Turns out, it's just like being an engineer for everyone else.
On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
31–40 of 77 posts
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#32As someone who was directly involved with hiring & managing Bryana let me set one aspect of this conversation to rest: Bryana's performance _across the board_ was top-notch, without qualification.
She commanded, and continues to command, respect from her peers for both her technical contributions on a very challenging tech stack, and product savvy in an extremely complex business domain. I was on her interview and there was no question of moving bars. It didn't even come up, because she was so very well-prepared. We just evaluated the performance and hired the best dev for the position, end of conversation.
On the job she spoke with authority and confidence in standups and earned every single bit of responsibility she ever got. Mention her to anyone who's worked with Bryana and you'll get the "eye roll of respect." She's so talented there was a minor running joke with a couple of us that we should keep a countdown clock of "minutes till I work for Bryana."
I only wish that early in my career I could have been half as well-rounded and with a fraction of the aptitude, product savvy and technical depth Bryana has.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
If we actually do break down barriers and correct our gender biases as a society, what is to stop us from continuing this "special treatment" at the expense of men? When do we say "mission accomplished"? Case in point: "Black History Month" wasn't supposed to be permanent. We still celebrate it though, as if black history were distinctly different from American history. It started off with good intentions, but it con…
Well, we can be sure folks will bring it up again. Nobody is ignoring this issue, especially on internet comment sites. But for now, the status quo is unacceptable and special treatment is called for. Doing nothing is tantamount to acceptance of the unfair situation. Here's an idea: lets reverse things for now. You lose your job, along with most other men, and women are put in their place. That's millions of people c…
Anyone who argues that Black History Month should be abolished is labeled as a sexist, even if they're black. You think this issue won't suffer the same problem?
The idea of using sexual discrimination to fight sexual discrimination is absurd. Women being treated differently than men is the root of the problem, not the solution.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#34Bryana refers several times to a fear she has been chosen or favoured due to her gender, and because of the positive discrimination we have allowed to happen in our industry. Positive discrimination is not positive, because discrimination is never positive, no matter which group it favours. And here we see the consequences - a cohort of women who will suffer the paranoia of not knowing whether they were selected on m…
The way I see it, fear/paranoia of incompetence is common among a great many entry-level developers/engineers, the so-called "imposter syndrome". What I think Bryana did, talk to her manager to find the real reason behind a decision, is what I think anyone, male or female, who has any doubt about their job should do.
Nothing will dispel uncertainty better than getting the facts. The bar was not visibly lowered in Bryana's case. Her manager said the fact she is a woman never crossed his mind in giving her lead on a project. The good work she was putting in over her first year demonstrated to management she was ready to take lead on a project. If we're just honest with each other, we'll all be better off.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#35She says she was encouraged to apply and speak at conferences, and that management would campaign for the whole team to attend any conferences where she is accepted to speak. > This may seem like special treatment or in some ways unfair. "Reverse sexism" some might call it. I don't see it that way. This industry treats women differently, so my managers treat me differently in the exact opposite way the industry does.…
Encouraging and incentivizing a female employee to speak at a conference is not reverse sexism or sexism. It's simply providing a pathway to level the playing field. The cultural meme of reverse racism or reverse sexism is simply used to continue in our racist or sexist behaviors unapologetically. These are still cultural issues to deal with, despite the progress we have made on them, and therefore there is a real po…
>It's simply providing a pathway to level the playing field.
This doesn't level the playing field. It specifically encourages employers to treat their female employees differently than male employees.
As Bryana mentioned in her blog, it's pretty much impossible for a woman to not be singled out in STEM, simply because she is a woman. Men almost never have to worry about their gender being brought up, while women generally either have to deal with being looked down or being put on a pedestal.
You can thank "people deliberately righting wrongs such as by giving extra encouragement to female developers" for this additional layer of sexism in STEM...
