Rudimentary gender biases prevalent in tech sector, says report

We uphold the tech and IT sector as the pantheon of innovation in the modern era, yet a new report has shown that it may perpetuate traditional gender discrimination.

It’s an interesting dynamic when an industry is praised for its innovative prowess but, at the same time, often regurgitates harmful gender biases that have disenfranchised women for decades. Innovation and progression should go hand in hand, when in reality, the tech sector has been pointed towards as a key detractor of gender equality.

A new report launched by Professionals Australia – Employment and Remuneration Trends for Tech and IT Professionals – has found that women in respective tech and IT sectors are at a significant disadvantage.

The report suggests that the gender pay gap is prevalent yet experienced differently across the IT industry. The game design and development sector (14 per cent) and the new tech segment (13.4 per cent) has a gender pay gap on par with national figures on the industry gap.

The key takeaway from the report, however, was the fact that only 23 per cent of the IT professionals surveyed were female, a proportion to the national figure of 21 per cent. This is by far the widest gender gap nationally among any group of professionals, with the next largest being among design, engineering, science and transport professionals (33 per cent).

“With just 23 per cent of survey respondents female, women in the tech and IT sector continued to be significantly underrepresented, particularly in senior managerial roles,” said Professionals Australia interim chief executive Paul Inglis.

“Gender pay gaps in the games industry and ‘new tech’ sector of around 14 per cent persist, and it’s clear that businesses must do more to attract, retain, and support women into senior leadership roles.”

The roles of women in the IT sector differentiated with 40 per cent of them being level 1 tech and IT professionals. While just 17 per cent were in level 4 or higher roles. This suggests that efforts to introduce more women into the IT industry may be having some effect in terms of young women joining the industry at an early career stage, yet numbers are still low when it comes to senior positions.

The report stated that addressing the retention and progression of women is critical to reverse the underrepresentation at senior levels. To achieve this, attention to improving workplace culture, remuneration and opportunities should be in the strategy, as those are common EVP standards for young women workers.

Discrimination, harassment, and bullying were also pinpointed as some other hurdles that women IT professionals face in the industry.

“Overall, women were also more than twice as likely to report harassment and bullying. Women considering leaving the industry were more likely to report reasons of discrimination, bias and incompatibility of work with parenting responsibilities compared with men,” the report said.

As the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) reports continue to create a layer of accountability for not only organisations but also industries as a whole, it’s crucial that strategies are implemented to overturn these damaging gender statistics.

If not, these traditional gender biases could remain the status quo, keeping an innovative industry on the back foot when it comes to progression.