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TECH HAS A DIVERSITY problem, and always had one to begin with.
With more companies releasing their own diversity reports in recent times, the demographics are skewed heavily towards men.
Google, Facebook, and Twitter are just a few examples of where this is the case and when you’re dealing with products that are used by a large number of people from different backgrounds, it doesn’t make sense that only one demographic shapes them.
It’s not a problem that’s going to be solved overnight, instead this is a long-term problem that will see gradual solutions being introduced.
There are initiatives that are trying to address this imbalance. Organisations like WITS (women in technology and science) try to bring women into this industry and retain them, while others like InspireFest hope to help by bringing these individuals to the fore.
The latter is an event run by Silicon Republic, bringing these different groups together. It’s something its CEO Ann O’Dea and her co-founder Darren McAuliffe have been working on for years after seeing the vast majority of panels dominated by men.
After finding this to be “incredibly boring”, they started running leadership events for women six years ago before, both to highlight those in the sector and to highlight the usual excuse of panel organisers claiming they weren’t able to find women to participate.
While the main focus is women in tech, O’Dea calls it a “kaleidoscope of diversity” not only dealing with gender, but with minority groups like LGBT.
The other important element was including the arts as well, a sector that regularly overlaps with science and technology since the latter has become a major part of our day-to-day lives.
Purposely, it’s quite wide. To break down the silos of science and technology is one part because the convergence is so massive now. A lot of these events are either very web-based or they’re very academic so we’re trying to mix the academic with the futuristic with the creative because all of these people should be working together. We’re amazed at how these people haven’t met before… [even when it's] just the Irish audience.”
Although when events or initiatives like this emerge, so too do the criticisms. The obvious two are if someone is good enough for a position, they’ll be hired regardless of gender or background, or that such initiatives portray men to be the enemy.
Dealing with the latter, such issues are solved by involving everyone and it was essential that it wasn’t an event only for women. Of the 2,000 people attending, 30% are male which O’Dea finds encouraging, but while the problem is complex, the immediate answer was anything but.
“There are all sorts of societal pressures, the whole issue is so complex,” says O’Dea. “But for us, it was incredibly simple that you only change the ratio and environment. If people get used to seeing, not token women, but seeing the very capable, remarkable women at their tech events, the more it becomes normalised.”
It shouldn’t be relevant if you’re male or female, it should only be relevant if you’re remarkable.
Also, qualifications is only a part of the hiring process, and no matter how independent and logical you are, you are inevitably going to be influenced by your environment and experiences, both the positive and negative.
While it may be true that the majority of software developers are male, that perception alone can dissuade women from getting involved (If you wanted an inverse example from a different industry, most primary school teachers tend to be female which in turn can result in the same conclusion for men).
The other problem isn’t getting women or minorities into the industry, it’s keeping them there.
Work isn’t just about having a set of skills, the culture of a workplace, people’s attitudes towards each other, and even unconscious bias, our beliefs and values that are established from our lives, play a role and can determines how certain demographics are treated on a day-to-day basis.
That’s a more difficult problem to address and one without a clear answer. For now, it’s a case where chipping away at it, and gradually breaking down the barriers that surround this is the best approach, according to O’Dea.
“They’re [women] leaving exactly at a time where we need talent, we can’t afford for any area to be leaving a sector as big as tech and science so those small things are incredibly important,” explains O’Dea.
I don’t think you can put that too much into people’s faces as they’ll clam up and they’ll forget, but if you gradually wear people down by ensuring that in their sector that it becomes unacceptable, that is the only way you’re going to make a change in my view.
Ultimately, such changes are going to be gradual and while there’s still a long way to go, there are reasons to be optimistic. The recent referendum on same-sex marriage shows that the majority of Irish people are inclusive and could also set a similar trend for the tech industry.
Ultimately, it’s a matter of being open to the idea that our definition of ‘normal’ might not be as normal as we once thought.
“In Ireland, we’re pushing an open door to some extent. I do think there is much less inequality and misogyny in Ireland and the yes vote is a really good sign that Irish people are welcoming.”
“Ireland has an opportunity to lead the way here, we could be the opposite of Silicon Valley where they have the opposite problem of misogyny and women leaving tech. Ireland can be a place where we do the opposite, I really do think so.
InspireFest is a three-day event taking place in the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre from 18 – 20 June.
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under no circumstances should he be handed to usa
@joe doyle: Why there they are supposed to be the good guys nothing will happen to him surely.
@joe doyle: He’s a dreadful individual he conned his friends into losing half a million when they put up his bail then did a runner, he’s a spy & and a traitor putting lives at risk he deserves never to see the light of day again.
@Joe Thorpe: He’s only guilty of telling the truth. Western domination would come tumbling down if that kind of honesty became common place – gotta crush him to make sure other journalists tow the party line.
This comment from @tom_fowdy on twitter is very apt.
“Western propaganda is based on the following principles:
1) We are morally superior and enlightened
2) X country is doing horrible things
3) We need to act and do something about it
And because of point 1, 2 and 3 concurrently are believed every single time.”
@Joe Thorpe:
You are badly linformed.
