Ask HN: How to help get more women in tech as a male? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How to help get more women in tech as a male?

7 pointstobz34 comments

There's been a groundswell over the past few years of organizations dedicated to helping get more women into tech, along with other STEM fields. Usually, though, these organizations are for women BY women. As a male, it feels like it would be considered white knighting, or condescending, to try and offer help to these organizations, or to attempt to start something on my own.

I'm looking for your thoughts on what I can actually do to help this movement. Any real-world experience would be greatly appreciated.

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I'm a female designer/dev. I got my diploma in design & then I went back & got my bachelor in CS (Maths).

Some here have mentioned interest & I agree. I think being a dev in general is a pretty lonely world. Multiply that by about 100 if you're a female dev. This is the same for anything STEM-related. I was the only girl in my high school physics class of 40+ boys, then 20 girls in 400 for CS & most dropped out by the end. I think you have to have some kind of underlying "geekiness" that makes you prefer looking at a screen vs anything else.

Most females that I know either A) don't know what a startup is at all or B) would love to learn to code, but shake it off as something they could never do. In the case of B), it would really only take one male/female to invite them to a meetup, hackathon, coworking session (or whatever) & perhaps that would be enough. I guess what I'm trying to say is, work out a way to make "tech" seem like something other than what non-tech females probably think it is - White men, incapable of non-awkward conversation, playing WoW on a Friday night in a dim-lit room.

Also female dev here - I think we all have our unique story about how we stayed in tech against the odds, rather than going with the flow. It might be helpful if we could, as women still working in the industry, compile a proper set of documents about the challenges we faced. It might help if there were just more details out there rather than the few stories we pass along when a post like this comes up.

Definitely easier now for the kids though - I've met 9 year old girls lately who are rocking python/robot dev and if they can stay in all-girl schools through secondary school (or have a very female-supported CS dept if mixed) they'll have good chance of staying in STEM.

I also have to say, because this is fairly recent for me, I've become less and less of a dev myself and more management and I'm having a blast. My years of dev has really gelled with the demands on product development and I very much enjoy the dynamics of running a team - something I never thought I'd find interesting. So it's something quite new for me, and as I know it's more common to see women building a career in management rather than thank of themselves as part of the coding team but I can see clearly how having more dev experience just makes you all the stronger. Might be a compelling argument for those going through school with their eye on an executive position for their future.

The problem with getting women into tech is that so few women finish school with a tech degree, so no matter what you do, there's going to be a huge imbalance until this changes. It's very difficult to change career later in life, for both men and women.

I think the greatest benefits come from getting girls excited about STEM careers, but this is a much longer term approach. I'm really dismayed at the peer pressure I see in school that steers boys and girls in different directions, since this is something you have to fight at home and de-program your children. Get your daughters a microscope, telescope, computer, whatever. Use it with her, show her all the cool stuff in the world and talk about how it works. Don't go for "girl-friendly" approaches, since IMO, those are condescending. Treat her like a curious little scientist, not little Suzie homemaker with a science hobby.

Having kids, it really pisses me off that people say boys are "smart, strong", and that girls are "cute, friendly". Freaking double standard.

I'm not sure why this is such a problem; a tech degree isn't necessary to be successful as a software developer. It may not even be all that helpful.

Agreed. I am only one data point, but i have no degree and I am a female dev. We're out there.

As data points go: male developer, serious systems programming background, 1 semester of college.

Maciej Ceglowski is, I think, even worse off than I am. He went to art school. Now he controls the Internet from his perch atop Pinboard.

I've worked in this industry for a long time, and while I have worked with fantastic self-taught developers from non-tech degrees, it seems to me that they're the exception rather than the rule. I would not hesitate hiring someone without a tech degree based on their experience, but they seem fairly uncommon. Most of the developers I've worked with seem to come from CS/EE backgrounds.

Good developers are all exceptions, not the rule. The majority of CS grads are not in fact effective programmers.

I went to a liberal arts college and got so well-rounded I can't stop rolling.

It's very difficult to change career later in life,

Perhaps I am showing my age, but a significant fraction of the seriously good developers that I know do not have CS degrees and sometimes even university time. Heck, I am quite happy with my career, and I went to university before there were even CS degrees to be had.

I think this is more true in this field than any other.

1. Give money to organizations that are doing the work you want to support

2. Get your company to give money

3. Speak out when you see sexism

4. When you are hiring, specifically reach out to women tech organizations (I have a women's college in my town with a CS dept -- I made friends with the Dean and some profs -- I send intern and job openings to them)

I think that there's work that you can do to increase the number of women applicants, so I do it. By the way, these things help to increase diversity along other dimensions, which you should also do.

