Today is National Women in Engineering Day – this year is the first time I had heard of it but if you keep up with Engineering or STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) news, you would’ve probably heard about it a lot over the past few months. It’s a big topic. At my company, they tried to get women to post with the #notjustforboys hashtag. Which is fine, a little cynical sounding but it gets its point across.
I went to a photocall this morning for all women engineers in London. London is hugely populated and I maybe half expected people to travel down. Unsure if they did. But over 800 people attended. I was oddly disappointed in the number, it just showed how few women engineers there are. I guess it might sound like a lot, but that is less than all the pupils from one (typical) secondary school. 6% of the UK engineering workforce is female.
The photocall itself was not super well prepared and I felt like I would rather be at work really! Which is kind of ironic, thinking about why I was there.
I’m finding it more difficult to find the time to take part in these activities, keep up with Engineering events (quite difficult when these events start at 6pm and you’re a good hour away from central London) and ultimately have time for myself. But the real question is, does enforcing females to get in the industry really ultimately matter?
For me, it’s not about whether you have XX or XY chromosomes. There is a serious and growing gap of skills shortage in the UK. My company released a report on the skills shortage and stated that if we could just increase the amount of females in the industry by x amount by 2020, we would double our workforce. Yeah ok I can’t remember exact figures, I did read it 6 months ago (give me a break).
I’m not saying feminism is not a problem but not one I would 100% focus on. I have heard stories from podcasts and experienced my own inequalities in the industry. It’s not pretty and it’s pretty damn ruthless. But honestly, it happens in a lot of industries – like retail for example.
Oh and about that Tim Hunt thing? Kind of in 2 minds about it. Mostly I think that what he was trying to say got misconstrued completely. Yet some of the stuff he said I can’t understand at all – how girls cry when criticised? I don’t know what he was trying to get to, or whether it really was just a really poor joke. Because have you ever seen how certain men react when criticised? Not exactly professional, I’ll tell you that for sure…
✰ Xiarrr ✰ 