A Glaring Lack of Women Software Developers

Part 2: Suppositions, Solutions, Summary

Relationships

As a software developer, one spends more time in relationship with machinery, though this has been significantly altered by the Agile process (but many male developers now feel they spend too much time with other people).

This may run counter to innate psychology between the genders – the more nurturing profession, such as nursing (a feminine function built right into the word) is dominated by women (approximately 10-1), though more men are entering this field. This field is inherently built to service other human beings directly, supported by medical knowledge and processes.

The philosopher Ken Wilber stated that agency is a masculine trait, whereas community is a feminine trait (note that he is not saying men or women here, we all need to embrace both qualities). Agency is being an "agent" for some drive, cause, dream, motivation, whereas community is about finding connections among others in the world. Agency, obviously is a more solo trait than communal.

And despite being on software teams, the work is generally a solo endeavor, interacting with machinery for hours on end, then secondarily reporting the results to the team in Agile meetings. So once again, this may be a factor in the lack of interest in software development by women.

Problem Solving Stereotypes

Another way to frame software development is problem solving. The initial "problem" is a blank canvas, or a lack of software to solve a perceived need. From then on, there are an unending lists of major and minor problems to solve, even long after a piece of software is released – bugs, maintenance issues, upgrades, security problems, regulatory requirements, etc - all these problems have to be overcome, one by one.

Stereotypes don't just appear out of nowhere – observations are made about a group and then a summary conclusion is made about a group's general behaviors or characteristics - some can be funny, and some are highly bigoted, nasty, prejudicial.

One stereotypical (?) difference between men and women are how they respond to crisis and problem solve: men, fueled by agency, will tend to isolate themselves and solely try to work out their problems in their heads. Women, on the other hand, will reach out to others in their community of friendships, letting their friend in crisis express themselves without offering a solution immediately.

While there are attempts to make coding a more "communal" experience, such as pair coding, pure software development is seen to be a more solo activity, solving those aforementioned logic puzzles in one's head while the code pours out into the IDE.

Again, a more male stereotype.

Suppostion #3. Young Women are Influenced by the Collective Conscious and Unconscious

Discussed above are traditionally inherent traits or stereotypes that my drive down the motivation of young women to participate in a software development career.

I recently saw an interview by an individual commenting on young people's motivations for a career, east versus west. In the east, he heard the usual drive to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, astronaut. But in the USA, it was "tik-tok influencer". Oy vey! For young women, there are only so many slots for a career in advertising revenue based upon hair, make-up, fashion, lifestyle blogs. Only so many fashion designers make a decades long career out of it. And for young men, only so many pranks, punks and goofs to go around.

In light of this, doctor, lawyer, engineer may sound boring or "too much work for too little" to motivate young people.

I do not have much to go on here, but only questions: