Women enter tech with enthusiasm, occupational hazards hasten their exit

Women make up only 9.8 per cent of those contributing to open-source software projects. We found that women's negative experiences range from minor to severe harassment, sexism, discrimination and misogyny to explicit death threats. Their expertise is challenged, their contributions are not well-received and their roles diminished unspecified

Although there will be 3.6 million computing jobs in the US, by 2029, the turnout of graduates with computing degrees will only be enough to fill 24 per cent of those jobs. For decades, the US has poured resources into improving gender representation in the tech industry. However, the numbers are not improving proportionately. Rather, they have remained stagnant and the initiatives are failing to make it any better.

Women make up 57 per cent of the overall workforce. Zeroing down to technology industry, they make up only 27 per cent of the workforce, in comparative terms. The picture turns worrisome when considers that more than 50 per cent of them are likely to quit before the age of 35, while 56 per cent are likely to call it quits midcareer.

The pertinent questions that arise include ‘why does the technology industry have a retention problem? Why are women employed in it are quitting in high volumes? What factors contribute to this low retention of women and what kind of support do they need to stay on and succeed?

I'm an information science researcher, specialising in gender and information technology, women in STEM – science, technology, engineering and math – online communities and open source software. My team at the University of Tennessee conducted a research to address these questions. We found that retention plays a large role in the gender disparity in the tech field and that online and physical spaces that support women can boost retention.

Reasons for quitting: Research shows that women face many challenges in the tech industry. The gender pay gap is severe. They do not get opportunities similar to that of men-for instance, only 18 per cent of the chief information officers/chief technology officers are women. Moreover, they are subject to unfair treatment. My research team focused on the experiences of those women with a particular focus on the treatment they receive at the workplace and the nature of support systems for women who succeed.

We studied open-source software communities because they present an extreme example of gender inequity. Around 70 per cent of all the software that supports technology infrastructure is open source, which makes open-source software integral to the future of the tech workforce. Yet women make up only 9.8 per cent of those contributing to open-source software projects. We found that women's negative experiences range from minor to severe harassment, sexism, discrimination and misogyny to explicit death threats. Their expertise is challenged, their contributions are not well-received and their roles diminished unspecified. They face constant harassment and deal with ‘normalised’ abuse, often hearing that ‘guys will be guys’ and they deal with isolation because they are often outnumbered by men.

The impact of these negative experiences and occupational hazards comes in the form of multiple levels of harm. For example, the individual harm that a woman faces leads to incidental harm of other women being discouraged from participation, resulting in further collective harm for the open-source software community in the form of fewer women participating.

Overall, these negative experiences are detrimental to the retention of women in open-source software and the tech industry in general.

The culture problem: Mainstream media often reports on open-source software's toxic “tech bro” culture. In recent years, high-profile leaders in open-source software have been exposed for their abusive behaviour. Open-source software icon Linus Torvalds stepped aside from the Linux kernel after his toxic and abusive emails to other developers were exposed in the media. His decision to step down came as a result of questions about his abusive behaviour in discouraging women from working as Linux kernel programmers. Another towering figure, Richard Stallman, was pushed into resigning from Free Software Foundation and MIT after a very successful career in open-source software because of his views on paedophilia and multitude of sexual harassment cases from students and faculty at MIT over the course of 30 years.

Such public incidents of unprofessional behaviour from tech industry leaders have a chilling effect on the participation of women and perpetuate toxic behaviour.

Support systems for women: With regard to support systems, we observed and documented the value of online spaces that focus on women in the form of social, emotional, technical and networking support. The key to supporting women in open-source software, we found, are online spaces that are focused on female participants and are readily accessible through the websites of open-source software organisations. The spaces help because they provide a sense of community for women working in open-source software. Of course, they are not exclusively for women.

Fedora and Debian women: When women face discrimination and misogyny, these spaces allow them to reach out to other women and seek social and emotional support. They mentor each other to navigate the toxicity of the tech industry and find avenues to call for gender equality. We found that women flourish when supported by community guidelines, such as code of conduct for online spaces, in-person events and professional organisations. Codes of conduct often become advocacy tools for women's equal treatment in open-source software online communities. They serve as tools for women and allies alike. When women are supported by mentors and allies and can network in their communities, and when they see role models, they are less likely to quit. The retention problem can be addressed by tackling gender disparities in the technology industry with online and physical spaces that focus on women, policies and practices to ensure equal treatment, female mentors and role models.

(The writer is Professor of Information Science at University of Tennessee)