Women in Tech

[MaryQueenofSocks]

As promised, a new women in Tech thread!

This is a space to talk about our industry, celebrate our successes without apology and moan about anything we want to!

We can swap stories, ideas or just shoot the breeze.

Guidelines for this thread:

We are supportive
We encourage each other
We celebrate each other
No judgement on what we earn or what we want to earn/achieve.
If we are working mothers, then no judgement.
If we are child free, no judgement.
Ignore any derailing or goady posts

If anyone wants to add to the above list then feel free.

Come on in, grab a virtual coffee and park yourself on a comfy sofa 😊

Having seen some of the dross that Chat GPT comes up with, I'm not scared. To be honest though I want to shake companies at the minute because no-one seems to want to put the time into bringing on a junior and they want people to have sprung from the womb with 5 years knowledge of a 3 year old product. This attitude is leading to a massive 'Grey Beard' problem in IT I think, certainly most of my group is the wrong side of 50.

I don't think Computer Science is vital to get in to Tech, but if she isn't doing computer science, then certainly she needs strong maths and maybe another science like physics. But most vital to select are subjects that she's interested in and is willing to work towards.

If she can find a subject that brings on her problem solving skills and critical analysis then that would be brilliant, too many folk sit there with there thumbs up their arses when things are not straightforward.

Wondering if I can join. Years as a DBA in many different DBMS on all kinds of platforms from mainframe to AWS and Azure. I’ve literally just retired but I’m looking for a voluntary role where I can use my skills.
Worked mostly in FS and Insurance but also CS.

@MrsWombat It sounds like we might be in a similar position ('m hoping to move out of a health care setting). Feel free to send me a pm if you want to compare notes without us clogging up the thread.

I think maths is more useful than compsci at GCSE/A-level. All my tech and coding skills have been developed on the job through apprenticeships (will shortly finish my master's in Data Science) but maths has been very useful. Many, many people in tech roles came in via routes other than CompSci.

If planning to go the uni route, then you should check typical entry requirements for courses she is interested in. Expect no specific GCSE requirements but for example some of the computing science degrees may prefer computing science or math at A level.

This is a great thread! I was a national account manger for a Saas I quit when I became a mum as the maternity leave was rubbish. I'm thinking of pivoting and finally doing what I've always wanted to do. Front development. I've always dabbled, but I think now is the time to take it seriously and do what I've always wanted to be. Any advice is welcome! My partner who is a senior product owner is dubious that I'll be able to do it. Ann keeps telling me how hard it is.

We take on a lot of data graduates and loads of them have maths or physics degrees rather than compsci

I will only be worried about AI when stakeholders are able to clearly articulate their requirements...

@Ifeelsuchflutterings "I will only be worried about AI when stakeholders are able to clearly articulate their requirements..."

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

Or at the very least know what the want

"I think it would be better if it was better, you know like if it worked differently so it was better........."

Hello, mid 50s QA here for a US multinational. Hubby is a Dev so it's a very techy household, luckily we don't work for the same company, I don't think he'd be very happy if I found bugs in his work! Frantically trying to write and execute my tests before we go into Prep. 😬

My partner who is a senior product owner is dubious that I'll be able to do it. Ann keeps telling me how hard it is.

@Mummynumberoney What aspect of it does he think is sooooo hard? Because tbh if I've taken away anything from a career change into tech, it's that most of it is really not that hard; if it were, men wouldn't be able to do it.

This obviously comes with a caveat that if you're trying to career-change into data science and you're shit at maths and analytical thinking, etc, etc, it's not exactly going to be a cakewalk, but the average motivated individual can learn most things if they really want to and if they try. And I'd expect someone's life partner to be their cheerleader and think highly of their ability to succeed at what they set their mind to.

On the subject of "will AI eliminate tech jobs": yes, but only a small segment thereof. It will also generate many new ones.

What I genuinely do believe is over (and have believed for a long time) is that the age of "programmers" or "testers" is very nearly over. Please note that I'm not saying "developers" or "quality engineers"!

What I mean by this is that I don't see roles that are about pure execution lasting. When I say "programmer", I really mean "person capable of producing code from quite comprehensive specifications, but who doesn't think about the what, why, when, and how beyond the lines of code in their slot.java or report.py file. Those things, an AI already does faster, and the pressure will increase as acceptability for this grows.

What I don't see going away for now are the kinds of jobs that either entail deep technical knowledge or go beyond execution and require an understanding of concepts. Despite their surface-level impressive results, one of the key weaknesses of LLM based AIs is that they have, literally, zero grasp of concepts. Therefore, their output on tasks that would benefit from such is very hit and miss indeed!

What I most certainly don't see going for now is anything to do with value based and human factor relevance.

As for "is tech hard?": it's a large field! Learning how to code is easy, as is grasping the basic idea of a delivery method or writing a few sentences on what should be happening when you click on button X. Doing all this but also doing it well can be very challenging indeed. I personally happen to believe that society at large over-estimates the complexity of "making computer do stuff" and also - alongside a significant share of people in tech - underestimates that of "making computer do stuff well".

I've been 'retired' (read SAHM) for 15 years. before then I worked in software but moved across to standards and processes and discussion facilitation, basically trying to help the techies get the best out of themselves.

Generally upsetting by techies / PMs for making them write things down occasionally, but also upsetting management for saying certain things weren't practical or should be left flexible

That's reassuring!

