Women returners in tech

[MotherOffCod]

Is anyone else noticing a trend for women returning to work after child-rearing years getting into deep geek tech?

I’m my area of the UK it’s a big thing, and seems to be escalating.

Bloody brilliant area to get skilled up in once your kids are older and you’re ready to dig in again.

Anyone else in this sphere? My feeling is that it’s a major opportunity for smart women who’ve been out or the workplace for a while, but have time and opportunity to re-train in exciting new fields with high demand and low supply.

Blobby that’s a great article - loved it.

I’ve had clients where no one was being glue, and found myself getting sucked into that role, because I see the things coming unstuck.

Totally agree about it being a risk to start being glue if you’re not being recognised and rewarded for it. It’s easily unseen work.

I’m in the no-code world, but glue work is everywhere!

Very interesting and inspiring thread! What are the chances of a 50 year old, absolute beginner, who hates social media, and can't even get her phone to work properly getting a qualification in tech? She's very intelligent, honest

Being the "glue" sounds like the workplace equivalent of "women's work". I'm sure it happens in every industry.

Seriously look up project management. Go for agile. Check out the buzz words. It's just being really organised, chatting to everyone, reminding folk to do stuff. Reporting on it all. And you pick up the tech as you go.

Ideally look at software that had something to do with your previous career, then you are a subject matter expert. The tech is learnable, 20 years experience in operations is not learnable, without having done it!

Some UK women in tech resources to find out more -

www.womenintech.co.uk/

wearetechwomen.com/

www.stemwomen.co.uk/

Coding classes for women - codefirstgirls.org.uk/

@MotherOffCod Sharing your story sounds like a fab idea, it was from reading stories/blogs of other women that made the switch that made me think I could do it too.

I am so glad I found this thread. I really need to use my brain again for my own mental health. Still in the baby stage here but am in such a rut. I had so much potential when I was younger but my university education has all gone to waste really! The idea of being "intellectually mothballed" by motherhood for years really struck a chord! I have no idea where to begin but this thread has given me hope so thank you!

So many exclamation marks!!

I have found my people! Loving this thread. I’ll be back later to join in - gotta go do my tech thing for now, and figure out when to slot in my second vaccine without impacting on my planning too much!

Maybe we should do a Mumsnet blog post about it? Is that even a thing?

I am absolutely in a tech field, but it is saturated with the whippersnappers taught everything in uni with fresh brains! I left uni 20 years ago without a sniff of what I do now.
After a few years out having babies, I feel out of my depth and it's also a field where security is key and WFH not easily done.
I'd love to switch to something I feel I have an aptitude in and could work from home. Should be getting Gbps internet soon too!
@WomanInStem42 I'll drop you a DM!

Great thread. I work in a software related role but I've always enjoyed tinkering around with various technological tools and languages. The software industry is pretty vast and evolves rapidly. And I've always found that difficult as it can seem hard to keep up with all the new stuff.

I was in a bit of a rut for a number of years but I've recently started trying to get back into learning something new in my spare time.

There's a free introduction to HTML tomorrow evening (the language used to create webpages/websites at its most basic level).
It's on the Code First Girls MOOCS page - scroll down towards the end.
codefirstgirls.org.uk/courses/moocs/

P.S. MOOCS stands for Massive Open Online Course(s)

I've just realised this free course starts on Monday!
www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/courses/Computing/Skills%20Boost%20for%20Data%20Science%20NPA%20SCQF%20level%204/CR1SBDSC20

Data Science seems to be a big thing these days.
www.ed.ac.uk/bayes/about-us/our-work/education/data-science-technology-and-innovation/programme/additional-resources

@Howzaboutye

Seriously look up project management. Go for agile. Check out the buzz words. It's just being really organised, chatting to everyone, reminding folk to do stuff. Reporting on it all. And you pick up the tech as you go.

