----------



## miss minnie (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Just went downstairs and had a brief chat with two female software engineers, both agree that they nor any of their friends or colleagues, have encountered negative issues with regard to being a woman in IT. Thats probably over 100 years collective experience between the group, a decent sample no? Granted its not complete, nothing is, now if we were talking about a female bricklayer it would be a different story I'm assuming.
> 
> Edit: They did concede that having a child can negatively impact but only because you are a year behind everyone else in experience.


I've got 10 mates who between them have experienced 200 years of sexism in IT. 

Hearsay is all very well etc.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> I've got 10 mates who between them have experienced 200 years of sexism in IT.
> 
> Hearsay is all very well etc.


 
Which I happily concede, however it then makes question of the use of the word  institutionalised. IT has it, everwhere does, but its one of the sectors I think that would suffer less from it


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> *People who grow up within a culture and have internalised the messages of that culture rarely even notice the basic assumptions that culture operate on, even when they themselves are negatively affected by them.*



Get over yourself ffs. 

Its a simple question "As women have you or any other women you know in the IT industry experienced sexism or any other sort of discrimination based on gender?"

One has just been given a promotion over several male colleagues to product architect.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

It really isn't a simple question.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> It really isn't a simple question.


 
Deep answer


----------



## Sue (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Get over yourself ffs.
> 
> Its a simple question "As women have you or any other women you know in the IT industry experienced sexism or any other sort of discrimination based on gender?"
> 
> One has just been given a promotion over several male colleagues to product architect.


 
I'm so glad we have a man on here to tell us whether what we've experienced...


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

Sue said:


> I'm so glad we have a man on here to tell us whether what we've experienced...


 
Read the posts correctly.


----------



## Sue (Apr 17, 2011)

I did. Especially your comments about how someone looked when it had fuck all to do with the subject at hand. (And I'd say the fact you thought it was relevant in this context says a lot.)


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

Sue said:


> I did. Especially your comments about how someone looked when it had fuck all to do with the subject at hand. (And I'd say the fact you thought it was relevant in this context says a lot.)


 
Yeah what a horrible bastard I am, how dare I! Look at the context, its after referring to her a gifted person (I was aware it was not relevant I guess I was just getting a bit nostalgic), this reaction is so over the top.


----------



## Sue (Apr 17, 2011)

Why mention her looks at all? Can you see that's kind of undermining? 'Look, she's smart and does a techy job and she's not a *complete* dog...'!

(I am taking the piss a bit here but having heard all this shit...well, you get my point how annoying and pointless it is?)


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

Sue said:


> Why mention her looks at all? Can you see that's kind of undermining? 'Look, she's smart and does a techy job and she's not a *complete* dog...'!
> 
> (I am taking the piss a bit here but having heard all this shit...well, you get my point how annoying and pointless it is?)


 
It was a throwaway comment, I can see how it looks insensitive to discussion, fair enough but its hardly worth the reaction it has stirred and resulted in a complete derail.


----------



## kained&able (Apr 17, 2011)

In the webdeisgn/ development type area of IT i can't see why there would be a reason for a gender divide, its hardly the most macho of environments or anything.

Maybe the girls just have things they would rather be doing with thier lives. Maybe the question needs asking to women as to if they would like to work in IT and if not why not. Rtaher then trying to analyse where IT is letting the females down.

dave


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kained&able said:


> Maybe the question needs asking to women as to if they would like to work in IT and if not why not.


 
this.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

kained&able said:


> Maybe the question needs asking to women as to if they would like to work in IT and if not why not


 
Post 4, dave.



kabbes said:


> It's not easy to select subjects that none of your friends are doing, you have no role models for, you know you will be an outsider in and you know you will have to face both implicit and explicit discrimination and prejudice whilst doing.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Post 4, dave.


 
The first point is valid the rest is a misconception.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Course it is.  All irrelevant, of course.  Doesn't affect anyone at all, that stuff.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Course it is.  All irrelevant, of course.  Doesn't affect anyone at all, that stuff.



What do you think could be done to encourage women into traditionally male dominated sectors?


----------



## kained&able (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes i get what your saying but on the other hand i can't think of who my web design/IT idol(does anyone have one,other then mac fan boys?) would be and didn't have any school friends who went into the industry. So i think there is more to it then that. Can't speak on the rest of it from personal experience.


dave


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

You have to do a root and branch change of attitudes, approaches and examine everything about your entire process.

We did this, by the way at my old company.  When I got involved with the graduate recruitment process, we had recruited no women for 4 years and had barely had a single applicant.  By the time I left, the intake was 50/50.  That didn't happen by chance -- it was a deliberate series of actions taken over a number of years and it worked.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Apr 17, 2011)

Role models are not "idols". On a gender basis, who can men see in the IT industry as an example of someone having a position they might like to aim at, or think they can do better than, or generally relate to in the context of their lives? _Anyone, because they're basically all men_.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> You have to do a root and branch change of attitudes, approaches and examine everything about your entire process.
> 
> We did this, by the way at my old company.  When I got involved with the graduate recruitment process, we had recruited no women for 4 years and had barely had a single applicant.  By the time I left, the intake was 50/50.  That didn't happen by chance -- it was a deliberate series of actions taken over a number of years and it worked.


 
What if the graduates simply are not there? We are talking about IT here.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

kained&able said:


> kabbes i get what your saying but on the other hand i can't think of who my web design/IT idol(does anyone have one,other then mac fan boys?) would be and didn't have any school friends who went into the industry. So i think there is more to it then that. Can't speak on the rest of it from personal experience.
> 
> 
> dave


 
Dave, you don't need a role model because you're heading into a sector that is already dominated by your gender.

The fact that you don't have any school friends that went into it is unusual, I think, but also not quite the point.  What _subjects_ did you study to get into it?  Did your friends do the same subjects?


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> What if the graduates simply are not there? We are talking about IT here.


 
Yeah.  That's what they said at my work too before I got involved with the process.  It's all just out of our hands, eh?  Nothing we can do about it -- it's just a lack of _talent_.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Yeah.  That's what they said at my work too before I got involved with the process.  It's all just out of our hands, eh?  Nothing we can do about it -- it's just a lack of _talent_.


 
Well in my experience recruiting we had such difficulty finding candidates that were up to the job, didnt get one female applicant. This is for a software development house based in central London, working on an interesting .gov project.

IT is suffering from a drastic skills shortage.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> Well in my experience recruiting we had such difficulty finding candidates that were up to the job, we wanted anyone who could do o it, didnt get one female applicant. This is for a software development house based in central London, working on an interesting .gov project.


 
Why could that have possibly been?


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

FridgeMagnet said:
			
		

> Why could that have possibly been?


 
The general standard of applicants was very low, I've heard the same complaint from several other people hiring in London.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Indeed, why could that possibly have been?  All the fault of the women for not lining up to ask for a job, I suppose.  Definitely no impact from any of the factors I mentioned earlier that you said were a misconception.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

grit said:


> The general standard of applicants was very low, I've heard the same complaint from several other people hiring in London.


