Girls and careers in technology is a hot topic here on SheBytes. We’ve written about whether the amount of technology firms headed by female CEO’s and executives is improving, and have drawn attention to women led startups who are trying to tip the scales.
But as we continue down this road, one thing has become increasingly obvious:
Girls don’t want careers in technology!
Now the question is why?
This is where Belinda Parmar (@belindaparmar) comes in.
Belinda recently wrote a Huffington Post article with the intention of answering this difficult question. But before we get into it, I’d like to highlight Belinda’s own company; Lady Geek TV.
Lady Geek is a unique site which SheBytes loves so much, we included it in our post “Link Round Up: Our Favorite Blogs!”. Lady Geek does something which I’ve never seen before; they are a firm with the sole goal of “helping businesses sell technology to women”. With big companies like B&O investing huge sums of money in researching women and technology, Lady Geek is in a perfect position.
Additionally, the team; who refers to themselves as ‘The Lady Geeks’ creates hilarious tech related videos to parody and publicize the relationship between women and tech. Check out their YouTube channel here!
Now back to our question of why girls don’t gravitate towards technology.
Belinda emphasizes that “girls tend to want careers that lean towards what they deem as ‘creative’”; something which is more than reasonable. But the trouble is, that the first encounter between women and a career in technology is often steeped in boredom; a world of spreadsheets, data and rules.
I am in total agreement with the head Lady Geek in her assertion that we must make a career in technology, from the very beginning, appeal as something creative and exciting which really does utilize the imagination.
Just like young children hate practicing scales on the piano, because they don’t realize just how vital that scale knowledge and familiarity will become later on down the road (for doing really creative things like composing and improvising), girls see tech as rote and unfulfilling.
Coming from a career in tech, I can honestly say that the industry is blooming with fresh innovation and is a thrilling thing to be a part of.
Now the first step is to convey this enthusiasm to young women as they begin on the road towards professional careers.