He has committed no crime. The Swedes have dropped the false rape charge which the US/USA were using to get him to the US, where he faced charges of treason for revealing the war crimes of the US/NATO warmongers.
Now he will be extradited to the US, where he will not get a fair trial and be either “suicided” or murdered slowly by solitary confinement and torture. Guantanamo still exists, there are prisioners there without trial for years.
The US have promised a fair trial and no restrictive measures against him. But if he contravenes any of the conditions of his imprisonment according to the head of the CIA, these guarantees will fall.
The same CIA which investigated assassinating Assange in the past.
@Joe Thorpe:
It is you who is a dreadful individual, what have you done for mankind except make silly remarks?
Julian Assange has more courage, brains and integrity than you had or will have.
Stop watching Sky New/reading the Sun or other British rubbish and try to get information from sources that are not British government mouthpieces.
That includes many Irish media.
Will they be handing over the diplomats wife?
@motojack: She will be under trial in the US and conclusion will be that motorcyclist caused the accident by driving on the wrong side of the road.
@motojack: That was the problem, she and her husband weren’t diplomats and didn’t have diplomatic immunity. I can understand how it can happen as I’ve driven in the US many times. Your natural tendency is to drive on the side you are used to, you really have to pay attention. Why she just didn’t stay and deal with it I don’t know, she probably would have been given a slap on the hand and a driving ban.
@Jim Buckley Barrett: not likely. She would have had to do time more than likely. Britain is draconian when it comes to road deaths or even crashes that are non fatal.
@Jim Buckley Barrett: Both she and her husband are intelligence agents and apparently pretty senior ones . The Americans are not going to allow people like that to be locked up.
@motojack:
No way! The Yanks never hand over their citizens, but expect other countries to do so. Usually the Brits trip themselves over to facilitate them.
Some years ago a US fighter plane flew UNDER the cables of a cabin taking skiers up a mountain in Italian, killing all on board.
The four US military were whipped out of Italy immediately, and never faced charges.
Julian Assange has killed nobody, he has merely exposed the hypocrisy and lies of the “Western” governments, including Ireland, and their war crimes.;
For this he is being punished, also to send a message to other journalists that the truth must not be let out, ever.
@Colin Conlan:
Brilliant!
Yet they won’t send Anne Sacoolas back for killing Harry Dunne and fleeing the country. Disgraceful double standards.
@Mark Brown: https://youtu.be/LVwby34mR6E?t=200
On the basis of ‘four light assurances from US authorities’… Oh yeah, like they have a good track record there.
Shocking and sad day for so called ‘Freedom of speech’ and ‘Democracy’…. And all at the hands of the 2 biggest so called ‘crusaders’ of the ‘free’ world
Freedom of speech is great, until you say what “they” don’t like.
@Kieran Woods: Freedom of speech is only to particular case of saying something irrelevant to a deaf audience. Everything else draws penalty by some law.
The rte website claims the case against Assange is because he “attempted to obtain and disclose national defence information” no mention that Assange actually made public war crimes by US in Iraq, rte is Orwellian to the core in their mastery of language for hiding relevant facts
Imagine he’s only crime was making govts look bad. Telling everyone the truth at what was going and govts all over the world were scrambling. At the end of the day what the US did was illegal and they committed mass murder in the middle east likewise as they had done in Vietnam and anyone who exposed them was the enemy.
There was a doc leaked where it showed the UK GCHQ were tapping all Ireland’s internet cables and harvesting all the private data so they could spy on Irish citizens. Somehow our govt was ok with that!
Lap-dog and Poodle come to mind.
He has severe mental health issues. This is a death sentence.
The objective here is to slowly drive Assange to complete breakdown, it will be dragged out over years to achieve this end, any pretence that the British judicial system is totally independent of the political establishment is farcical.
It will serve as a warning to any future whistleblowers what awaits them if they expose war crimes by any western nation.
The absolute craven attitude from the msm is hardly surprising, case gets coverage only from the legal proceedings point of view but no pressure from the media on politicians to protect whistleblowers that are doing the job the msm are not allowed to do, the EU with all their pretence about protecting human rights are about as silent in this matter as they are regards the war in Yemen and the butchering of a journalist by the Saudis, it’s easy speak out againts clowns like Lukashenko but not good oul uncle sam and buddies, a sad day for proper journalism and the rights of individuals against persecution by militaristic states.
It is easy now for UK to rule subjectively on what they want, as ECJ is out of the way.
Frightening and despicable. You think we live in an enlightened, free society in the West, but do something big enough the establishment doesn’t like and see what happens.
It will be interesting to see if the US adhere to their assurances … serving his sentence in Australia , for example…. that would be hard to swallow as he’s an arch enemy to their LEAs they want an example made of him , harsh sentence and incarceration , as if they hadn’t already done this already to others whistleblowers .
A disgraceful decision but also a totally predictable one. The timing during Biden’s Summit for Democracy is ironic seeing as Freedom of The Press is such a big part of that event.
And we still let state killers land in Shannon and head off to the middle east to indiscriminately murder men women and children.
Will the sht just hit the fan….. And the walls and got smeared.
Great news.
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