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
If we actually do break down barriers and correct our gender biases as a society, what is to stop us from continuing this "special treatment" at the expense of men? When do we say "mission accomplished"? Case in point: "Black History Month" wasn't supposed to be permanent. We still celebrate it though, as if black history were distinctly different from American history. It started off with good intentions, but it con…
Well, we can be sure folks will bring it up again. Nobody is ignoring this issue, especially on internet comment sites. But for now, the status quo is unacceptable and special treatment is called for. Doing nothing is tantamount to acceptance of the unfair situation. Here's an idea: lets reverse things for now. You lose your job, along with most other men, and women are put in their place. That's millions of people c…
Let's make it more fair: instead of men and women changing jobs, ostensibly causing a great deal of chaos, let's go with a parallel universe where your conditions are already in place.
Or even better, let's use industries in our own universe that already has those conditions: education and child care.
What sort of "special treatment" do men get in those industries? Well, in many day care services, the male employees are not allowed to be alone with children. In education, male teachers make it a deliberate point not to be alone with students, because a single false accusation would end their career permanently.
But are there cries for more "positive discrimination" from the men in those industries? Not that I've heard. Equal treatment would be just dandy, though.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#37She says she was encouraged to apply and speak at conferences, and that management would campaign for the whole team to attend any conferences where she is accepted to speak. > This may seem like special treatment or in some ways unfair. "Reverse sexism" some might call it. I don't see it that way. This industry treats women differently, so my managers treat me differently in the exact opposite way the industry does.…
What kind of manager treats every single employee the same, regardless of differences in talent, background, needs, etc? If a manager hires a person who needs a bit more structure in order to stay focused, that person should be given a little more structure. Or in this case, if a manager hires someone who has been pushed down her whole life and has learned to fade into the background so as not to upset men around her…
It is weird that discrimination is a four letter word when it is absurd to try to treat everyone equally.
But... either we can discriminate based on gender or we can't. If you have an all male team where most members are extremely shy around women (like bad enough they probably should see a therapist), then it would make perfect business sense to only seek another man for that team. But discrimination based on gender isn't allowed, so you can't do that. And for the same reason, even though there is business reason why special treatment is justified, you can't discriminate based on gender.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#38She says she was encouraged to apply and speak at conferences, and that management would campaign for the whole team to attend any conferences where she is accepted to speak. > This may seem like special treatment or in some ways unfair. "Reverse sexism" some might call it. I don't see it that way. This industry treats women differently, so my managers treat me differently in the exact opposite way the industry does.…
In critical race theory ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory ), the main tenet is that racism is the combination of discrimination and power. Everyone can do negative discrimination versus anyone based on race, but it becomes racism when the party that does the discrimination has power over the party being discriminated again. If you apply this schema to patriarchy, one cannot call positive discrimina…
>one cannot call positive discrimination "reverse sexism" or "sexism".
Positive discrimination for one person is negative discrimination against another, of whom the discriminator has power over the discriminated. So it still fits as being a *ism.
That is assuming you even accept the whole 'power + mistreatment' bit.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#39As someone who was directly involved with hiring & managing Bryana let me set one aspect of this conversation to rest: Bryana's performance _across the board_ was top-notch, without qualification. She commanded, and continues to command, respect from her peers for both her technical contributions on a very challenging tech stack, and product savvy in an extremely complex business domain. I was on her interview and th…
Nobody is questioning her ability or qualifications, only your decision to offer her opportunities and incentives based on her gender which her post implies were not also available to equally qualified male members of her team.
If you want to put the conversation to rest, simply clarify that point.
Re: On being a female on a male-dominated engineering team
#40About the "assertiveness" part - no, I think most women have it totally wrong on this.
When you say that men are assertive and women are not, you are in fact talking about a subset of men - the extroverts - who are assertive. In reality, and in particular in the software world, you'll find a lot of introverted men who are much like you - they don't feel comfortable speaking up. It is just that they're not very visible because they aren't heard.
In my opinion, assertiveness is more of a personality issue. And it is ridiculous that we expect everyone to be assertive - it does not improve your ability to code in any way.