Certification - November 2008 - (Page 48)

sit down for a meal and discuss IT careers and address questions. “People like role models,” Dunn said. “So if we can create more role models in the industry, we can, by definition, draw more people in.” Another option for squashing the intimidation factor involves creating hands-on experiences. These demonstrate exactly what IT workers do and show girls they are capable of doing the tasks, too. At Owens’ “We Are IT” event, all activities are hands-on, said Snyder, who chairs the event committee. Girls can choose from sessions on programming and robotics to Web design and game development. “Actually letting them hands-on do that and see that [allows them to realize], ‘Hey, this isn’t so hard. I really can do this.’” As another means of attracting women, the industry can leverage women’s technologyrelated interests in the same way the marketing industry is doing so to sell them products and services. Slade suggested polling women for feedback about the technologies they use and then showing them how they can change what they don’t like. “We try to expose the diversity of what a networking career looks like to get people around the myth that if you come into [IT], you sit in the back room. That’s not really what IT careers look like anymore.” – Jeanne Beliveau-Dunn, General Manager, Learning@Cisco Success With Flexibility Women’s roles in the workplace often require more flexibility. By considering this, employers can increase their recruitment of talented female IT workers. Maria Melfa, co-founder and president of IT staffing company The Training Associates (TTA), said her company has integrated flexibility into the workplace to take advantage of the skills women have to offer. “Internally, we want to be more flexible because we know that there are a lot of very intelligent, capable women out there that have been not taking jobs because of the lack of flexibility,” she said. “Our trainers basically get to choose when and where and how often they want to teach. So it’s a fantas- For instance, if a woman doesn’t like a particular Web site or cell phone design, ask her, “How would you change it?” Then tell her about job roles that deal with those particular issues. Slade said getting women’s input on the design of such products is important not simply for the social justice aspect of diversity in the IT workforce, but “because women do think differently from men. They have different experiences and see the world in a different way. So if there were more women designing cell phones, who knows how they’d be different, and better, for everyone.” 8 CERTIFICATION MAGAZINE November 2008

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Certification - November 2008

Certification - November 2008 Editor's Letter Contents Tech Careers Dear Techie Virtual Village Data Stream Academic Connection Troubleshooting What We Like Look Ahead The Gender Gap: IT Lacks a Woman’s Touch IT for Free: Volunteering Today Interface Technical Architect: Learning, Growing, Innovating Inside Certification Endtag Ad Index

Certification - November 2008

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