On this International Women’s Day – the 100th – I remain frustrated, but optimistic about the role of women in Europe’s ICT sector.
I am optimistic, because I see women and organisations taking steps forward every day. And there is great interest in these issues (my tweets today on IWD have been retweeted more than any others since I started tweeting!!) But still the pace of change, in particular in the ICT sector, is slow.
So, let’s start with the positive. There are great role models everywhere.
From the brave women of Egypt – who now deserve a full role in their country’s future to European women featured in this great calendar. From the companies that have signed our Code of Best Practices for Women in ICT, to the all the women who’ve made ICT what it is: from Ada Lovelace, the very first programmer, to the women who programmed ENIAC the first computer
But we face a long battle. Generally, as this video shows, and in ICT in particular – to win for women the opportunities and recognition they deserve. And this is not just a problem for them, for us as women – this imbalance is a problem for the whole sector. The ICT sector must find a new gender balance if it wants to avoid underperformance and a huge skills shortage in coming years.
The imbalance is so obvious it is hardly to make the explanation interesting. Can anyone name a woman who set up and run their own huge ICT company? In that hall of fame, the names you think of are Jobs, Gates, the Google guys, the Skype guys, Zuckerberg and his friends. It’s time we saw a woman on that list.
That would not be an answer in itself, but it would be a sing of deep cultural change. A sign that we can do more than run networks and camps and codes – a sign that women were really included in the sector. So we have to take a very broad perspective – starting with the school system and going right through to the top of the profession. Getting and keeping women in ICT is about career progression, equal pay and balancing family and professional life. See my full speech here.
From classrooms to boardrooms to garage start-ups: my message is the same. There is no point in getting half of Europe digital. There is no place for macho nonsense in our digital future.
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Tags: Ada Lovelace, Digital Agenda, Digital Agenda for Europe, Egypt, ENIAC, ENIAC women, IBM women, Intel women, International Women's Day, IWD, Jan 25, Kroes, Neelie Kroes, Women Egyptian revolution, women in ICT
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Et les femmes arabes jouent toujours un rôle dans les sociétés européennes mais aussi dans les différentes révolutions qui secouent les 22 pays arabes. un respect s’impose.
Dear Ms. Kroes,
Indeed, I wrote it in the context of our activity around “Women Role Models in the Digital Age” for the “Women for Smart Growth” workshop at the Digital Agenda Assembly! 
In your honor, please believe me when I say it was a total accident that I yesterday made a blog-post entitled exactly the same as this one (http://bit.ly/everyWoman). I flatter myself to think I could be as clever as you, but please read the post to see where the idea came from.
To encourage your blog readers to hopefully also get involved in this invaluable discussion, I include links to our online activities here.
Blog: http://bit.ly/EUwomen
LinkedIn: http://linkd.in/euwomen
Facebook: http://on.fb.me/EUWomen
Twitter: @euwomen Hashtag: #daa11women
We are also carrying out an ongoing survey on “Women Role Models in the Digital Age”: http://svy.mk/DigitalWomen
Looking forward to seeing you at the Digital Assembly on 16-17 June, and keep up the great work being one and also promoting Women Role Models in the Digital Age!
80% of the speakers at the European Internet Foundation reception on the eve of the Digital Assembly were Women. So too were 30% of the industry representatives in the EIF audience.
I do not know the proportions for the Digital Agenda Assembly, probably significantly less, but I noted that the workshop on “Building and Open and Global Market Place” had approximately 30% women in the audience, which was almost entirely from industry.
From 1988 – 92 I was project manager for the first “Women into IT Campaign” in the UK. It used £500,000 from Government to run an office which raised over £20 million in cash and kind from industry to help organise employer-supported careers activities and returner programmes. It was terminated because the trusteees were personally liable when Government not only declined to provide ongoing funding for the campaign office but cut funding for local careers services - so that office was swamped with direct enquiries.
The campaign had raised the proportion of applicants to university computer courses from 13% to 27% and showed what could be done if you were serious. The proportion has since fallen back to barely 10% in the UK.
One of my conclusions from that exercise was that women are interested in technology for what it can do. Men are interested in it for its own sake. Another was that a woman project manager is more likely to bring a project in to time and budget with no publicity. Meanwhile a male project manager will win promotion by being seen to win battles, even if they were unnecessary and expensive.
The other side of the coin was that my trustees (all-female) would not allow me to use “robust political techniques” to secure renewal of the public funding.
Applying that thinking to the attendance at the EIF and at the Assembly sessions:
- Women were being sent by industry to those sessions where they wanted to see action.
Forget social justice.
Do you want agreement on a course of action that can be delivered ?
Do you then want delivery to time and budget ?
Put a woman in charge.
Glad you mentioned the role of women in Europe’s ICT sector.
The results of the recent survey had shown that in Europe the position of women life conditions and state of mind became much better than in previous decade. It’s a great news I think.
But it would be way much better if we could get good results in muslim countries. I wish they could fiunally understand that they can’t treat women the way they do. It’s wrong.
International women’s day! Is it really international? While only in Russia and other post-soviet countries people celebrate this day…
Very inspiring. Thanks.