Page 20
equal opportunity employment journal
November 2020
The Future of Work is WOMEN IN TECH The future of work is women—specifically, it’s women in technology.
U
nfortunately, the numbers do not reflect that yet. While women make up more than 50 percent of the workforce in the United States, women only achieve about 20 percent of representation in the technology sector. Powerhouse technology companies like Salesforce and Intuit are currently taking steps to hire more women. Salesforce, in particular, took steps to order an internal review of over 17,000 employees and spent an extra $3 million on payroll in order to close the gender representation and pay gap. As a result, women at Salesforce make up 33 percent of their global employees. The road to equality isn’t an easy one—but companies like Salesforce are implementing real, meaningful change for the future of women and their representation in technology. There are many factors feeding into the low representation of women in the technology
by CareerContessa.com
• Gender inequality in STEM jobs That’s not to say that no women pursue STEM. It’s simply that it’s hard to find someone to look up to; someone for a young girl to seek mentorship from, to emulate, or to simply point to and say “I want to be just like her.” So why women in tech?
WHY WOMEN IN TECH MATTER
industry. For starters, girls are discouraged from pursuing STEM at a young age. According to several studies, young girls often express an interest in STEM around age 11. By age 15, many have lost interest entirely. Factors contributing to this drop off include • Lack of female mentors • No hands-on experience or projects focused on girls
Researchers have concluded that boosting the number of women in STEM fields would drastically increase our nation’s pool of talented workers. In addition—and this is so important—higher female representation in technology will bring an entirely new dimension to the entire scope of the work. This allows for entirely new breakthroughs on problems that have been previously overlooked. There have been decades of research pointing to the fact that diversity makes us smarter. In order to solve a complex problem, it is better to
Positions available in various professional and technical fields:
Civil Engineering Communications Contract Administration Finance/Accounting Geographical Information Systems
Human Resources Heavy Equip. Operators Maintenance Planning/Research Project Management Transportation Techs
Texas Department of Transportation Human Resources Division 125 East 11th Street Austin, TX 78701-2483
Additional information may be obtained by calling 1-800-893-6848 Apply online @ www.txdot.gov/careers Equal Opportunity Employer
