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Amazon Embodies the Gender Gap in Tech

Posted by Soulskill on from the don't-let-the-name-fool-you dept.

New submitter chpoot writes: "The Guardian reveals the gender breakdown among Amazon's management 'S Team.' At one end of the team of 132 are 12 secretaries. All are female. At the other end are 12 who report directly to Jeff Bezos. All are male. Of the 119 remaining when Bezos and the secretaries are put to one side, 18 are female. Amazon, of course, grew out of book selling. Book selling, publishing, and writing have all a fairly admirable tradition of employing women. In its attempts to overthrow traditional book selling, Amazon seems to have been particularly successful in subverting that part of the tradition."

13 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. Hmm.. by Travis+Mansbridge · · Score: 5, Funny

    And here I'd always heard that Amazon women were particularly cutthroat..

  2. And Amazon's not the only one either! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There's also a surprisingly low percentage of female garbage collectors.
    Since that particular job requires very little education, it would be far easier to start there when trying to close the gender gap.
    Why aren't we?

    1. Re:And Amazon's not the only one either! by MightyYar · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The Venn diagram for "WOMAN" && "STRONG" && "NO EDUCATION" is smaller than the same for "MAN". Women tend to be more educated and weaker.

      Educated and physically weak happen to align well with the stereotype of tech nerds.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    2. Re:And Amazon's not the only one either! by lagomorpha2 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Women tend to be more educated and weaker.

      Educated and physically weak happen to align well with the stereotype of tech nerds.

      The types of education women tend to get on the other hand do not align with the types of education associated with tech nerds. No, your gender studies degree is not as valid as my programming experience.

    3. Re:And Amazon's not the only one either! by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Purely out of curiosity: what percentage of this "management 'S' team", that the article refers to, are working as box shifters?

      It's amazing to me how so many people in these threads keep missing each others' points.

      Like GP, and apparently the parent commenter, who seem to have totally WHOOSHED the point that "gender inequality" is usually only raised when the subject is attractive, well-paying jobs, which is hypocrisy. Equality is equality, including garbage collection. Anything else is inequality, by definition.

      This only serves to reinforce the same old point I have been making for many years: most "feminists" I have met did not really want equality; they wanted advantage.

  3. how come we never hear by ganjadude · · Score: 5, Insightful

    about how few females are truck drivers?? or garbage collectors? or oil field workers? or (insert other industry here)

    Why does it seem that tech is being unfairly beat up because of a apparent lack of women? the lack of women does not automatically mean that there is some sexist agenda, It could simply mean that there are A - not enough women wanting to be in the field or B - better qualified candidates who happen to be male.

    Females wanted equality, I define equality by giving the job to the best candidate, not an artificial quota of genders in each position

    --
    have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    1. Re:how come we never hear by LMariachi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Your examples all select for good upper-body strength. You may as well point out that there are no female linebackers in the NFL. Office work and management has nothing to do with raw physical ability, so unless you’re prepared to make the argument that women are genetically unsuited to the cutthroat world of sitting on one’s ass in front of a keyboard, you better re-examine your premise.

    2. Re:how come we never hear by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I have a team of all male, all white people. Since I don't care about the sexual preferences of my workers I can't really say whether they're gay or not (in my experience, an oddly large amount of good programmers actually is), so I can only stereotype by the things I see because, frankly, I don't really care. For all I care I'd hire a blue-skinned alien that has all three genders instead of just two as would be normal with his species, as long as he/she/it performs what I need from him/her/it.

      The main reason why they're all male, all white is simply that so far only male and white people even applied for the jobs. That doesn't mean that I'd hire a black dyke because she's a black dyke. But if she knows her shit I'd hire her. Not because she's a black dyke, not despite her being a black dyke, but because she knows her shit.

      I can only hire people who apply, though. If you bemoan the lack of "diversity" in a field, first of all LOOK at the field. If you have two female engineers in a team of eight, it looks very unfair to the women, until you notice that one out of ten engineers in total is female. Then it suddenly looks quite unfair to the males.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  4. Amazon is not a "bookseller" by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Amazon is not in the same business as traditional bookselling. Amazon is a tech company which sells books (among other things). As a result, the characteristics needed in its employees are those of a tech company, not those of a book company. I used to work as a bookstore manager. If you look at the types of jobs that are typically dominated by women and the types of jobs which are typically dominated by men, you discover that those jobs require different characteristics. Bookstores and publishers require a mix of those characteristics, as a result, you have a fairly even distribution between the sexes.
    I tried to explain why Amazon does not need to have more women executives, unlike bookstores and publishers, but I cannot quite put it into words. I do not think Amazon would be hurt by having more women executives. It is just that the nature of the company is such that men are more likely to have the characteristics which cause them to rise to executive positions.

    --
    The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
    1. Re:Amazon is not a "bookseller" by west · · Score: 5, Insightful

      One major problem is that human beings over-generalize. It's very easy for a field where there might be a "natural" split on the basis of ability and inclination of 60-40, that quickly becomes 90-10. Why? Because every member of the minority is subject to far higher scrutiny (see the famous "you suck at math", "women suck at math" (XKCD comic). Their errors are remembered, their abilities questioned.

      Now, this is *not* deliberate discrimination. This is how the human brain works. We see a pattern and we over-generalize from it.

      However, in the end, it does mean that a substantial social injustice is done. People who have both ability and inclination are driven out of the profession (who wants to be in a profession where every mistake you make will count for 5 times everybody else's in the opinion of your peers).

      So, I see no great leap that we consider changing the the "natural" outcomes of a system to compensate for certain defects in human reasoning systems by building in certain other compensating elements.

      To make a *rough* analogy, in a "natural" setting, the physically strong dominate the physically weaker. As a society, we've decided this domination is not ideal, and we've passed laws to restrain the natural interactions between people. At this point, this unnatural intervention is so all encompassing, we don't even blink at the idea that physically strong individuals are denied their natural dominance. (And indeed, lose the culture among the strong that they would otherwise enjoy.)

      Obviously male dominance in the executive suite (or tech) is a far more subtle matter calling for far more subtle compensations, but lets not fool ourselves. Pretty much every reader here is already the recipient of interventions on their behalf. And no surprise, the world is a lot better for it.

  5. huh? by shadowrat · · Score: 4, Funny

    At one end of the team of 132 are 12 secretaries. All are female. At the other end are 12 who report directly to Jeff Bezos. All are male. Of the 119 remaining when Bezos and the secretaries are put to one side, 18 are female.

    I don't know what i'm supposed to be picturing here? what is the significance of the ends? are employees implicitly linear? is it particularly damning that the secretaries are all put on one end instead of being allowed to freely mingle with the other 120 team members? Do the 12 team members who report to Bezos somehow balance out the 12 secretaries? why are there 12 of both? Why are they at the other end? do they never get to see the secretaries being so far away? Is this just a super complicated way of saying that out of 132 team members 30 of them are female and the most important 12 members are all male?

    Are any of them hot?

  6. I'll just say it by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'll just say it out loud for everyone. Most women are not that aggressive. Most men are. Often it's a detriment in the modern world. Where it's not is in leading business. Why are most HR departments filled with women? Because women and men are in fact different and our gender does affect how well we perform and enjoy certain tasks. We have equal opportunity laws because most is not all. There are women that make great executives and they should have the chance to show it. But to expect very specific roles in a single company to be gender equal numerically is just stupid. Are we going to accuse Etsy of sexism because the majority of their customers/stores are run by females?

  7. Re:And this is just fine. by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Childbirth is exactly one of the reasons why women are at a disadvantage. Because getting kids is actually considered a health risk, much like a bad back or failing heart would be. The mere fact that woman may get pregnant, have a child and would take time off to at least raise it for a few months is a risk that simply cannot happen to a man.

    Or rather, if it ever happens to a man, I sure as HELL want that guy in my team, the PR alone is worth everything...

    Children are a health risk from an employer's view. Depending on the local laws you may not be allowed to use the woman fully while she is pregnant, especially during the last trimester, she will be absent (obviously) for a while during birth and depending on your local laws again she will be out of commission for a while afterwards, in my country this can be up to 3 years.

    That alone makes woman very unattractive as employees.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.