How to #BreakTheBias and combat workplace gender bias in the tech industry
The campaign for International Women’s Day 2022 is on breaking the bias, and we as Verve Women are all here for it!
You may have heard of the term ‘gender bias’, but did you know we’re still very far off where we should be in ensuring there is gender equality in the workplace? There’s many forms of gender bias and i’ll go through real-life examples and types of implicit gender bias that women experience at work. I’ll also provide practical tips on what businesses can do to eliminate this bias.
“Earlier on in my career, a senior male colleague in sales said I won’t be taken seriously because ‘my wife has large breasts like you’ ” (Anonymous)
“I was asked “why do you need to leave the office at 4.30pm, can’t your wife pick up your son from school?” (Sidd Venkatesan)
“Being assumed that the woman in the meeting will be the one to make the tea and take notes” (Penny Townsend)
These are just a few of the quotes both women in tech and men have faced, showing workplace bias aimed at women throughout their careers. It’s 2022…yes we have come a long way in breaking the bias against women in the workplace over the years, but we are NOWHERE near where we should be. For businesses to have employees who are performing better, retaining them and increasing revenue, they NEED to work to break the bias in the workplace.
Unfortunately, bias against women in tech isn’t just men being bias towards women, we’ve been given examples of women biased against women, such as:
“Earlier on in my career, I was told by another woman when entering sales that I won’t be able to achieve my ambition of leading complex deal pursuits without many years of experience” (Rebecca)
I personally know that isn’t true, because there are many opportunities for growth and promotion within tech, which doesn’t need to take many years to get there!
Research has shown that having a diverse workforce can lead to better decision making, greater innovation and higher engagement in the workplace (Andra Picincu, Chron). However, the hard truth is that although businesses are working towards increasing diversity in the workplace, there is STILL a large gap in women in leadership positions in tech and women are STILL being underpaid. The Harvey Nash Tech Survey 2021, showed that women represent only 10% of leadership roles in the tech industry.
Yes…you read that right…10%.
Role models and representation matters, and the lack of women at senior positions continues the myth that women are not as good at science, technology and maths as men. This is especially shocking when you see statistics that show companies with more women on the board of directors outperform those without any women by 26%! So, considering all the benefits that gender equality in tech can bring to the workplace, why is there still not enough being done about this?
Let’s start by digging into more detail on what gender bias in the workplace really is and what businesses should be doing to combat it.
So what is gender bias, and why does it matter?
I’m sure most people know that gender bias is about someone being treated differently based on their gender identity. But what some may not know is that bias isn’t always explicit; sometimes the biassed actions of another are due to unconscious bias, or implicit bias which happens when an individual unconsciously attributes certain stereotypes or attitudes to another person or group of people.
There are a number of unconscious biases related to performance which disproportionately affect women’s success in the workplace, this is especially true for women in a typically male industry such as tech.
Some of these are:
Support Bias - when employers, managers and colleagues provide more resources and opportunities to one gender (typically men) over another.
Review Bias - the tendency to review one gender (typically women) more subjectively from another (typically men) - even when the review meetings are meant to be based exclusively on performance.
Reward Bias - the tendency to reward an employee of one gender differently from another gender. These rewards can be in the form of promotions, raises or other performance based rewards. This is also linked to attribution bias.
We know that this is especially true for women as studies show that women are still underpaid compared to their male counterparts doing the same role, especially in the tech industry. A data collection study found that in London, men have a 10% higher pay than women, and found on average, salaries were 3% higher for men than women working in the same position.
Steps to tackle bias in the workplace
So now that we understand gender bias and the different types of unconscious bias that can exist hindering women’s growth in tech, what can tech businesses do to break the bias?
Take a top down approach - Change needs to start at leadership level and trickle down the employee chain. Only then will true change happen in breaking the bias, as they will be promoting a culture of inclusivity and diversity. Leadership should come up with model policies that encourage diversity, such as flexible working.
Implement regular gender bias training - Organisations should be offering regular training sessions to make individuals self aware of the unconscious biases they may have and steps they can take to reduce the likelihood that bias will affect their decisions.
Go above and beyond in recruitment - Review the language used in your job descriptions. Use this free gender decoder to identify subtly ‘gender-coded’ words. Research has shown that women are put off from applying for jobs that use words that a typically associated with male traits, such as “determined” and “dominant” . Read more on glassdoor to find out about how you can change your job descriptions to avoid gender bias. You can also take a look at The GEC (The Global Equality Collective) to find GEC member organisations that have great talent.
Elizabeth Broderick AO, Founder, Male Champions of Change said “Unless we actively and intentionally include women, the system will unintentionally exclude them”. Thus, businesses need to be doing all they can to combat gender bias.
Invest in your female talent - Businesses need to be investing in upskilling female talent to increase retention and inclusion in the workplace. Research has shown that organisations which have traditionally been very male-dominanted environments, such as tech, struggle to retain diverse talent once they hire it and this is because they’re not doing enough to keep them.
Diversity affects a company's bottom line…yes I said it. A McKinsey analysis found that gender-diverse companies are statistically 15% more likely to outperform their less diverse counterparts in achieving above-average returns.
In the UK, for each 10% rise in gender diversity amongst senior executives, EBITA increased by 3.5%. So if companies want to increase their returns, it’s vital to do everything they can to retain female talent.
Recognise the urgency - Waiting for the STEM gap to close at its current rate will take decades, so it’s imperative that we do everything we can to help the effort NOW. Businesses need to do more to find, hire and retain talent from underrepresented groups in tech such as women and minority ethnic background, to address the STEM skills challenge.
There is a clear economic benefit to closing the STEM gender gap, but have you thought about the economic benefits to your organisation? It’s very likely there’s a strong business case for closing your gender and diversity gap based on reducing spend on recruitment, contractors or freelancers alone.
From the above, you can see that to truly break the bias in an organisation, it takes both a top down approach from C-suite leadership and employees to be more self-aware of their unconscious biases and actively work to eliminate these in recruitment, performance reviews and day to day interactions. Once this is achieved, businesses will see happier employees, increased retention and financial benefits.
Have you experienced gender bias in the workplace?" We'd love to hear about your experiences and how you overcame them in the comments below.
If you are working in the tech industry and would like to get more free advice on how to overcome biases in the workplace and get ahead, join our community .
Thank you to Cat Wildman, Co-founder of The GEC for supporting ideas on what businesses can do to close the gender gap.