 
Probably best to foster a recruitment process that is actively encouraging to women then, to avoid losing a substantial proportion of the potential pool before you even start.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

As an example, we had to even look closely at the individuals we were sending to graduate recruitment fairs and the literature that went with them.  Did the individuals present an image of the firm that would be the kind of place women would feel comfortable working?  Was there anything unintentionally problematic in the literature?  You'd be amazed what you can find when you approach it with an inquiring and open mind rather than just assuming the problem is with the applicants rather than with you.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Probably best to foster a recruitment process that is actively encouraging to women then, to avoid losing a substantial proportion of the potential pool before you even start.


 
You could be a 3 headed monster from mars and if you could do the job you would get it. its not about the mix its about the actual total size of the pool, anyone good doesnt stay unemployed for a day.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Yes, it's just the fault of the applicants for not applying.  Nothing you could do to improve the situation at all.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Women can be every bit as problematic as men when it comes to institutional sexism, by the way.  Sometimes even worse, because _they_ managed it so why can't everybody else?


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Yes, it's just the fault of the applicants for not applying.  Nothing you could do to improve the situation at all.


 
Since you are stuck on an obvious loop lets change tact, whats wrong with women not having an equal interest to working in IT?


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Can you rephrase, because I can't make head nor tail of that question.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Women can be every bit as problematic as men when it comes to institutional sexism, by the way.  Sometimes even worse, because _they_ managed it so why can't everybody else?


 
So what should we do, remove all our reproductive organs when entering the workforce? You are sitting there in tin foil hattery proclaiming doom and gloom for the sexes working together.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Can you rephrase, because I can't make head nor tail of that question.


 
What is the primary negative consequence of women not having as large an interest as men in working in the IT sector?

Bonus points for how to encourage women into the sector, and I presume its something more than changing the stock photos of your marketing literature.


----------



## bouncer_the_dog (Apr 17, 2011)

I would be interested to see if there was a connection between IT and the autistic spectrum...


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

bouncer_the_dog said:


> I would be interested to see if there was a connection between IT and the autistic spectrum...


 
Its certainly attracts some interesting characters


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

I'm not predicting doom and gloom.  Quite the reverse.  I'm saying it can be fixed and I played by part in a company that dealt with the problem.  YOU'RE the one saying we're all just doomed.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> I'm not predicting doom and gloom.  Quite the reverse.  I'm saying it can be fixed and I played by part in a company that dealt with the problem.  YOU'RE the one saying we're all just doomed.


 
I'm saying there isint a particular problem with IT.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

There is a problem with _all_ business.  This problem is enhanced in some sectors, IT being one of them.  It exists, even more so, elsewhere.  In my present company as a whole, it's fairly even until you get to senior management level.  Beyond that point, there is only one woman... and she's the HR director.  That's not an accident.  It's not just the way things are. 

Ultimately, the numbers don't lie.  Not just in terms of numbers employed in the IT sector, either, but the distribution of roles within that sector.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> There is a problem with _all_ business.  This problem is enhanced in some sectors, IT being one of them.  It exists, even more so, elsewhere.  In my present company as a whole, it's fairly even until you get to senior management level.  Beyond that point, there is only one woman... and she's the HR director.  That's not an accident.  It's not just the way things are.
> 
> Ultimately, the numbers don't lie.  Not just in terms of numbers employed in the IT sector, either, but the distribution of roles within that sector.


 
citation needed.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

You're now disputing what, exactly?  That the IT industry is male dominated?


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> You're now disputing what, exactly?  That the IT industry is male dominated?


 
That sexual discrimination is "enhanced" in IT. That the disparity in the roles is so huge and that it can be attributed to discrimination.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

It's my assertion.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> It's my assertion.


 
Well how fucking scientific, this has become boring, there is obviously a vast amount of conflicting experiences. I'll just say I'm glad that I've never witnessed it or have it affect a woman I know.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 17, 2011)

Given your insistence that it was appropriate to reference a woman's "sexiness" in talking about her ability as a mathematician, I don't think you'd actually know it if it slapped you on the arse.


----------



## grit (Apr 17, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Given your insistence that it was appropriate to reference a woman's "sexiness" in talking about her ability as a mathematician, I don't think you'd actually know it if it slapped you on the arse.


 
Ran out of stuff and now back to this, *yawn*.


----------



## FridgeMagnet (Apr 17, 2011)

It's good that there is nothing unusual about IT so nobody in IT has to do anything, just wait for the revolution.


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 18, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> Indeed, my first employer said the same thing, he thought being good with language was more beneficial.
> 
> Btw Shippy, went to the PHP UK Conference and the opening keynote speaker ran with the theme of "take my mother, she can't use a computer har har".  He seemed to think this would be funny, peppering his speech with "anecdotes" about how his mother can barely find her way around an iPad.  It was reassuring to find that the Business Design Centre auditorium packed with geeks mainly of the male persuasion didn't share his sense of humour.  A few polite titters but clearly this old chestnut has gone stale.


 
wierd...  people  not being able to use computers isn't funny (mostly*) i find it fasinating  especially as a teacher...  it really  shows you something about  how people think   both  people with  no computing experience and those with lots




* i will  admit to gaining a laugh  after my mother accused me of breaking  her computer  only to find it was her putting cds in upside down, however the funny bit on that  was not that  she was somehow  stupid for putting the cd in upside down (serious how should people  know  there isn't a this side up  lable on them)  but  the family politics involved


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 18, 2011)

this thread has  kinda gone into personal experiences of  the IT sector  but  i was  kinda more interested in what preconceptions people outside of IT had  as  that  probably has more  influence on what  makes people  pick  a subject to study in the first place

what do none IT bods think?  (though probably none are reading  this thread anymore)


----------



## Sue (Apr 18, 2011)

grit said:


> I'll just say I'm glad that I've never witnessed it or have it affect a woman I know.



I'd be very very surprised if any woman you know who works in IT hasn't experienced sexism at some point, Still, what would I know...?

ETA Or maybe I know different types of women from you or maybe the women you know just haven't mentioned it to you or think there's no point going on about it or whatever else. Just because you're not aware of it doesn't mean it hasn't happened...


----------



## Sue (Apr 18, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> this thread has  kinda gone into personal experiences of  the IT sector  but  i was  kinda more interested in what preconceptions people outside of IT had  as  that  probably has more  influence on what  makes people  pick  a subject to study in the first place
> 
> what do none IT bods think?  (though probably none are reading  this thread anymore)



Okay, I work in IT but I can tell you the reaction I get from non-techy people (so people who're not scientists or engineers) when work stuff comes up. 'You do what? That's an unusual choice for a woman/There can't be very many women doing that.' Which may be true but it gets a bit bloody tedious after a while. Think you can probably get the preconceptions from there -- it's strange for a woman to work in IT.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Sue said:


> ETA Or maybe I know different types of women from you or maybe the women you know just haven't mentioned it to you or think there's no point going on about it or whatever else. Just because you're not aware of it doesn't mean it hasn't happened...


 
Or maybe just maybe, now stay with me here........ they actually havnt experienced it (note I'm not saying others have not experienced it). I'm half tempted to ask ms grit to post on this thread.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

I'm sure we'll each assign our own probabilities to each of those and all the other possibilities, grit.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> I'm sure we'll each assign our own probabilities to each of those and all the other possibilities, grit.