Ideally look at software that had something to do with your previous career, then you are a subject matter expert. The tech is learnable, 20 years experience in operations is not learnable, without having done it!

This is exactly how I moved into IT project management. I was asked to take over a failing project because I had demonstrated leadership and delivery ability in my specialty, and these are key requirements. This dual experience was really useful during the 2007 recession as I could flip between the two, SME roles and PM roles, and managed to keep on working through the bad years as a result.

[quote NonnyMouse1337]Great thread. I work in a software related role but I've always enjoyed tinkering around with various technological tools and languages. The software industry is pretty vast and evolves rapidly. And I've always found that difficult as it can seem hard to keep up with all the new stuff.

I was in a bit of a rut for a number of years but I've recently started trying to get back into learning something new in my spare time.

There's a free introduction to HTML tomorrow evening (the language used to create webpages/websites at its most basic level).
It's on the Code First Girls MOOCS page - scroll down towards the end.
codefirstgirls.org.uk/courses/moocs/

P.S. MOOCS stands for Massive Open Online Course(s)

I've just realised this free course starts on Monday!
www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/courses/Computing/Skills%20Boost%20for%20Data%20Science%20NPA%20SCQF%20level%204/CR1SBDSC20

Data Science seems to be a big thing these days.
www.ed.ac.uk/bayes/about-us/our-work/education/data-science-technology-and-innovation/programme/additional-resources[/quote]
There are a few data science and data visualisation courses on Futurelearn too:

www.futurelearn.com/subjects/science-engineering-and-maths-courses/data-science

Some paid but lots of introductory ones are free.

Haha DevOps ...love the terminology...we used to call this 'doing everything' and i was most glad to move away from release implementations and production issues as mainly the companies wanted fixes/releases scheduled out of hours on a rota which was not conducive to me as a single parent. Perhaps now tooling has moved on and more frequent incremental releases are hopefully more common, out of hours implementations are less common.

Systems thinking and digital transformation are huge drivers for tech skills, and growing fast.

Anyone interested in the Project management side of things would do well to get stuck into learning either of those. Or data science, as per previous posts.

Udemy has free courses for various no code tech platforms, and most of those have free levels where you can play.

See what tickles your fancy.

I used to love Excel and MS Access, so the newer database platforms are a thing of joy for me.

Eg lots of demand for AirTable skills at the moment. And anyone who likes a spreadsheet or database will be right at home in there.

AirTable!

Going to check that out.

I was in bleeding edge tech from 1989 to 2006.
Only woman in a technical role over 3 companies.
Loved it, had brilliant opportunities for training and travel and was paid handsomely too.
Packed it in when dh worked away for 5 years to look after the dc.
Would have loved to have gone back to it but things had moved on and I was out of date.
Even now, there are no women in the team I left and it's a huge countrywide company.

There were plenty of techy women in the company, just not in the section I was in.

@Howzaboutye

Blibby that's interesting, but surely that's the project manager role? I don't see how any project could be delivered in time without that role being done.

Well, under agile that formal project manager role doesn't really exist, at least not as a Tech role. There may well be PMs in Business Change projects but their remit is different. The degree to which individual companies and teams retain a formal or informal PM role, and what they call it and how much it's split between more than one person's role varies.

But, that aside.... yes, someone or someones always need to have some ownership of a roadmap beyond the current sprint, mid to long term planning, prioritising, communication beyond the team etc.

What I've seen is that seems to be filled by women more than men in Tech. On paper it seems like a good thing, but because you don't build Tech skills and tend not to have significant line management (because you need more engineers than PMs / BAs / Product Owners / Whatevers), it ends up as a bit of a dead end promotion-wise in Tech.

I've seen a lot of very competent women get sidelined in PM roles - they get seen as a safe pair of hands and very trusted, but they get given the "high downside" projects where failure looks really bad but success is just "meh" - often regulatory stuff or restructures where the effort is really "running to stand still" rather than transformation. The sexy transformation projects go to the boys.

