The Manager of Systems Services at my company once said to my face that he did not believe women could by good sysadmins until they PROVED IT TO HIM. But men he just assumes can do the job. There is now ONE woman on his team, she is a Mainframe person and I honestly think he only hired her because it is so incredibly difficult to find skilled MF people these days
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So, I'm not this kind of woman, but here's what I'm led to understand by female coworkers and friends:
In general in the sciences and tech and whatnot, the guy thing, the macho thing, the I know how to do it and you don't thing, the whole culture is (apparently) intimidating. Also, the I'm the only woman in the room thing isn't so cool either, which lands you in a neat little cycle. Personally, I have always just wanted to beat the guys at their own game, but I am not the norm.
Add to that the demanding, obnoxious users who think they know better (especially better than some chick) and it doesn't surprise me that most women stay the hell out of IT.
And though I realize you know a fair number of female developers, in my office of about 140 people, there are about 5 female developers.
I was sitting in a meeting one day where one of the Directors of the company was giving a talk on Engineering planning and such to the R&D Engineering organization. I looked around.. there were 2 women in the room. One was my Project Manager, and the other was me. I don't feel like there's a culture of discrimination at this place, but well... the numbers speak. This is not the case in the Bioscience side of R&D where female PhD's almost outnumber the male ones. It is also not the case in the IT organization here. There are far more women in the IT organization than in the engineering one. I keep looking for ways to change the male/female ratio in the R&D Engineering department, but I haven't found any yet.
I got bored and tired of the crap and went back to opera.
There are times where I miss it. But they are few and far between.
And for what it's worth, where I worked there was little to no issues with sexism. So I'm not sure what other people are dealing with. Nathan works with a lot of women in the consulting area of IT. Maybe that is where they all are. Much more money there.
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The Manager of Systems Services at my company once said to my face that he did not believe women could by good sysadmins until they PROVED IT TO HIM. But men he just assumes can do the job. There is now ONE woman on his team, she is a Mainframe person and I honestly think he only hired her because it is so incredibly difficult to find skilled MF people these days ( ... )
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In general in the sciences and tech and whatnot, the guy thing, the macho thing, the I know how to do it and you don't thing, the whole culture is (apparently) intimidating. Also, the I'm the only woman in the room thing isn't so cool either, which lands you in a neat little cycle. Personally, I have always just wanted to beat the guys at their own game, but I am not the norm.
Add to that the demanding, obnoxious users who think they know better (especially better than some chick) and it doesn't surprise me that most women stay the hell out of IT.
And though I realize you know a fair number of female developers, in my office of about 140 people, there are about 5 female developers.
Reply
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There are times where I miss it. But they are few and far between.
And for what it's worth, where I worked there was little to no issues with sexism. So I'm not sure what other people are dealing with.
Nathan works with a lot of women in the consulting area of IT. Maybe that is where they all are. Much more money there.
Reply
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