 
Same here, and round and round we go once again.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Personally, I'd still like to know how in in 16 minutes you managed to leave the computer, go and find several women who work in IT, tear them away from what they were doing, tell them you need to hear their experiences of sexual discrimination, probe this experience in sufficient depth to gain more than a surface-level brush-off, have the conversation that would inevitably result, return to the computer and then write a post.  

In the meantime, I know what I'm assigning the highest probability to.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Personally, I'd still like to know how in in 16 minutes you managed to leave the computer, go and find several women who work in IT, tear them away from what they were doing, tell them you need to hear their experiences of sexual discrimination, probe this experience in sufficient depth to gain more than a surface-level brush-off, have the conversation that would inevitably result, return to the computer and then write a post.
> 
> In the meantime, I know what I'm assigning the highest probability to.


 
I went downstairs to ms grit and her best friend who were chatting in our kitchen. I asked the question quoted previously and listened to the answers. I then came back up to my office and wrote the response, I didnt claim it was a scientific study, the words I think I used was "brief chat".

Edit for clarity: I prefaced the question with that I was involved in a discussion online and was questioning the argument being put forth that sexism is rife in the industry, that its institutionalised. Both confirmed they didnt share this view  personally and didnt believe their peers did either. ms grit's friend then informed that she had recently beaten several male colleagues to become product architect. She then continued to concede that having a child does set back the progress of your career due to the time missing from the workplace and honestly not keeping up with the fast moving world of software development. ms grit agreed with everything that was said. We then discussed the dynamics of the female dominated  software company that myself and ms grit used to work in and even with it being a female dominated environment the challenges were the same as they were in their current positions (aviation/finance software), male dominated companies.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

There's no way a polite, brief chat could possibly get to the heart of the kind of insidious and institutionalised sexism we are talking about on this thread.  At best, you might have said, "Hey!  Can you tell me -- have you experienced any sexism at work?" -- something that is a closed question that does not invite debate.  People chatting wouldn't particularly welcome such an interruption and would likely give the most surface of answers, based only on experience of the kind of direct discrimination we're not particularly talking about here.

The time scale involved most definitely supports this theory of events.  There is simply no way you could have a proper discussion about it in the time available.


----------



## DrRingDing (Apr 19, 2011)

miss minnie said:


> A favourite one that we have to fight is managers doing appraisals and wanting us to move into 'soft skill' roles.  Good techie women who are pushed into training and documentation, often because the guys won't do it and the women are shown a glass ceiling in the dev department.


 
I've been at my place a short time but the new director has made one of our most talented developers into 'more of a people manager'. One of two women in our department.


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Sorry, but it doesn't happen.  Grit says so.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Sorry, but it doesn't happen.  Grit says so.


 
You are now just being a dick, I've conceded on several occasions it happens.

Petty, even for such a pretentious prick as yourself


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> You are now just being a dick, I've conceded on several occasions it happens.


 
So what are you arguing about then?  What's your point here?


----------



## fractionMan (Apr 19, 2011)

his point is that he couldn't possibly admit to posting something stupid.

(he works in IT, remember)


----------



## girasol (Apr 19, 2011)

The way women survive this working environment is by keeping a dignified distance from pointless arguments and concentrating on the job instead


----------



## fractionMan (Apr 19, 2011)

Yeah, right


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> So what are you arguing about then?  What's your point here?


 
Answer hasn't changed since the last time you asked that question, read my response #143


----------



## girasol (Apr 19, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> Yeah, right


 
 it's true!!!!


----------



## Corax (Apr 19, 2011)

I think more women are getting into IT now that you can buy shoes online.


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> . IT has it, everwhere does, but its one of the sectors I think that would suffer less from it


In my experience as an IT recruiter, I'd say this is true. for my part, I'd be crazy to let gender prejudice play any part in candidate selection - I'll willingly exploit any of you lot, regardless of gender, sexuality or ethnicity! - but more seriously, I've never had any reason - AT ALL to suspect hiring line managers (i.e. my clients) of prejudices against female candidates, and I've actually placed a lot of women over the years.

My theory, FWIW, is that ubergeeky types who spend their working lives thinking in code and are passionate about technology simply have a totally different mindset to alpha-male, rugger-bugger city bosses


----------



## girasol (Apr 19, 2011)

I agree, if you are a good programmer and have good communication skills, you are welcome in this industry regardless of gender, because good software engineers who can communicate well are actually hard to find.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> What do you think could be done to encourage women into traditionally male dominated sectors?


essential step one - get more young women to apply to do IT degrees. However, you are right in your earlier comment about the skills shortage, which amounts to a massive national own-goal concerning the serious under-representation of british students on IT courses at UK universities. 
solve that problem, and you'll be well on the way to a solution of the other problem


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

At last some fucking sanity on this thread.

Streathamite's theory is spot on.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite hasn't added a theory.  He's just said that the problem is to get young women to do IT degrees.  That's exactly the problem I have been addressing all along.  

The issue from post 1 has been _how_ you get young women to do IT degrees.  What are the reasons they avoid them?  I can only once again quote my very first post on this thread, back at post #4:



kabbes said:


> It's not easy to select subjects that none of your friends are doing, you have no role models for, you know you will be an outsider in and you know you will have to face both implicit and explicit discrimination and prejudice whilst doing.


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## wtfftw (Apr 19, 2011)

IT degrees smell though. It's the boy stink of stale excitement.


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> as part of my teaching course i've been asked to look at inequality in my subject specialism an for me the fist thing that sprung to mind  is  the gender balance in IT classes.
> 
> on the course i teach in web design  the  classes are male dominated  with usually 80% or more of the students being male  and  we often have classes that are all male.
> 
> ...


 
me in the first post   talking  about the problem  being at the  educational level  

the thread got so  off topic  people  think the original topic  is  something new to talk about


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> the thread got so  off topic  people  think the original topic  is  something new to talk about


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Streathamite hasn't added a theory.  He's just said that the problem is to get young women to do IT degrees.  That's exactly the problem I have been addressing all along.
> 
> The issue from post 1 has been _how_ you get young women to do IT degrees.  What are the reasons they avoid them?  I can only once again quote my very first post on this thread, back at post #4:


 
I was referring to the line that started "My theory,FWIW "......

Why do you think nursing is a female dominated occupation?


----------



## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

He can call it what he wants.  It doesn't change what has already been said.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> He can call it what he wants.  It doesn't change what has already been said.


 
You have been really running out of steam the last 2 pages.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

That's what happens when nothing new is being added.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> That's what happens when nothing new is being added.


 
The only person parroting the same tired questions is you.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> The general standard of applicants was very low, I've heard the same complaint from several other people hiring in London.


best to use a professional recruiter then! <hint>


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> best to use a professional recruiter then! <hint>


 
We did, couldnt read a fucking spec to save their life, well thats a bit harsh. I'm a student now so sort of on the other side of the tables these days 

Blood from a stone etc.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Streathamite hasn't added a theory.  He's just said that the problem is to get young women to do IT degrees.  That's exactly the problem I have been addressing all along.


