A male-dominated IT industry is problematic to a workforce that faces skills shortages in technology. Women are crucial to keeping up with the demand in an ICT workforce that DEEWR predicts will grow by 33,200 workers or 7.1 per cent from 2012 to 2017.
The problem is there’s not nearly enough women entering the industry as there should be. The Australian Computer Society’s Statistical Compendium 2012 found women only make up 19.73 per cent of the total ICT-related occupation workforce, declining from 24.10 per cent in 2011.
However, the percentage of women working in the industry may increase if the number of young women studying IT is any indication. In 2013, 52 per cent of students studying IT at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) were women. This compared to 51 per cent in 2012 and 52 per cent in 2011.
Grace Sharma, a recent IT graduate of RMIT University, completed her Bachelor of Telecommunications and Electronics Engineering in November 2013 and landed her first job as a system engineer at a consulting company in Melbourne in March 2013.
Sharma says there were more than 200 men enrolled in her course at university and about less than 10 per cent were women, with most of those women dropping out within the first two years.
From my days helping to set up a Mentoring Program for women in IT it is discouraging to see things haven’t change much in over ten years. Women are smart but don’t they feel they are smart enough for the technology space? What is stopping women from claiming this traditionally male-dominated space their own? This article attempts to find out. More here – https://www.cio.com.au/article/535814/what_stopping_young_women_from_taking_up_career_it_/
Curated from www.cio.com.au