#4 is a really great idea, and something I'll have to try and research. #1 - #3 are very good, too, but #4 hits a chord with me for some reason.

I'm a male, I attend three Meetup events that are focused on Women/Entrepreneur. I asked the organisers first if it would be cool to attend - to avoid whiteknighting, I've been declined permission from others.

When attending I work hard to spend more time listening, hard for me, I love my voice. Sometimes I relate stories how I would handle jerk coworkers or push for things I want in the workplace. Feedback shows me that assertive women get called names :(

This condescending behaviour is core issue that keeps women as 2nd class. You don't need an organisation to work on the solution.

My new favourite hobby is to clown the shit out of males when I hear their verbal diarrhoea. It works great. I get to take the moral high-road and insult some dumbass for the entertainment of those around me. Win,win,win.

In our office gender, religious, ethnicity insults, or condescending actions or language is taken seriously. Eg: telling someone to "stop being a bitch" or a "that's gay" comment means you're buying lunch - a $200 offence. 3 strikes and you're out.

So basically I'm saying: be excellent to each other and mock ignorance at the top of your voice.

Get married, have kids, invest in their lives and share with them your passion for technology. If you have daughters, they may choose tech.

My wife and I have chosen not to have children - for reasons personal to us. That's why the outreach aspect (if I can't pass the torch along to my own, I want to pass it off to someone) is big to me.

You can always adopt. That's a double-win: improve lives without growing the population of Earth.

Corrupting other people's children is usually practiced by secret societies, religions, sororities, TV companies and/or Tumblr posters. So try founding one of those.

To get more women seriously involved into technology, you realistically need to get more women to be unsocial and spend the majority of their lives planted in front of a glowing computer screen.

The reality is not that "careers in computers" are too hard to get into, or that we need them to be friendlier. In fact, I have personally found working in computers to be generally unfriendly across the board. I welcome any changes to make working in computers more attractive to women, because it would make it appeal more to myself as well. Since I already work in the field, it would just make the field better.

The fact is that a majority of women don't realistically want to be in the field once they know the full story of what is required to succeed in it.

I am aware of the people who have had computer careers and found them generally cheery, friendly, and easy, but I don't think this is the common case.

I really think the key problem is interest. My girlfriend got her degree in human resources for example while I didn't graduate high school and got a job in IT. Most of the people in her class were women by a decent majority. They could of went for computer science degrees, they prefered human resources, Maybe its sort of a non-problem.

This is an important point. While the industry isn't always super welcoming to women, that isn't the whole problem. Lots of women just have other interests. We'll probably see gender parity in IT when we see gender parity in nursing.

I would rephrase that further to say: are diverse interests between the genders a problem?

I have never heard anyone complain that we have too few male teachers, nurses, or airline attendants.

Even better than I put it, I agree overt sexism is a problem in some companies but I doubt it is really a huge issue in CS courses in academia and that is sort of where this problem begins.

I've never heard anyone suggest that teachers, nurses or airline attendants are highly-paid elites...

> I have never heard anyone complain that we have too few male teachers, nurses, [...]

You haven't looked. Programmes exist to increase the number of male teachers and male nurses.

interesting. i'm guessing from your spelling of "programmes" that you are not in the US - where are these programs you speak of? i'd be very interested in reading about them.

Mindset is important, shift your thinking from White Knight to Strategic Agility.

Recruiting women to your team or company can be a huge competitive advantage, especially given the growing importance of diversity and global markets. Keep an eye out for the most talented women-- they will be your secret weapon.

(Full disclosure: I'm not part of our talent coordination / hiring efforts, everything is anecdotal here)

A predominant amount of the applicants we see (we, as in, the people who are told that there's a phone screen or interview to be done) are male. It feels, strictly from my limited experience, that a big chunk of the problem is finding qualified female applicants.

I'm not sure if it's a lack of female applicants period, or a lack of qualified ones. This also goes back to me asking for real-world experience, because I'm not even sure where to best focus my donations / efforts.

If you met someone who could use your company's product/service-- wouldn't you put them in touch with the appropriate sales people?

Same applies to recruiting talent. If you recognize a high-potential candidate-- help them connect with a hiring executive. You'll be seen by the higher-ups as a Big Picture thinker. Unfortunately, myopic corporate HR staff often fail to enlist the broader networks of existing employees.

Yes, thank you. The white knight attitude can be very frustrating and give the opposite of the desired effect. We are an asset, not something to be saved from other fields.

The best thing is to insist your tech employer interview female candidates. Speak out if they don't.

The NFL has the "Rooney Rule" that has been instrumental in generating more african american head coaches. Make your company have the same.

Retire to create less competition for them. Then spend money on software contracts to create new seats.

Is this serious?

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