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Comment by gorpomon | Hacker News Reader

In reference to the point she makes about people not assuming women are developers, I now make it a point to assume two things about most everyone (male and female identifying) that I meet in tech:

1) That they are competent and smart until they definitely prove otherwise to me.

2) That they are technical and interested in technology.

It's worked really well for me so far. In practice it means when I meet someone I say "You're a dev right?". Most people appreciate being assumed to be technical, and if they aren't we still get a great convo out of it. I admit it's kind of a silly thing, but so far in years of doing it I don't know of a time it's made anyone feel bad.

Edit - Also, if their answer to the dev question is that they are instead a product manager, UX, Designer, etc, I try and follow up with a funny compliment about their field. "Ah, so you make apps useable", etc. Again, just a simple conversational technique to make people feel valued.

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I try to do the same, and I share your experience.

That said, sometimes it gets awkward in funny ways. A few months ago I was at a conference/event selling our product (booth and everything), talking to two young Polish girls who were running a tech startup. I don't recall the details by heart, but it was some marketplace I think. Our product is relatively technical, so your approach, "You're a dev, right?" usually pays off. But these founders giggled, rolled their eyes, and said "Do we look like developers to you?"

Eh, yes? :/

I can see that getting awkward! But, you might also have been able to save the moment with a confident "Yes. You look like you'd make awesome developers."

I try to live by "It's only awkward if you let it be awkward" to get through those situations.

Haven't they seen TV recently? Every hacker is now a hot young chick, since 2010 or so.

I suppose it makes up for the past somehow, but would be nice if the pendulum could come back to center at some point.

They probably, rightly, assumed that certain personality types gravitate toward programming work. They also probably felt that their manner and choice in clothing style helped to convey their personality type. For example, in their minds a programmer might choose to dress more like the girl in "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" or interact socially in a way that's either more intense (excitable nerd stereotype) or more withdrawn (shy nerd stereotype) than is the norm.

I know that despite my gender people will change their expectations about my career based on how I dress. When I had an undercut and wore around hoodies more often people were much more likely to assume I was technical. Now that I've gotten a little older and my fashion sense has become more conservative people tend to assume I'm a manager or in some other sort of administrative/people oriented role.

It doesn't take much experience in the world to notice that personality type, fashion sense, and career choice are correlated with one another.

It takes a lot of experience on the other hand to learn that you are supposed to ignore such things for the sake of politeness.

Along those lines, I don't automatically assume a project manager, sales person, or designer is automatically a moron either, and hopefully they'll do the same for me along those dimensions.

Defaulting to a minimal level of respect is a good strategy and goes both ways.

This has been my strategy as well and I can confirm that only good things have come of it.

Great strategy! Thank you for sharing.

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