Nancy’s Blog

Today’s NY Times has an article about the continuing lack of women in science and technology, based on a study by the Center for Work-Life Policy, a nonprofit organization that studies women and work, to be published in the Harvard Business Review in June.  The purpose of the study was “to measure the size of the gender gap and to decipher why women leave the science, engineering and technology professions in disproportionate numbers.”

It seems that more women are getting degrees in the fields in question — engineering, the hard sciences, the life sciences.  And they get good early job evaluations, so the problem isn’t quality.  And men do leave these professions — but proportionately more women do.  The reasons, they say, are varied, but can be subsumed under “pervasive macho culture.”  They don’t like the culture; they suffer harrasment; they are out of the loop; they don’t get mentored.

One story is telling: a woman named Josephine who was nicknamed “Finn” found it to her advantage to send email as Finn.  She got information that “Josephine” didn’t. Her advice: “Get yourself a Finn.”  (Apologies to my Finnish friends — you’re not the kind of Finn that she meant.)

The full report is a book available via Amazon et al: Off Ramps and On Ramps: Keeping Talented Women on the Road to Success (Harvard Business School Press).

If you missed this in the NY Times, it’s well worth reading:
Women Are Never Front-Runners by Gloria Steinem.

By the way, most of audio/video reports on Hillary’s emotional moment in New Hampshire stop after the first few seconds and don’t play her whole response.

Excerpts from Steinam op/ed:

So why is the sex barrier not taken as seriously as the racial one? The reasons are as pervasive as the air we breathe: because sexism is still confused with nature as racism once was; because anything that affects males is seen as more serious than anything that affects “only” the female half of the human race; because children are still raised mostly by women (to put it mildly) so men especially tend to feel they are regressing to childhood when dealing with a powerful woman; because racism stereotyped black men as more “masculine” for so long that some white men find their presence to be masculinity-affirming (as long as there aren’t too many of them); and because there is still no “right” way to be a woman in public power without being considered a you-know-what.

I’m not advocating a competition for who has it toughest. The caste systems of sex and race are interdependent and can only be uprooted together….

But what worries me is that he is seen as unifying by his race while she is seen as divisive by her sex.

What worries me is that she is accused of “playing the gender card” when citing the old boys’ club, while he is seen as unifying by citing civil rights confrontations.

What worries me is that male Iowa voters were seen as gender-free when supporting their own, while female voters were seen as biased if they did and disloyal if they didn’t.

What worries me is that reporters ignore Mr. Obama’s dependence on the old — for instance, the frequent campaign comparisons to John F. Kennedy — while not challenging the slander that her progressive policies are part of the Washington status quo.

What worries me is that some women, perhaps especially younger ones, hope to deny or escape the sexual caste system…

This country can no longer afford to choose our leaders from a talent pool limited by sex, race, money, powerful fathers and paper degrees. It’s time to take equal pride in breaking all the barriers. We have to be able to say: “I’m supporting her because she’ll be a great president and because she’s a woman.”

I don’t work in IT, so my opinion on this is based on anecdotes and hearsay, not empirical data or my own experience. But I find this interesting — from Silicon.com – excerpt:

Are women ‘too smart’ for IT?
Best of Reader Comments: Or is it too macho…

By Gemma Simpson

Published: Tuesday 23 January 2007

Women are abandoning techie careers, with many put off by the long-hours culture and lack of flexible working. Currently only 16 per cent of tech workers are women, of which few are in management roles, according to IT industry trade group Intellect.

The female flight from IT may not be a question of sex discrimination but more about poor working conditions, say silicon.com readers, as the IT workers suffer from a lack of flexible working schemes and the threat of losing their jobs dues to offshoring.

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Charles Smith, a consultant from London, pointed out IT workers worry their jobs will be exported and are expected to work long hours of unpaid overtime by myopic management.

Women, readers argue, are simply being more choosy about life-work balance than men - and thus they are leaving the industry.

One reader pointed out that women were “maybe just smarter” for shunning IT careers in favour of “much easier jobs” such as being a doctor, lawyer or accountant.

Others said it was a lack of interest in the subject matter. An anonymous reader said he had tried to encourage women to learn more technical things but “only men seem to want to be technical”.

Some female readers said IT has become unattractive due to the ‘macho culture’ and offensive behaviour of their male colleagues.

I haven’t seen this, but today’s SF Chronicle has an interesting review:

She’s Such a Geek! Women Write About Science, Technology & Other Nerdy Stuff
Edited by Annalee Newitz and Charlie Anders
SEAL PRESS; 231 PAGES; $14.95 PAPERBACK

Looks like it would be of interest to a lot of young women I know.

I don’t usually watch Washington Week in Review on PBS, but when I did last week I was struck by the ordinariness of what would have been extraordinary not that long ago: all the participants, the moderator and all the guest journalists, were women.

Young women today generally don’t realize how fast things have changed. I remember, when I was growing up, being told that women could never be TV or radio on-air personalities, because women’s voices were too high and unpleasant. And women print journalists were mostly restricted to newspapers’ “Women’s” sections. Later a program like WWIR would have one woman, rarely more.

However — I’m reading Madeleine Albright’s autobiography, and watching the WWIR group I wondered when we’ll see women who look like her - of her age and body type - on the air. Shortly after this, I reached the point in her book where her husband of 23 years and father of her three children leaves her, telling her that she looks too old.