I am terrible at maths so no data science for me. I love front end so I think that would be my focus, may consider full stack but I know that is more mathy.

Hello, not in tech but after suffering homelessness with a baby and being unemployed I would like to change my life and find a job in tech. I've been researching online but there is too much information. what should I learn to get an entre level job please?

You could start your journey today by going onto the Microsoft Academy site and taking a look at all the qualification pathways there. It's a great place to figure out what interests you and you can quickly get some basic competencies under your belt to start off your CV. The courses are mostly free, you just pay for the exams.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/training/

Once you've taken a look, let us know what interests you and I'm sure there's a lady on here that works in that field and can advise you.

Hope that helps!

I would love to have worked in tech, I love jailbreaking things for personal use / experiments only, I love messing around with hardware and software! But alas I was told at school (and my very old fashioned parents) that science, maths and engineering were male only professions and since I was useless at home economics and pretty much anything academic I should get married and have kids as I had no other uses.
Dd really wants to be a chemical engineer, she's shite at maths though inherited my dodgy maths brain, so I don't think she'll get the grades she needs at GCSEs. if I had my time over again, I'd absolutely want to be a software engineer, I enjoy using python and coding, but unfortunately I think I'm too old now to go back and start again!

Wondering if I can join in, I would love to retrain and move across to a data role (I'm having to retrain for health reasons), I've got a PhD (Science) and have quite a lot of knowledge around big data, however, I am thinking of doing one of the Government-sponsored courses; has anyone done this?

@brokenlore, that is horrible, and I really relate to this!

The reason why I ended up in Tech can be summed up as "my dad told me computers weren't for girls - I was 13 and at peak teenage rebellion, so I decided to learn how to code just to spite him". This is, literally, my origin story, so to speak! I'm still a little salty over him saying that - especially since he now introduces me as "my daughter, she's a tech executive [therefore, my genes outperform yours ...]".

You could always consider a lateral move if you still fancy the idea. Lots of positions in Tech that aren't purely technical and lits of use for all sorts of skill sets. My first boss in the industry had a degree in Spanish literature!

Great thread idea. I'm 50, been in tech since switched from science via a CS masters at 25. I started at a unix/linux engineer, then storage, then contracted for 8 years and now work as a pre sales engneer for a US security software company, based in London. I'm remote working and always have been, at this and previous presales role, since way before covid.

I've seen all kind of shit (and shits) since I started in the 90s, s you can all non doubt relate too. I'm still the only woman in the technical team I work in, and always have been. Loking forward to hearing everyone's experiences.

hello. IT Projects Manager here: have had many titles but started off in support and worked my way though DBA/Business/Systems Analyst/ Product Owner to Delivery Manager and here I am working (remotely from UK) for a large American company. My background though is retail - I do not miss peak period and the world being on fire at xmas 😄

My degree is in languages - so there was no barrier there.

Nice to have found a group of fellow techies!
SoE

@Notmytotoro hello and I'm sorry thing have been so tough.

www.gov.uk/guidance/find-a-skills-bootcamp/london

Have a look through the boot camps for your region and technical interest area.

I would also be mindful of what happens on the exit of some of these. Some are better than others so for example I know the ServiceNow bootcamp lines up interviews on exit.

Do some homework and pop back on this thread with some questions and we will try and help.

Tech is still very male oriented, it's not like you experience massive sexism everyday but it's kind of the low level hum in-the background.

I went to an expo a few weeks ago with my colleague, both dressed up nice (because we work at home and live in joggers so it felt like a good opportunity to fancy up a bit) and we made it into a bit of a game, because you know, you either laugh or cry.

Walking up to the vendors, about half of them moved to their 'oh dear it's a girl, best talk slow and use little words voice',

Them - "We sell this Asset management inventory software, do you know what an Asset is?"

Me and colleague, look at each other then I say, "hmmm assets, yes I do know what an asset it, I also know which asset management inventory tool we use currently, how many assets we have globally, what make, model, version and the information assets/criticality that they process. I know the current functionality of the tool, it's pros/cons and the associated risks. I sign off the budget and influence the board on future budget decisions....... what do you have to offer to this discussion?"

Got so much free swag in that few days, literally loaded down with bags of stuff from all the men trying to apologise when they realised they were losing their opportunity to sell.

@CyberCritical JFC seriously stupid but I have pretty woman moment vibes from the story ..."big mistake, huge" (walks out with swag...hints that a Yeti cup might close a deal)

I work in a vendor and this very example is why they need more women in, mine is actually above the industry norm at about 30%.

I mean companies should reflect society and given women are 51% we have a way to go still.

Hi! I'm an infrastructure engineer :) Thanks for starting the thread.

@CyberCritical I've experienced the same. People often assume that I'm a project manager instead of engineer (no hate to PM's, I started in a similar role"). I have people talking over me, repeating the exact same points that I made, speaking to me as though I'm dumb.

I'm also baffled as to why the world and his wife are learning to code. But nobody wants to train juniors and expect even a mid-level engineer to have the knowledge of an entire IT department. So many people have certification after certification but no basic knowledge.

There are lots of other roles and easier ways if all you want is a better job that are less technically demanding and won't require hours of your personal time playing catch-up...

*sorry for grammatical errors... it's been a long day!