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Could a Grace Hopper Get Hired In Today's Silicon Valley?
theodp writes "There has been lots of heated discussion on the topic of where-the-girls-aren't, both in the tech and larger business world. Dave Winer broached the subject of 'Why are there so few women programmers?', prompting a mix of flame, venom and insight. Over at Valleywag, Nitasha Tiku pegs 'Culture Fit' as an insidious excuse used to marginalize women in tech. Completing the trilogy is an HBR article, 'Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?', in which Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic concludes the problem is that manifestations of hubris, which occur much more frequently in men than women, are commonly mistaken for leadership potential. So, with a gender and age strike against her, would a Grace Hopper in her prime even land an interview in today's Silicon Valley?"
You never see women hanging off the back of a garbage truck. Is this a problem? Why is it a problem that women don't want to be programmers but not a problem that women don't want to be "garbage persons?"
Having met http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_hopper briefly while I was at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Texas_at_Austin back in the '70s I can say without a doubt she would be highly regarded in the current environment. She is known for COBOL but her accomplishments are many, including very early compilers and standards for FORTRAN. She was very influential to me. If she was 40 today I would easily imagine her leading a Silicon Valley company, as her tenure in the Navy was very similar, requiring leadership and technical capabilities, but she chose military service for her career, making what I consider very significant advances in computer science. She really was quite an imposing figure for a 90 lb grandmotherly woman. I wish I could have known her better. During many of her lectures, she illustrated a nanosecond using salvaged obsolete Bell System 25 pair telephone cable, cut it to 11.8 inch (30 cm) lengths, the distance that light travels in one nanosecond, and handed out the individual wires to her listeners. One of her great quips: "The most important thing I've accomplished, other than building the compiler, is training young people. They come to me, you know, and say, "Do you think we can do this?" I say, "Try it." And I back 'em up. They need that. I keep track of them as they get older and I stir 'em up at intervals so they don't forget to take chances."
Women don't often choose tech as a career. But those that do get paid more and find jobs easier then comparably qualified men.
Every company that does any business with government is always looking to hire females/minorities. They are required to. Don't pretend that doesn't have an effect.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
There weren't very many female CS students at college with me, and they ranged between worthless (few) to okayish (most) to exeptional (very few). In other words, pretty much followed the same patterns as the male students, albeit being far fewer in numbers.
That said, I gradumicated thirteen years ago. So YMMV.
This is exactly the problem. The pipeline is bled dry waaaay before actual companies try and hire women programmers. There is quite possibly some sexism involved in hiring practices, but the bigger issue is why are there so few women in a position to be hired in the first place? Why aren't many women choosing to study these subjects. Are they being discouraged from studying computer science? Are they graded more harshly? Is it social pressure?
I've been wondering recently if it isn't more to do with expectations. Men are judged very harshly on their career. A man with a crappy job is often unfairly seen as a crappy man. Women are given much more space and encouragement to "find themselves" I find (anecdotal I know....) and can work "lowly" jobs without judgement. This is likely due to the fact that they encounter more obstacles than your average man, so people generally cut them more slack (reasonably). But I can't help but wonder if the lowered expectations isn't also preventing some women from finding their true potential. A more insidious form of sexism since it's based on good intentions.
There have been lots of studies about this, and one of the most telling related self-employed/small business owners based on gender lines, where men and women had relatively equal qualifications. As self-employed individuals, this avoids the potential bias of a glass ceiling or other unfair discrimination. As you'd expect in today's environment, men outperformed women on average.
However, that's not all. The study included a metric to determine the goals of the individuals; money, etc and if you split it up your comparisons based on their goal focus, you found something interesting; men tended to focus on making money, and would sacrifice vacation, schedule, family, etc to do it, while women placed higher priority on a short commute, flexible schedules, family (including child-rearing), and so on. This is all expected stereotype, not at all interesting.
What was interesting is when matched to those women who made money their motivation, men were beaten handily. In fact, once paired with same-motivation/goal, women out performed men almost across the board, achieving a higher success rate, and in general, a higher level of subjective happiness across those metrics. The averages are just skewed because more men choose money than women, and we tend to use money as an objective measure of success.
The salient point to take from this is: Men and women have different goals and motivations, and that can affect both their career choice and their apparent success in a given field to an uninvolved observer. Trying to artificially adjust this rate will probably end badly, unless you change the definition of success. However, few businesses willing to hold an employee up as 'very successful' when their primary goals include child rearing and vacation time.
As an aside, this is also why there are so few female CEOs, especially of larger, higher dollar businesses. Many of those CEO's have unbroken strings of management reaching 30-40 or more years. On the other hand, many female managers have taken time off for children, family, etc. They're not being penalized, but simply put, one individual shows a greater dedication towards advancing the business than the other. ... I'd like to link to the article, but it was in a business magazine, and I couldn't find a reference to it online
I had a 1st grade teacher who was "very concerned" with my math skills. She told my single, working mother, who was also earning a degree in civil engineering, "You know, there are even some girls doing better in math than him."
I remember the way she taught math was explaining a problem, then assigning a few pages of problems in our workbook, and offering candy (Smarties) for pages turned in. Math was right after recess, and the school wasn't air conditioned so she kept the lights off most of the day. Turns out, that at 6 years old I was just more interested in sleeping in a warm dark room after running around than earning candy by doing a bunch of adding and subtracting. Meanwhile, the girls who were talking during workbook time were given a pass, but boys who talked "were unfocused."
That would have been '85 or '86.