Women in tech can have it all – even an arts degree

Actually, imposter syndrome as presented here, is not real. Just a handy political fiction.

Sometimes people feel like they do not know what they are doing, and generally, such feelings are accurate.

Claiming despite any evidence to the contrary that they are actually geniuses seems to be all the rage with womyn_in_tech right now, and I find it pretty silly.

They do seem to feel that men are better programmers than them:

> Struggling with the course work, perceiving her peers (mostly male) as doing much better with much less effort, feeling a misfit between herself and a cultural norm that associates success with an all-consuming love of computing, she questions whether she belongs in the department. [1]

But this difference is not a false belief implanted in their minds by a male conspiracy, this difference is real, and kind of obvious. If anything, people chronically overestimate their competence [2].

1. http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/project/gendergap/www/p...

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

As someone with an arts degree I have found that knowing how to tell a story really well; and working collaboratively with subject matter experts has made me a successful and valued contributor on technology teams. Theatre people know how to hit a deadline, to make the tradeoffs necessary to do that, and how to handle immense pressure with a spirit of humor and focus on quality.