In many ways it's a trap for the competent and conscientious - we are always looking out for any avoiding problems, which means we never get seen as leaders who will take control and manage through in a crisis (because we didn't let the crisis happen!)

I'm very conscious of it and tell my managers bluntly it's a risk for women and I will walk if they do it to me.

I have quite a high appetite for risk and don't flinch at high risk projects. Most of the work I get is because there is a mess that needs unravelling and I have a reputation for delivering in those circumstances. I don't think transformation projects are at all sexy, they are usually a bit of a joke as they are fantasies thought up by idiots. They are usually painful and nasty as the ego that demanded the spend far outweighs the actual benefits possible, in fact I've enjoyed making myself unpopular by trashing business cases for so called transformation which were actually just show off reputation enhancers. My reputation improved by saving them the 1.5 million by proving it was not needed.

That's a shame you've only seen ego-driven transformation projects. There's no doubt too many of them exist, and perhaps it even takes a certain type of "idiot" to be bullish enough to get one off the ground. But there certainly are projects and opportunities that transform a business or part of a business out there as well.

@Blibbyblobby What advice would you give to avoid getting sidelined in a tech PM role?
It’s a really useful insight about the types of projects being assigned, I hadn’t clocked that but I’ll definitely keep my eye out for it in future!

I don’t have children but happy to help anyone!
I work as a self employed SAP contractor

I got my Salesforce admin certification on Monday. Dead chuffed!

Salesforce supermums run training courses from admin to developer and consultant - I didn't use them for my cert but I'm considering the consultancy course.

In terms of pay rates PM is not really sidelining.

www.itjobswatch.co.uk/contracts/uk/project%20manager.do

This analysis which came up on a quick search shows it as the same average as all IT contractor rates at 475. I've seen good ones paid double that and more.

In terms of climbing the leadership hierarchy in permanent employment it is highly visible, more so than come of the tech streams.

Don't be put off if you have the PM skill potential. If you want to be a tech specialist then stick to that track, there are far more openings as there is only one PM on a project after all.

Congrats wincarwoo. So many SMEs looking for salesforce expertise, and it’s growing fast. Great platform to get into as your niche.

NiceTwin, if you fancy getting back in the water, getting skilled up on the newer, fast growing unicorn no code stuff is all about aptitude and fast learning.

It’s an open field because a lot of the roles haven’t really existed before, and what businesses are looking for is technical mastery (or the skills to acquire it fast) along with creative problem solving and marketing or industry smarts.

In terms of pay rates PM is not really sidelining

Aye, that's true enough, I can't complain about the money. I was thinking of the career progression rather than the pay package.

What advice would you give to avoid getting sidelined in a tech PM role? It’s a really useful insight about the types of projects being assigned, I hadn’t clocked that but I’ll definitely keep my eye out for it in future!

Sorry, I don't have a magic bullet! It's a trap I'm trying to avoid but aware it could get me by the end :)

I'm a permie in a big corporate so my advice is probably only relevant in that context. I think just being aware of the possibility helps a lot, and being prepared to sell yourself/push yourself forward, keep an eye out for the groups that are forming to do the investigations ahead of a project and say "I think I can add value to X and I'd like to be involved". Being honest with your manager about your career goals and also what you don't want helps as well, which I think women are not so good at. As Orange pointed out, a project I would hate might be exactly what someone else relishes so the more open we are about where our skills fit, the more chance of getting work that suits us.

Although all that said, if you do get stuck with a poison project, never complain about it, just knuckle down, do it bloody well, make sure you put effort into comms so you build your visibility and network, and make sure everyone knows you were a really strong team, everyone did a fantastic job and your leadership made that happen :)

But ultimately, I will (and have) left jobs that look great on paper if I don't see my role developing where I want it to go. I absolutely don't think it's my employer's responsibility to only ever give me work I want to do, but I also think I owe it to myself to move on if a role doesn't excite me with where it could lead.