Interview - Women in Tech

By Yiler Huang

Women in families and society is one of the major topics we explored this semester. We had discussions about women's role in different situations and how they were treated differently from people of opposite gender. In order to get a grasp upon how is it like to be a woman in workplaces, we invited a woman programmer who was also the financial provider in the family, Claire, to share her experiences with us. We've prepared questions about the information we wanted to learn about, and I was in charge of learning informations about her relationship with society as a woman programmer.

Based on the information I knew about Claire, I made some assumptions before the interview about how she would answer these questions. One question I was interested in was what advantages or disadvantages has in the tech field as a woman. I felt this was an important/interesting topic because it is a topic people would rarely share about due to the sensitivity of this topic. I expected that one of her major disadvantages is the limited variety of social interactions available to her due to the gender imbalance in the workplace. I thought this way because she mentioned in her website that she doesn't participate in some of the activities her co-workers do namely drinking after work, and this might limit the chance for her to socialize with people around her outside of work.

I was also interested in how others view her as a woman who provides the family money, I expected her to say her co-workers would feel it is special in the beginning. I thought that most people would think that this situation is rather strange because women who are the breadwinners in the family are still rare in the modern society. However as time moved on people might start to get used to the fact that she is the one making money in the family. This is because according to my own experience, people will usually understand the situation someone is in after knowing them. Therefore, her co-workers might not feel her situation is too out of the ordinary.

I was also wondering how other people's opinions about this issue might have changed or affected her. I expected her to say something such as she was not used to the views from people in the beginning but she got used to these views and felt more free to express about her situation after years of experience. I thought this way because it seemed like she is quite comfortable to share about her situation on her website. Another information I wanted to know was if there are special reactions from people around her because she is a woman programmer, I assumed she would say people do have special reactions when they learn that she is a woman programmer. This is because in the society, woman programmers are still relatively rare. Therefore, people might be surprised due to the rarity of women programmers.

After the interview, we got some valuable results from Claire regarding women's role in workplace and families and I wanted to share some of the most memorable ones to me. In the beginning of the interview, we learned about the disadvantages and advantages women have in a programming company, and Claire shared some information with us. She believes that one of the major disadvantages of being women in the tech field is that she does not have female co-workers to discuss with about the technological knowledges after work, which made her progress not as easily in improving her technological knowledges. She also shared with us about some of the advantages she thinks women have in the tech field. She believes that women are more capable of dealing with things involving personal interaction, such as marketing, designing user experience, resolving conflicts etc. Because of that, she thinks the balance between women and men in workplaces is important. I think these two statements are both very valuable, and even though we have a limited number of interviewees, we can see that one of the problems in the tech field is the lack of balance in two genders. I would say my prediction about this topic is somewhat accurate, which could mean that my understanding of the topic might not be too far from the current condition of society.

Other than the advantages and disadvantages Claire has in the work field, she also shared about her experience about how people around her view her as the financial provider in the familiy. She told us that many people around her would think it is weird or unusual for her to be the financial provider and her husband to be the one talking care of the kids at home. In the beginning, she would also feel it is weird and feel uncomfortable about this situation. However, after she continued working, she saw her potential in the workplace and accepted her role as the financial provider of the family. In my opinion, society should soon adapt this kind of family model. This is because more and more people are expecting women to work, and it would be unreasonable if we want them to work but think it is unusual for them to be the financial provider at the same time. My prediction on this topic is also not too off from the real situation, but after the interview I have gained a more educated view about this topic.

The last piece information I wanted to discuss about is a rather surprising one. During the interview, Claire said that she observed instances of harasment from men to women in the company. This was a question I did not prepare for hence I do not have a prediction for it. It was a surprising fact to me, because she told us that the women that were harassed did not say anything about it. I think could also be caused by the lack of women in the workplace, which seems like a serious problem in society.

Over all, I think the information we learned from Claire were all valid results for us to gain a more educated understanding of women's role in society. Based on what we learned from Claire, I feel that there are still problems in society. Namely imbalance in workers of different genders, society's view of women workers, and how men treat women in work places. I believe that in order to make society a more friendly place for women workers, some adjustments have to be made. However, this is not an easy task, and this topic definitely needs more attention from the general public. Like what we did this time, society should survey women in workplaces and understand the general feeling of woman workers in society so we could identify the potential problems in the society.