Not quite-or that's not the _only_ problem.
The bigger problem is to get sufficient amounts of young British students doing IT first degrees, full stop. And, interlinked with that - and given that Unis are under funding pressures like never before, and that foreign students get charged far higher fees than British ones - how to ensure the Unis are allocating sufficent places to British students, rather than chasing the money


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> Not quite-or that's not the _only_ problem.
> The bigger problem is to get sufficient amounts of young British students doing IT first degrees,


 
You really think thats such a big problem? Granted bit ironic for me to say it as an Irish immigrant in a UK university full time


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> We did, couldnt read a fucking spec to save their life, well thats a bit harsh. I'm a student now so sort of on the other side of the tables these days
> 
> Blood from a stone etc.


sure, every calling has their donkeys...


----------



## fractionMan (Apr 19, 2011)

IT degrees?  LOL.

Out of the 7 programmers I can see from my chair only one has an IT degree (well, PhD anyway).


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> sure, every calling has their donkeys...


 
Point taken, I wasnt senior enough to influence that as I think the company had a standing contract with them.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> IT degrees?  LOL.
> 
> Out of the 7 programmers I can see from my chair only one has an IT degree (well, PhD anyway).


 
I'm coming from the other end, over ten years experience and no degree,  it gives you a glass ceiling. That piece of paper can open a lot of doors.


----------



## fractionMan (Apr 19, 2011)

Well I'll just pretend my degree is IT when the time comes.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> Well I'll just pretend my degree is IT when the time comes.


 
One of the best programmers I've ever worked with had his degree in economics. I'm not sure even the title is that important its just seen as a mark of some sort ability to apply yourself.


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> You really think thats such a big problem? Granted bit ironic for me to say it as an Irish immigrant in a UK university full time


yes it is. numbers of british school-leavers (or even more mature students) of _both_ sexes, both _applying_ to do IT first degrees, and being _accepted_ onto IT degree courses, have been falling pretty much consistently over the past 2 decades, even during a period of considerable expansion of the HE sector. This only changed - slightly - when the recession kicked in in 2008


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> yes it is. numbers of british school-leavers (or even more mature students) of _both_ sexes, both _applying_ to do IT first degrees, and being _accepted_ onto IT degree courses, have been falling pretty much consistently over the past 2 decades, even during a period of considerable expansion of the HE sector. This only changed - slightly - when the recession kicked in in 2008


 
Whats the big emphasis on British, is it the fear of the training being taken in the UK and the skills are applied outside?


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

this isn't just HE 

this is also FE  

it's not just about   picking what degree you do it's  right through  to   what dole course you pick


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> it's not just about   picking what degree you do it's  right through  to   what dole course you pick


 
I dont follow, would you mind rephrasing?


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

this divide isn't  just manifesting itself  at the degree level  

in fact if anything  in my experience  there is less of a divide  at degree level   so people  shouldn't focus just on that


though   i should  probably  quit trying to revive  this thread


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Whats the big emphasis on British, is it the fear of the training being taken in the UK and the skills are applied outside?


 Yes, as most people will then return to their home countries after first degrees, and because it is that that is at the root of our growing, serious skills shortage, and in this we are unlike any major industrial nation I know.
So far, the Tier-1 scheme, post-study visa scheme, ancestral visa scheme and EU immigration - plus Britain's continuing redhot popularity as a place to come and work - a popularity I can only assume you endorse!  - have just about filled in the gaps. if they start cutting either of those schemes, the UK IT industry faces a skills crisis


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> this divide isn't  just manifesting itself  at the degree level
> 
> in fact if anything  in my experience  there is less of a divide  at degree level   so people  shouldn't focus just on that


I know: i'm just addressing the end I can speak with authority on.
I would say however, the same psycholobgy issues are at the root of both FE's and HE's problems in this regard (but AFAIK, the foreign students/funding issue doesn't manifest itself in the FE field)


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> Yes, as most people will then return to their home countries after first degrees, and because it is that that is at the root of our growing, serious skills shortage, and in this we are unlike any major industrial nation I know.
> So far, the Tier-1 scheme, post-study visa scheme, ancestral visa scheme and EU immigration - plus Britain's continuing redhot popularity as a place to come and work - a popularity I can only assume you endorse! - have just about filled in the gaps. if they start cutting either of those schemes, the UK IT industry faces a skills crisis


 
There is also a lot of "us" who will stay and ply our trade here (I cant ever see myself going home). I've only lived in London in the UK but really half the city seems immigrant. It was about 6 months before I met my first actual Londoner.


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> There is also a lot of "us" who will stay and ply our trade here. I've only lived in London in the UK but really half the city seems immigrant. It was about 6 months before I met my first actual Londoner.


true; but unless you are EU, you won't get post-study visa or Tier-1 (the old HSMP) after a first degree - you'd need to have done a Masters or PhD here. and the point is a huge amount of non-UK citizens currently working in the UK IT industry are non-EU
e2a: and so as to avoid giving the wrong impression, thank god so many IT people from elsewhere choose to come here, otherwise we'd be totally fucked.
e2aa: trust me, London is NOT representative of the rest of the UK, not in any way. i'm from the county immediately to the north of London (hertforshire), I've lived in London most of my adult life, and the difference even between those two, ethnically/nationally is massive. London is a genuinely multinationbal city in a way that nowhere else is.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> non-UK citizens currently working in the UK IT industry are non-EU


 
How are they satisfying the visa requirements?


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

it does seem to boil  down  to   entrenched  concepts  about gender roles  

which is slightly depressing  

i was hoping that  as time moves on the computer will be seen more and more as common household object  and the role of interacting with one  less  of a one  with a gender role  attached to it   but it seems   still linked to a older   divide  about technical  and mechanical  pursuits


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> i was hoping that  as time moves on the computer will be seen more and more as common household object  and the role of interacting with one  less  of a one  with a gender role  attached to it   but it seems   still linked to a older   divide  about technical  and mechanical  pursuits


 
Personal computer is in its infancy, give it time


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## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

i think it may be harder to break

i mean a car is an everyday object  but  car mecanics is probably still a very male dominated area... or at least the  stereotype is that it is 

i'm not sure if the IT stereotype is  quite as  gender biased  but  it could be


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> How are they satisfying the visa requirements?


Tier-1 post study after doing an MSc here; or tier-1 HSMP, or (mainly saffies, aussies, kiwis) ancestral visa, or dependent spouse. After 5-6 years you get permanent residency


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> i think it may be harder to break
> 
> i mean a car is an everyday object  but  car mecanics is probably still a very male dominated area... or at least the  stereotype is that it is
> 
> i'm not sure if the IT stereotype is  quite as  gender biased  but  it could be


There's a BEEEG difference between the two; car mechanics has strong macho, rugged overtones whereas IT will never, ever seem macho and testosterone-ridden.
hate to break it to you, shippy, but your passion and vocation for IT will alone debar you for life from superhero, he-man, throbbing lovegod status.


poor shippy...


