Empowering women in the tech industry

The existing gender gap across the tech industry is increasingly seen as an urgent issue that needs to be tackled by the public and private sectors and policy makers. The speed of technologic development that it is taking place and how it affects all aspects of our society and daily life means that technology-based products and services should not be scoped, developed and delivered based on the perspective of only half of the population. Therefore, more needs to be done in order to encourage and support more girls & women to study, work and grow professionally in areas directly related to technology. This challenge looks for projects and digital solutions that have shown to contribute to the reduction of the gender gap within the tech industry and that can be replicable and scalable in a systematic manner.

The challenge

The gender gap that exists across the tech industry, resulting from the low number of girls choosing STEM subjects and then ICT careers as well as the low number of women working in the industry, but also present at Executive and Board level, is increasingly acknowledged as an issue that needs to be tackled in a systematic manner both by the public and private sectors and policy makers.

In addition to this, there is a growing sense of urgency to accelerate the reduction of this gap due to the technologic development that it is taking place and how it affects all aspects of our society and daily life. Technology-based products and services should not be scoped, developed and delivered based on the perspective of only half of the population. The development of artificial intelligence, robotics and big data connected to IoT and new industrial, working and living environments require more inclusive and diverse teams, as otherwise this will have strong negative consequences in society at large.

Many events and initiatives have already been developed to tackle the existing gender gap within the tech industry. However, the results have often been limited due to the lack of continuity of these programmes and emphasis in areas that have a limited capacity to create impact at a significant scale. Moreover, in some countries like the USA, UK and even Spain, there has been a slow, but steadily decrease over the last decades of the number of females studying STEM subjects and entering the tech industry.
More needs to be done in order to encourage and support more girls & women to study, work and grow professionally in areas directly related to the development of technology.

This challenge looks for projects and digital solutions that have shown to contribute to the reduction of the gender gap within the tech industry and that can be replicable and scalable in a systematic manner. These can be data-driven HR solutions, mentorship and on the job apprenticeships programmes for female talent development, coding training programmes developed for females, among others.

Find out more here 


Article Source: https://d-lab.tech/women-in-tech-ch4/

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No GA727816.

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