Interview - Growth, Education, Women in the Workplace

By Steve Wang

The worth of a person is something people think of a lot. Even subconsciously, people judge the value of someone based on multiple factors. One of those things is gender. When we think of a gender, there are traditional images we have of a gender. The traditional images of our gender have affected the way we are treated to the way we are raised to our profession work. I am a male so, I do not completely understand how women are affected by traditional gender images and gender roles. So, I interviewed two women from the Gear 8 company, a Japanese based web design company, to ask about how their gender has affected their experiences in life.

During the interview, they compensated heavily for our lack of interview skills and gave excellent answers. We started by asking about their early life and childhood. I found the toys that they played when they were young very interesting. According to them, during that time, they spent a lot of their time playing those Gameboys that had colored screens. Originally, I had expected them to play with more traditionally feminine toys like dolls or cooking sets because I expected the parents of their time to think a lot more traditionally. A reason for this could be because our sample size was small and the two women we interviewed just happened to play with these toys. However, it could also be that in Taiwan, parents did not really change the way they treat or raise their children based on their gender. At least not to the extent of other places in the world. The main takeaway for me about their response would be the ways they were raised. They were mostly raised like the way boys typically were and this is different from the ways girls are usually raised traditionally. This might mean that society is now more and more trying to treat men and women as similarly as possible. This might be one of the reasons gender discrimination is decreasing.

Another interesting point is, the boss of that division, said that she would be alright hiring a man. I thought she would prefer hiring women based on her past hiring habits or women would be more suited in her area of work (She worked in design and women’s eyes are better at differentiating color)(Smithsonian Magazine). I also asked her about the advantages a female boss has compared to male bosses. She said that female bosses were usually more empathetic towards others compared to male bosses. So, the workplace might need to hire more females for management positions because for this job, it is important to have some empathy.

During this point, I also asked if they thought their company was very traditional regarding gender relations and gender roles. They generally said that they thought it was fine because they had both male and female bosses. They did not really say anything negative about their company and seemed quite happy with their workplace. This kind of surprised me because there are many traditional Japanese companies stuck in the past. Furthermore, people do not often think of their workspaces so positively. This might mean that society as a whole is becoming more aware about the subject of gender equality and even traditional work environments are taking this into account.

In conclusion, the answers given helped get a clearer view of how women usually grow up in Taiwan, how women are treated in the workplace, and how gender roles currently function in companies. I think the most interesting and surprising thing about the whole interview is that the interviewees agreed to talk about a topic that is very sensitive in the society of today. Furthermore, they gave genuine and useful answers which I did not think people would usually give. This tells me that women in the workplace of Taiwan are being treated more equally to the point of them being comfortable talking about this topic. After listening to their answers, I think that genders in the workplace are quite equal in Taiwan compared to other countries. From the answers I have heard, regarding the workplace in Taiwan, we should focus on maintaining gender equality because the answers given did not mention anything being unfair in the workplace. So, Taiwan should do more checks to ensure this standard is maintained.

1. Magazine, S. (n.d.). Where Men See White, Women See Ecru. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved January 23, 2024, from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/where-men-see-white-women-see-ecru-22540446/