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> There's a BEEEG difference between the two; car mechanics has strong macho, rugged overtones whereas IT will never, ever seem macho and testosterone-ridden.
> hate to break it to you, shippy, but your passion and vocation for IT will alone debar you for life from superhero, he-man, throbbing lovegod status.
> 
> 
> poor shippy...



As a recruiter, what (if any?) are the negative consequences of the gender imbalance in IT?


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

fractionMan said:


> IT degrees?  LOL.
> 
> Out of the 7 programmers I can see from my chair only one has an IT degree (well, PhD anyway).


yes, experience counts for more, ultimately, than qualifications, and given the improvisational, DIYesque roots of the IT industry (all those teenage hackers and dysfunctional bedroom-based code geniuses) it's unsurprising that there' still a lot of people around who got into the industry by that root.
however, this is 2010, not 1985. There is not a single medium-or-above-sized IT employer who would  even dream of offering an entry level position to someone without a degree/HND which was at least a large part about IT


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> As a recruiter, what (if any?) are the negative consequences of the gender imbalance in IT?


the same as the uni problem - a shortage of good candidates. Plus, also, my experience of female candidates is that they DO have better soft skills, which is crucial for interviews, and they take my advice onboard a lot better.
Also, employers MAY be less-likely to take on board the need for women-friendly, family-friendly workplace policies (maternity leave etc, hiring pre-menopausal women). However, my experience is that IT companies, telcos and IT departments are better than  most in that regards.
let's face it, techies wax far more passionate about the Linux/windows divide (or java vs .NET) than about the gender divide


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> the same as the uni problem - a shortage of good candidates. Plus, also, my experience of female candidates is that they DO have better soft skills, which is crucial for interviews, and they take my advice onboard a lot better.
> Also, employers MAY be less-likely to take on board the need for women-friendly, family-friendly workplace policies (maternity leave etc, hiring pre-menopausal women). However, my experience is that IT companies, telcos and IT departments are better than  most in that regards.
> let's face it, techies wax far more passionate about the Linux/windows divide (or java vs .NET) than about the gender divide


 
Right, its not really the gender imbalance its just the general lack of candidates (something that makes me VERY happy  ).


----------



## Yuwipi Woman (Apr 19, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> the same as the uni problem - a shortage of good candidates. Plus, also, my experience of female candidates is that they DO have better soft skills, which is crucial for interviews, and they take my advice onboard a lot better.
> Also, employers MAY be less-likely to take on board the need for women-friendly, family-friendly workplace policies (maternity leave etc, hiring pre-menopausal women). However, my experience is that IT companies, telcos and IT departments are better than  most in that regards.
> let's face it, techies wax far more passionate about the Linux/windows divide (or java vs .NET) than about the gender divide


 
I work in IT and I believe I was chosen for the job as much for the so-called "soft skills" as anything else.  They put me working on tech support because the men in the department didn't have the patience for it.  They were all about getting challenging assignments, which I wasn't going to get, even if I wanted them.  They saved them for their little in-group.  The ironic thing is that they've all moved elsewhere, while our IT department has become 50% female just by outlasting them.


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## magneze (Apr 19, 2011)

Doesn't this come back to schools rather than Universities? Tracing it back, there are fewer women in IT because fewer study it at University because fewer study the appropriate technical subjects at school which means that a search for courses appropriate for your A-Levels doesn't reveal Computer Science/Engineering as a potential choice. I'm sure this is too simplified, but to a large extent isn't this true?


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

magneze said:


> Doesn't this come back to schools rather than Universities? Tracing it back, there are fewer women in IT because fewer study it at University because fewer study the appropriate technical subjects at school which means that a search for courses appropriate for your A-Levels doesn't reveal Computer Science/Engineering as a potential choice. I'm sure this is too simplified, but to a large extent isn't this true?


 
Certainly makes sense, what sort of computing subjects are available to UK second level students?


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## magneze (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Certainly makes sense, what sort of computing subjects are available to UK second level students?


I don't know. I know that there was a Computer Science A-Level at the beginning of the 90s, but that alone wasn't enough to get onto a degree. What you really needed was Maths and proper Science (Physics, Chemistry, Biology).

Of course this might be totally different now.


----------



## magneze (Apr 19, 2011)

Random google gives York as a good example:

http://www.cs.york.ac.uk/undergraduate/entry-requirements/

They want Maths and preferably Physics so it seems that things haven't changed too much.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Right, its not really the gender imbalance its just the general lack of candidates (something that makes me VERY happy  ).


the gender imbalance is certainly there as well, and makes a bad problem worse


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

I picked that as a particularly extreme example but the same concept applies

 But I am still pumped from using the mouse


----------



## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> But I am still pumped from using the mouse


I'd try for the cute, cuddly, misused look, were I you


----------



## Shippou-Sensei (Apr 19, 2011)

my pillows don't judge me by my looks


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Get over yourself ffs.
> 
> Its a simple question "As women have you or any other women you know in the IT industry experienced sexism or any other sort of discrimination based on gender?"
> 
> One has just been given a promotion over several male colleagues to product architect.


A woman gaining promotion above men in a male-dominated environment can actually be a symptom of discrimination at entry-level. If very few women manage to get into that workplace in the first place, those that do will be the best of the best. If there aren't additional barriers to success, then you would expect the average woman to be promoted more often than the average man simply because the women have a higher average level of competence.

I spent years being the only woman in scientific committee meetings, with male doctors suggesting I pour the coffee and handing me their expense claim forms at the end. One meeting, the chair ignored me completely until right at the end, when he asked a question that no one else could answer. He did at least have the good grace to look embarrassed when he realised I wasn't there to take minutes ...

It didn't actually affect me a great deal in a career sense, for a couple of reasons:

1. My boss was very feminist and did what he could to stop this crap. If he heard someone asking me to pour coffee he'd make a big deal out of pouring it himself, or putting it on the table so people could help themselves. And I know for sure that he knew the answer to the question asked by the chair who was ignoring me - he pretended not to so that he could pass it on to me.

2. The only people from my office present at these meetings were me and my boss. If I'd been in any sense 'competing' with a male peer, being ignored and belittled like that could have had a very serious impact on my career prospects. That was the job that made me into a scientist (and paid for me to do my MSc). There were a couple of high profile projects that I was asked to get involved with precisely because my scientific input was valued by people who had worked with me. If I hadn't been in a situation where my boss was making sure I had that input despite the sexist assumptions, I might never have had the chance to get out of science admin and into actual science.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> then you would expect the average woman to be promoted more often than the average man simply because the women have a higher average level of competence.


 
Stopped reading once I got to this rubbish.


----------



## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Stopped reading once I got to this rubbish.


 
It's not rubbish. It's a well known paradox.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> then you would expect the average woman to be promoted more often than the average man simply because the women have a higher average level of competence.


 
As a scientist you should be embarrassed to post such ridiculous claims.


----------



## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> As a scientist you should be embarrassed to post such ridiculous claims.


 
You should probably try thinking about it before launching into hysterical denials. It's not just a well-known phenomenon, it's very obvious how it works.

