Working together towards more diversity in tech

30%. That’s the proportion of women who work in technology in France in 2022, according to tech university la Grande École du Numérique*. Even today, women are wholly under-represented in the digital realm.

Here at Qonto we’re convinced we need to correct this imbalance. And fast. Which is why we’ve partnered with BECOMTECH, an organization that’s focused on building greater gender parity in tech. That being said, it’s ever more critical that companies take their internal initiatives even further. Both Sarah Ben Allel, VP of People at Qonto and Dorothée Roch, cofounder of BECOMTECH, agree: in order to include more women in the workforce, businesses have to take concrete and collective action.

By combining their efforts - just as with the Open Innovation** initiative - companies can reverse the trend when it comes to gender parity.

Data scientists, community managers, web developers, UX Designers, UX Writers…we call these “computer trades”: jobs that rely heavily on new technology. They can be subdivided into several categories, such as programming, networks, infrastructure, marketing and communications.

A 2021 Ipsos/Epitech study on the employment of women in tech-related fields supports this claim. When young women begin to consider a job in tech, only 43% among them believe that they have the experience level to get into a computer science program, despite having more than sufficient grades to apply. It’s safe to say that self-censorship plays a role in preventing their entry into the field - even their parents share these same reservations. And for some who, in the end, do decide to try their hand at getting a job working with computers, there can be a real moment of disillusionment.

In 2019, women were 5 times less exposed to job offers in tech than men, according to the Diversidays association and Pôle Emploi in a report on diversity in tech.

Isabelle Collet, computer scientist and professor at the University of Geneva, suggests we look to our collective history to find the source of this lack of diversity. Her work Les oubliées du numérique (The forgotten women of tech) explains how tech, from its inception, had been conceived to accommodate men rather than women. Even the etymology of the term “computer” reverts to this belief: “adjective indicating God (a masculine noun in French) as he sets about establishing order in the world.”

As a result, it’s no longer enough to suggest role models to women to encourage them to get into more technical careers. It can even be counterproductive to do so, says Isabelle Collet in an interview with ADN (in French): “Putting forward more role models creates an additional pressure for women: either they become Ada Lovelace (one of the forerunners of computer technology in the 19th century) or Sheryl Sandberg (Director of Operations at Facebook), otherwise they’re nothing at all.”

Representation is therefore key. But it must be paired with a claiming of power in relation to tech careers.

The goal of this training was public speaking:

• Encouraging women to speak up in front of their colleagues, but also on social media, podcasts or any other online platform. The goal: get them to fully take on the role that they play in tech.
• Get them to share their expertise with others confidently.
• Allow them to choose the company to work for according to how committed the company is to diversity.

According to the experts we spoke with for this article, it’s necessary, now more than ever, for companies to work together to further increase the success of these programs.

In 2015, Qonto joined France Fintech, an initiative that seeks to solve the challenges of the financial services industry. This approach brings together multiple companies so they can collectively work on diversity in their unique field. It’s this very dynamic of collaboration that Ben Allel and Roch want to scale, at the business and organizational level.

As part of a greater community of socially engaged companies, each business can find inspiration in others to create a very real diversity policy.

• By setting up a diversity index, similar to that of the Index Egalité Professionnelle (Professional Equality Index)
• By signing up for mentorship programs with organizations like BECOMTECH. That way it’s possible to build out strategic positions that will help support the growth of the company.
• By measuring the impact of diversity policies using tools like Mixity.

• Isabelle Collet’s book The forgotten women of tech Ed. Le Passeur, 2019.

*Consult the Grande École du Numérique figures here

** The Open Innovation consists of a company rethinking its R&D by integrating collaborations outside of the department responsible for innovation, or even by consulting other companies or partners. More info here.

***https://www.genderscan.org/Page_Etudes.php