Ways to screw up as a woman in technology

https://medium.com/@zornitsatomova/5-ways-to-screw-up-as-a-woman-in-technology-7c416aed8db8

by _eibv • 8 years ago

16 8 8 years ago

medium.com

pwaivers• 8 years ago

"Who was I, a 23-year-old university student, to be advising those guys with 25+ years of experience?"

This doesn't seem woman-specific. Anyone would be intimidated in that situation!

handbanana• 8 years ago

I found this very generic and hard to read

mlthoughts2018• 8 years ago

These don’t seem to be specific to women, except maybe the first one, which is frustrating because it comes off like victim-blaming (e.g. don’t “allow” yourself to be intimidated ... but often the whole structure of a corporate hierarchy is designed to do exactly that, and to milk any gendered intimidations it can to coerce fealty out of subordinates, both men and women).

I don’t think it’s good to spend even a tiny bit of our brain cycles worrying about what “mistakes” marginalized employees might make, when executives, HR and corporate governance are virtually predicated on taking full advantage of employees in every way they can.

Let’s just focus on rampant corporate bad actors, sweepingly horrible company cultures, agism, racism, sexism, unfair pay, unhealthy working conditions and so on. These things are so up-front, huge, and wide-spread that there is just no valuable returns to be had by twisting it around to focus on what workers might do wrong in terms of navigating workplace dysfunctions.

gamesbrainiac• 8 years ago

The advice about pretending to know about technology when you don't is the very reason why there are so many bad people in managerial positions. Its hard to have respect for the work that your engineers do if you have no idea what they do.

BigChiefSmokem• 8 years ago

Another multiple fail-preneur article from Medium? Downvote as you see fit but come on HN you are better than this. This one is especially bad...

"There is this perception that in order to get into IT and do well in it, you need to know programming, which many women like me find unappealing and hard to understand. But the truth is, you don’t really need to know programming."

There are so many things wrong with her world views and views about tech (and women) in general it makes me sick. My daughter loves programming in much the same way a young boy would. If that changes it's because she has no examples of women who like and do what she does, mostly because a lot of women to this day retain the above mentality.

sgocity• 8 years ago

That part made me cringe. Also the part about complementing the "tech guys" on the team. :(

gwbas1c• 8 years ago

I really enjoyed this article.

One thing I don't think most people realize is the concept of "man time." When a work situation is mostly, or completely, men, work turns into "man time."

A workplace should never be "man time." I think that's the biggest obstacle to get over; and the hardest obstacle, too. If we better understood "man time," it'd be easier to set boundaries and keep it out of the workplace.

KenanSulayman• 8 years ago

I feel bad because I googled "man time" and then proceeded to read the whole manual of "time" instead.

Ways to screw up as a woman in technology

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