If you have a think about it and still don't get it, I'll explain it for your below averagely-skilled self.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> You should probably try thinking about it before launching into hysterical denials. It's not just a well-known phenomenon, it's very obvious how it works.
> 
> If you have a think about it and still don't get it, I'll explain it for your below averagely-skilled self.


 
Go on, I need a  bit of light entertainment.


----------



## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Go on, I need a  bit of light entertainment.


 
OK.

It's usually explained in a simplified world where the only two jobs are high-skilled (highly rewarded in financial terms) and low-skilled (not highly rewarded in financial terms).

There is a key assumption, which I know you will have no problem with as you have supported it yourself on this thread: there are no inherent gender differences which make men or women generally more or less suited to high- or low-skilled work.

However, there is institutional sexism leading to fewer women being given an entry level job in high-skilled work.

Let's say the high-skilled workplace ends up as 90% male and 10% female.

The 10% of women who get into high-skilled work are the 10% who are the most highly qualified for the job. On average the skills of this 10% of women will be on a par with the most skilled 10% who are men. The other 80% of the workforce is made up of men who are less skilled than the women, because half of them only they got their jobs at the expense of better qualified female candidates.

If there is no further discrimination in terms of promotion, then you would expect the same number of promotions amongst the 10% who are women as there are for the top 10% who are men because these two groups are more skilled than the rest. 

If there are promotions available for more than 20% of the high-skills workforce, then those promotions can only go to men of lesser talent than the women who were rejected initially, because those women aren't there to take the promotions.

It also means that the women in the low-skilled work are more skilled, on average, than the men - because the low skilled workplace contains only the bottom 10% of men, whilst many highly talented women were unable to get jobs in the high-skilled workplace because of institutional sexism.

Dunno if that makes sense. But it's the same thing as state-school pupils doing better at university than private school pupils with the same A level results. They do better because they _had to be better to get there in the first place_.


----------



## Sue (Apr 19, 2011)

magneze said:


> Doesn't this come back to schools rather than Universities? Tracing it back, there are fewer women in IT because fewer study it at University because fewer study the appropriate technical subjects at school which means that a search for courses appropriate for your A-Levels doesn't reveal Computer Science/Engineering as a potential choice. I'm sure this is too simplified, but to a large extent isn't this true?


 
Yep, completely agree with this.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> OK.
> 
> It's usually explained in a simplified world where the only two jobs are high-skilled (highly rewarded in financial terms) and low-skilled (not highly rewarded in financial terms).
> 
> ...


 
It appears you have accomplished the impressive feat of pulling a whole data set out of your arse. Way too many assumptions.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

Perhaps you could explain your logic in more detail. I have no hope of seeing the flaw you see in mine, if you give me so little to go on.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> Perhaps you could explain your logic in more detail. I have no hope of seeing the flaw you see in mine, if you give me so little to go on.


 
Simply, whats the data you are working from? 

Stuff like this "The 10% of women who get into high-skilled work are the 10% who are the most highly qualified for the job. On average the skills of this 10% of women will be on a par with the most skilled 10% who are men. The other 80% of the workforce is made up of men who are less skilled than the women, because half of them only they got their jobs at the expense of better qualified female candidates."

 Is just something that you have made up without any sort of evidence. It has the same lack of scientific rigor as kabbes lovely "its my assertion" comment. Its a gross simplification.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Fuck me, you're stupid.

Ymu is explaining a wll-known logical paradox.  She's not pretending to deal with actual data sets.

Go llok up the paradox on Wikipedia if you don't believe her.

The only question is to what extent the paradox will follow through to the real world.  The answer is that it is a logical imperative wherever the following conditions are true:

* two populations are of equal ability
* there is a barrier to entry for one of the populations
* there are no further discriminatory effects.

That's it.  

The fact that you think ymu is actually suggesting that her 10% and 90% are anything other than illistrative to help explain the paradox is jist really showing up your inability to follow a simple argument.


----------



## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Ymu is explaining a wll-known logical paradox.  She's not pretending to deal with actual data sets.
> 
> Go llok up the paradox on Wikipedia if you don't believe her.
> 
> The only question is to what extent the paradox will follow through to the real world.


 
A paradox that may or may not apply here. The question can be refined to is it complete utter bollocks or just wrong.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Which of the three necessary and sufficient conditions do you think is wrong?


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

There's no data, ffs! It's a thought experiment.

Try a simpler version:

Take a non-sexist secondary school that gives all its kids an excellent education before packing them off somewhere else for sixth form. Girls and boys do equally well in GCSEs.

Unfortunately, the best sixth form in the area has a sexist admissions policy, meaning that they take twice as many boys as girls. They take the top third of the girls, and the top two thirds of the boys. Once they're in the school, they get treated equally.

Do you expect the A level results for boys and girls in that school to be:

a) the same
b) much better for the boys
c) much better for the girls

Show your working.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Which of the three necessary and sufficient conditions do you think is wrong?


 
The last 2, as supported by an IT recruiter and other IT professionals in this thread. Its a nice idea that checks out, but there is no way we can determine its validity to the situation (or if there is any at all). So using it to back up such comments seems forced to say the least.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

Thanks kabbes. Cross-posted with you there.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> The last 2, as supported by an IT recruiter and other IT professionals in this thread. Its a nice idea that checks out, but there is no way we can determine its validity to the situation (if there is any at all). So using it to back up such comments seems forced to say the least.


 
I have never once said that this is a dominant effect in IT. I merely pointed out that your 'evidence' of a lack of sexism (your female colleague being promoted) doesn't mean anything because it is a predictable consequence of sexism at the recruiting stage (which may include sexism at the getting qualifications stage).


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> I have never once said that this is a dominant effect in IT. I merely pointed out that your 'evidence' of a lack of sexism (your female colleague being promoted) doesn't mean anything because it is a predictable consequence of sexist recruiting practices.


 
So in summary my anecdotal experience has pretty much the same relevance as the "thought experiment". I never presented it as hard evidence I have conceded on several occasions sexism does exist, what i dont agree with is that its worse/institutionalized in the industry.

It seems odd that kabbes posts with such authority when he doesnt even fucking work in the industry and has had his assumptions refuted by people who actually do.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Grit, I don't thinl you understand what a barrier to entry is.  I think you think it's something imposed externally.  Actually, it could be internal.

The fact that fewer women than men are taking IT courses is a de facto proof that there is a barrier to entry.  It just remains to work out what the barrier is -- how much comes from without and how much is from within.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> So in summary my anecdotal experience has pretty much the same relevance as the "thought experiment". I never presented it as hard evidence I have conceded on several occasions sexism does exist, what i dont agree with is that its worse/institutionalized in the industry.
> 
> It seems odd that kabbes posts with such authority when he doesnt even fucking work in the industry and has had his assumptions refuted by people who actually do.


You need to show your working. I can't make head nor tail of what you are writing, but if you explain your thought processes, I might be able to work out where you went wrong. Like, for example, why the fuck do you think kabbes needs to work in IT to understand Simpson's Paradox?


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> The fact that fewer women than men are taking IT courses is a de facto proof that there is a barrier to entry.


