Women's representation in tech

Despite making up almost half the global population, women remain underrepresented and underfunded in tech. This session explored the importance of mentorship and networking – as well as access to capital – to help women in business reach their full potential.

Myself and three amazing female colleagues from big group attended at Web Summit 2023. What we heard resonated with us, making us think about the company we work for and how women are represented in our workplace. Let’s jump in to what was said…

Women in the workplace and tech. It’s a conversation that happens over and over, but is anything changing? I don’t know about you, but I am bored of having the same convo again and again. Us women know our strengths, and those of our colleagues.

A bit of background: At the big group agency where I work, 52% of the workforce are women, with a 50/50 split across the whole business. Which seems fair? Getting granular, our Search, Tech and Data department is 44% female, and the main board of the business is 1/3 female. So, we as a business are getting there, and are already at parity when it comes to the workforce. For senior leadership, we still need to make progress, but experience takes time, and we know that every single woman on the board is respected across the business.

I have one small stat to share with you. The talk was attended by only five men. Five. Out of an audience of nearly 100. Which begs the question – where are the advocates? Where are our allies? Are men even interested, or am I writing to an empty room here? We know you’re out there, so make yourselves visible and join in the conversation. Those five guys? Kudos to you. I’d like to be able to walk past a women in tech talk (as a woman in tech) and see an audience of men. At the moment these talks, attended mainly by women don’t manage to enact change, they have nowhere to go as they’re preaching to the converted. If men don’t engage in the debate, we’ll be having this same talk in ten year’s time on the same stage.

Talk with us. Listen to women in the workplace and understand our perspective and our challenges. We’re in this together, so step up and play your part. We’re going to keep succeeding, keep progressing, and keep working towards equality of opportunity. We’d much prefer to do that with you, so we ask you to engage more actively.

Back to the bigger picture: Fewer than 30% of women work in tech, and the higher up the business ladder we look, the fewer women there are in leadership and senior roles. There’s a lot of talk, but we need to see more women role models in tech, it’s as simple as that. As Marion Wright Edelman said about the numbers of women in Computer Science, ‘You can’t be what you can’t see’. And she was right.

The talk asked the questions - Should there be more training on gender bias? Should we be less conservative in our outlook? Stop under-celebrating our achievements and be prouder of what we are doing?

We walked away from the session inspired by the power of change and the possibilities that lie ahead of us. In many ways we are fortunate to work in a business that has made and is making positive steps forward, but the lingering questions remain. Where are the men who say they’re with us? How long do we wait until we achieve parity? And, most importantly, when will we no longer need a women in tech stage?