While women make up nearly 47 percent of the US workforce, they hold less than about 28 percent of the leadership positions in tech. It’s also worth noting that both of these percentages predate COVID-19.(1) When you factor in the pandemic, the resulting layoffs, furloughs and businesses and a disproportionate number of women taking on childcare duties, the gap only widened. Not only is the situation detrimental to women wanting to pursue or remain in STEM, but their absence illustrated multiple reasons why gender diversity puts tech businesses at an advantage – more innovation, better overall business performance, greater revenue, and it fills the need for more talent.
Women bring a diversity of perspectives and opinions to teams, which encourages coworkers to anticipate these differences and work harder to come to agreements. Having to concentrate on mutual understanding means groups can avoid a trap of “group think.” More ideas are put on the table and thoroughly explored, which makes for better solutions as well as fewer shortcomings that can be overlooked due to like-minded team members. In short, when team members are exposed to multiple points of view, they inspire new ideas that in turn frequently beget ever better ideas, and so on.
Research has found that gender diversity leads to higher profitability for companies. One survey revealed that firms that went from no female corporate leadership to a 30 percent female representation translated to a 15 percent increase in profitability. Rather than a difference in ability, greater gender diversity at the corporate level increased a multitude of things such as: skill diversity in upper management, decreased gender discrimination throughout the firm, a much smaller pay gap, and an improved ability to recruit top talent.(2) Another study found that Fortune 500 companies with at least three women in leadership positions saw their ROI increase 66 percent while other companies with the greatest gender diversity produced 34 percent of their revenue from innovative products and services in the latest three-year period.(3)
Lastly, the US tech industry simply needs more talent. More than a decade ago, over half of CEOs expressed concern over the dearth of talent for digital roles. By 2019, 79% had concerns.(4) By 2020, COVID-19 had created an unprecedented wave of tech adoption for businesses across all industries as workforces began work remotely en masse and needed to connect with customers virtually. In essence, what would have been a ten-year adoption to remote work models happened in a single year. Businesses have had to scramble to fill the gap. Big companies with their large budgets stand the greatest change to benefit, but SMBs may experience more difficulty in recruiting the talent they need in order to grow. The U.S. could miss out on over $160 billion of annual revenues by the end of the decade if they fail to meet the need.
In essence, women in STEM represent an enormous resource that companies tend to overlook, meaning they are losing out on greater frequency of innovation, bigger bottom lines, and the means to compete on the national and even international scale.
Sources
1. Awad, Neveen, Hennessy, Alexis and Kim Morse, Christine. “Learning from Women Who’ve Made It to the Top in Tech.” BCG.com, 24 June 2021, bcg.com/en-us/publications/2021/benefits-of-women-in-tech.
2. Vize, Shannon. “Why We Need More Women In Tech.” Mondo, Retrieved 23 August 2021, mondo.com/blog-women-in-tech-business-benefits/.
3. Montilla, Elaine. “Top Three Reasons We Need More Women In Tech.” Forbes, 10 March 2020, forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2020/03/10/top-three-reasons-we-need-more-women-in-tech/?sh=40848ce415fb.
4. English, Larry. “The Tech Talent War Has No End In Sight. Here’s What You Need To Know.” Forbes, 01 June 2021, forbes.com/sites/larryenglish/2021/06/01/the-tech-talent-war-has-no-end-in-sight-heres-what-you-need-to-know/?sh=579067375f2d.