 
Less men in nursing, but there isint any barriers there.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Does it matter, incidentally, where exactly IT ranks on the great scale of gender discrimination?  If there is a problem then you should be concentrating on how to resolve it, not whining that it isn't quite as bad as the extremely sexist sector the next floor up.

Nobody said that IT was the worst, just that it has its own structural problems that need to be addressed.


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

Grit, there *are* barriers to entry for men in nursing.  The fact you say otherwise just emphasises that you don't know what a barrier to entry is.

If there are no barriers to entry then *by definition* you get a totally uniform distributiom of entrants.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Does it matter, incidentally, where exactly IT ranks on the great scale of gender discrimination?  If there is a problem then you should be concentrating on how to resolve it, not whining that it isn't quite as bad as the extremely sexist sector the next floor up.
> 
> Nobody said that IT was the worst, just that it has its own structural problems that need to be addressed.


 
Well since the thread is about IT, that has been the focus..........


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Grit, there *are* barriers to entry for men in nursing.  The fact you say otherwise just emphasises that you don't know what a barrier to entry is.
> 
> If there are no barriers to entry then *by definition* you get a totally uniform distributiom of entrants.


 
What are they? What does have totally uniform distribution?


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## kabbes (Apr 19, 2011)

The same ones I posted in past 4, for a start.

Anyway, off to bed.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> The same ones I posted in past 4, for a start.
> 
> Anyway, off to bed.


 
Which have been shown to be not considered as factors by people involved, which is the best sort of test we have available.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> What are they? What does have totally uniform distribution?


 
Male nurses get pretty fed up of being accused of being gay or on the pull (working with all them burds eh, nudge, nudge, wink, wink). The image of it being a 'female' profession is a significant barrier to entry, for men.

And, as kabbes said, this isn't about being a bit less or a bit more sexist than other occupations. It makes no difference if all other jobs have a perfect 50/50 distribution of men and women, or if all other jobs have a worse ratio than IT. What matters is evidence of barriers to entry (most obviously the lack of a 50/50 ratio), identifying what they are, and tackling them.


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## grit (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> Male nurses get pretty fed up of being accused of being gay or on the pull (working with all them burds eh, nudge, nudge, wink, wink). The image of it being a 'female' profession is a significant barrier to entry, for men.
> 
> And, as kabbes said, this isn't about being a bit less or a bit more sexist than other occupations. It makes no difference if all other jobs have a perfect 50/50 distribution of men and women, or if all other jobs have a worse ratio than IT. What matters is evidence of barriers to entry (most obviously the lack of a 50/50 ratio), identifying what they are, and tackling them.


 
Everyone has shit that they put up with from their job. The issue is that any barriers to entry that are there, are not being imposed by the industry its external factors. So then trying to shove part on the problem responsibility on the companies hiring candidates it is just wrong.

anyway, good debating, time for bed.


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## ymu (Apr 19, 2011)

As kabbes said, you have no clue what "barriers to entry" means. And I am at a complete loss to know why you are insisting that evidence of institutional sexism means nothing unless it is making some kind of moral judgement about an industry.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

grit said:


> Simply, whats the data you are working from?
> 
> Stuff like this "The 10% of women who get into high-skilled work are the 10% who are the most highly qualified for the job. On average the skills of this 10% of women will be on a par with the most skilled 10% who are men. The other 80% of the workforce is made up of men who are less skilled than the women, because half of them only they got their jobs at the expense of better qualified female candidates."
> 
> Is just something that you have made up without any sort of evidence. It has the same lack of scientific rigor as kabbes lovely "its my assertion" comment. Its a gross simplification.


tbh, having studied UK employment patterns professionally for so long, there is every chance that there is - at least - an awful lot of truth in what ymu has said here. 

There is, at least historically, huge gender discrimination as regards white-collar hiring, especially for executive/managerial, professional, scientific, engineering and technology-based roles, across the broad spectrum of the UK world of work. After all, women having these types of jobs is, in the greater scheme of things, very much a recent development, so some degree of a legacy of discrimination is inevitable. Same reason why there are so few female directors on the boards of PLCs (and most of them seem to be the HR director)
*I repeat; all my years in IT recruitment have left me convinced the IT industry has a far better record on this score than most other sectors*, for the reasons I've outlined, but you need the wider context of british social and industrial history.
and no, you're right, it's virtually impossible to quantify the degree of that discrimination, in ANY industry sector.


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

ymu said:


> Male nurses get pretty fed up of being accused of being gay or on the pull (working with all them burds eh, nudge, nudge, wink, wink). The image of it being a 'female' profession is a significant barrier to entry, for men.


alos, the peer pressure of their mates thinking they're doing a "woman's job" deters some


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## Streathamite (Apr 19, 2011)

kabbes said:


> The fact that fewer women than men are taking IT courses is a de facto proof that there is a barrier to entry.  It just remains to work out what the barrier is -- how much comes from without and how much is from within.


I can answer that; it comes from society as a whole, and social attitudes, and from the education sector.


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## Dowie (Apr 26, 2011)

Shippou-Sensei said:


> this is sorta taking for granted that IT is seen as being male...  i'm kinda curious why


 
The problem starts in education IMO

Plenty of companies are keen to recruit women, a large portion of HR people are female - the issue IMO is that relative to male applicants there are much fewer suitably qualified females.

Look at any random computer science or similar course at an average UK university and you can see the problem starts early on.

Then again I'm not necessarily sure there is a problem - if there is discrimination involved then clearly there is an issue however if the lack of women involved in IT is purely down to personal preferences over subject choices then I'm not sure it is necessarily an issue to begin with.


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## Dowie (Apr 26, 2011)

kabbes said:


> Grit, there *are* barriers to entry for men in nursing.  The fact you say otherwise just emphasises that you don't know what a barrier to entry is.
> 
> If there are no barriers to entry then *by definition* you get a totally uniform distributiom of entrants.


 
Your model assumes people are going to be randomly assigned to courses and influenced only by 'barriers' presumably either discrimination and/or social norms/pressures. This might explain some of the disproportionate numbers of men/women in say computer science and nursing but it still doesn't account for personal choice which (depending on the individual) might not be swayed by social norms. We don't know for sure, for example, that if we did have some futuristic society in which female engineers and male nurses weren't thought of as being a bit different and that, with all other things being equal, we still wouldn't get a disproportionate number of men studying computer science and women studying nursing. As much as we need to ensure women and men aren't treated differently we shouldn't forget that they are different and perhaps another major factor in all this is that, regardless of socially accepted norms, more women might well be naturally drawn to caring professions and more men naturally drawn to technical professions purely as a result of personal preferences.


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

Dowie said:


> it still doesn't account for personal choice which (depending on the individual) might not be swayed by social norms



How are you proposing that we isolate the personal from the social?


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## _angel_ (Apr 26, 2011)

The college course I started were desperate to get more women students in, we could even claim our travel expenses (I thought this was a bit unfair and never bothered).
It's not IT but my sis got a scholarship for engineering MSC, she reckons only because she was female, reckons there were more well qualified men out there. Prob  not fair either!


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## _angel_ (Apr 26, 2011)

magneze said:


> Doesn't this come back to schools rather than Universities? Tracing it back, there are fewer women in IT because fewer study it at University because fewer study the appropriate technical subjects at school which means that a search for courses appropriate for your A-Levels doesn't reveal Computer Science/Engineering as a potential choice. I'm sure this is too simplified, but to a large extent isn't this true?


 
I was talking with my friend (she did a phd in Chemistry) about how awful our science teachers were at high school, and how they managed to put me off science, despite being well into it at middle school. The head of year in the options year went about telling girls who wanted to do science to pick "food and nutrition" and told my friend, now with the phd to do "needlework" or something instead.


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## Streathamite (Apr 26, 2011)

The other point of just remembered is this; The greaT elephant in the IT room is how short of skilled staff the industry is, and how the whole problem is simply getting worse.
quite simply, this industry can't afford to discriminate, on grounds of gender, race, sexuality or whatever - and every hiring manager knows it


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## Streathamite (Apr 26, 2011)

_angel_ said:


> I was talking with my friend (she did a phd in Chemistry) about how awful our science teachers were at high school, and how they managed to put me off science, despite being well into it at middle school. The head of year in the options year went about telling girls who wanted to do science to pick "food and nutrition" and told my friend, now with the phd to do "needlework" or something instead.


that is utterly, toptally appalling.
I am genuinely horrified


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Streathamite said:


> The other point of just remembered is this; The greaT elephant in the IT room is how short of skilled staff the industry is, and how the whole problem is simply getting worse.
> quite simply, this industry can't afford to discriminate, on grounds of gender, race, sexuality or whatever - and every hiring manager knows it


 
Which makes the claims of "insidious" and "institutionalised" sexism, all the more fucking ridiculous.

e2a: Dowie's comments up top *nailed it*, thread over.


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## Streathamite (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> Which makes the claims of "insidious" and "institutionalised" sexism, all the more fucking ridiculous.


for the most part, I agree.
I have only ONCE - in a decade of doing this - come across a sign of racism by management - and that was Barings. The banking sector is more likely to be guilty of prejudice than most IMO (all that testosterone and alpha-maleism, plus a disproportionately large public skool element)


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> Which makes the claims of "insidious" and "institutionalised" sexism, all the more fucking ridiculous.
> 
> e2a: Dowie's comments up top *nailed it*, thread over.



Err, no it didn't because it failed to address how you isolate the personal from the social, and assumes, like you do, that sexism and social pressures occur on a purely conscious level.

Generally speaking though, in my limited experience of working in IT, managers will employ whoever they think can do the job - although in my case this went alongside some sexist shit. My experience in Manchester and London was that it was an overwhelmingly male occupation but I think employers like women who they imagine can do the techie stuff _and_ communicate to people well.


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## mentalchik (Apr 26, 2011)

_angel_ said:


> I was talking with my friend (she did a phd in Chemistry) about how awful our science teachers were at high school, and how they managed to put me off science, despite being well into it at middle school. The head of year in the options year went about telling girls who wanted to do science to pick "food and nutrition" and told my friend, now with the phd to do "needlework" or something instead.


 
when i was at school one of our physics teachers told us it was a waste of time teaching girls science


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> Err, no it didn't because it failed to address how you isolate the personal from the social, and assumes, like you do, that sexism and social pressures occur on a purely conscious level.


 
The reality is, thats all we can assume when attempting to deal with such issues.


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## Streathamite (Apr 26, 2011)

mentalchik said:


> when i was at school one of our physics teachers told us it was a waste of time teaching girls science


jesus wept, I could fucking _weep_


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## Streathamite (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> How are you proposing that we isolate the personal from the social?


with very, very great difficulty, I should imagine


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> The reality is, thats all we can assume when attempting to deal with such issues.



Well, that's that then.


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> Well, that's that then.


 
Yup another glaring example of how the world is not perfect, shit huh?


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> Yup another glaring example of how the world is not perfect, shit huh?



What is? Your inability to think past the surface of things?


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> What is? Your inability to think past the surface of things?


 
Our collective inability to understand the subconscious.

must try harder.


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

I didn't say anything about 'the subconscious' - I just said these things go on a level at which we're not always aware/conscious. Why are you so opposed to thinking about it?


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> I didn't say anything about 'the subconscious'


 
Well if its not conscious, what term would you use as the opposite?


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

I'm not sure I have one; people in different fields use different terms to describe what goes on beyond our conscious awareness and subconscious has a particular meaning to those who use it but I'm not one of them.


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> I'm not sure I have one; people in different fields use different terms to describe what goes on beyond our conscious awareness and subconscious has a particular meaning to those who use it but I'm not one of them.


 
So you are not capable of articulating the concept you are describing? Seems to support the idea its not really relevant because its unquantifiable.


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

I didn't describe a concept as such. It was a very general comment referring to how the social forms us in ways of which we are not conscious. 

And why does something have to be quantifiable to be relevant?


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> I didn't describe a concept as such. It was a very general comment referring to how the social forms us in ways of which we are not conscious.
> 
> And why does something have to be quantifiable to be relevant?



Well if you cant quantify something in some way, the debate essentially becomes philosophical and not practical.


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> Well if you cant quantify something in some way, the debate essentially becomes philosophical and not practical.



I don't agree with that although it is true that it doesn't involve immediate solutions.  

One of the things I really liked about working in IT was that my application either worked or it didn't - no grey areas. It was very satisfying being able to provide immediate solutions to problems. But I'm not convinced that way of thinking can be applied to something as complex as the formation of gender.


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> I don't agree with that although it is true that it doesn't involve immediate solutions.
> 
> One of the things I really liked about working in IT was that my application either worked or it didn't - no grey areas. It was very satisfying being able to provide immediate solutions to problems. But I'm not convinced that way of thinking can be applied to something as complex as the formation of gender.



You have not come across inconsistent run time bugs yet then? 

"Formation of gender" ehhhhh, what?


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

grit said:


> You have not come across inconsistent run time bugs yet then?



Surely only inconsistent until you work out what the bug is?

It's been a long time...


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## grit (Apr 26, 2011)

Red Cat said:


> Surely only inconsistent until you work out what the bug is?
> 
> It's been a long time...


 
You can have some code that executes fine 9/10 times, and then fails for no obvious reason. In distinction to compile time bug that can be checked by the compiler and will work or not. This is one of the arguments against high level interpreted languages such as PHP. </offtopic>

Anyway, back on topic, if you are not going to apply the reasoning I'm discussing, what other options do you have??


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## Red Cat (Apr 26, 2011)

Sure, I remember it failing for no obvious reason and being up all night trying to fix it - my favourite part of the job, I was bored when there wasn't the possibility of epic fail.

In terms of finding solutions? I don't think there are _immediate_ solutions in terms of women being more drawn to IT work, but as I've already agreed I think IT managers employ those who they think are up to the job. Despite the gender imbalance, what was striking to me about IT when I worked in it was that people got into it via all sorts of different routes - frequently quite clever people who didn't know what they wanted to do as a career after spending some time on the dole after uni or very often people with no uni education at all. It was a sector that was open to people who showed they had the _potential_ to do it in contrast with nearly every other job these days - in that sense, there is plenty of scope for further change.


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