Female engineers are rare. Female engineers who make it to retirement in the tech industry are even rarer.  During their careers, far too many young female engineers have to make an agonizing choice – Do they hold on to their profession and hard-earned accomplishments? Or do they quit for the benefit of their family? I’m sorry to say that I see this struggle far too often. It breaks my heart every time I see a promising young engineer struggle with this choice. This dilemma is not unique to female engineers, but there are a few things unique to technical careers that make holding on to them much more difficult while taking care of a young family. Today’s engineers work at companies that often hire the smartest folks and encourage them to work around the clock. Companies provide employees with breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Even laundry and car services are available at work just …

Susan was amazing at her job. She routinely executed the toughest assignments brilliantly. Yet, for some reason, our colleagues did not treat her like the accomplished engineer that she clearly was. Whether it was an all hands meeting or group lunch, teammates preferred the other aisle, the next table, or the other row. Being the only other female in the organization, I initially suspected the obvious – that they didn’t want her in the boy’s club. But after working with her a few times, I came to understand that everyone else’s attitude towards Susan wasn’t about bias. Susan was a Chicken Little. The sky was always falling. Every time you talked to her, there was some catastrophe on the horizon. It could be anything from “Oh! Our jobs are not secure! What will we be working on next?” to “Our taxes are too high!”. Whatever in life was worrying Susan …

Starting my career as a hardware engineer in the early 1990s, I felt incredibly lonely. Back in those days there were even fewer women in engineering, so I had a hard time connecting with my co-workers who were mostly male. Every day, they would argue about football in our shared office, and none of it made any sense to me. During my morning commute one day, I happened to listen to a radio show with famed football coach John Madden. None of what he said made any sense to me either, but when my co-workers gathered for their daily football discussion, I felt such a strong urge to be a part of this group that I repeated what Coach Madden said. Some of them agreed, others vehemently disagreed, but one thing was for sure: I was now a part of this group. Having even the smallest connection with a co-worker …

After years of technical excellence, Anne has earned her position as a senior member on her team. During a recent meeting, Anne asked a technical question, only to have an engineer direct his answer to a junior male engineer sitting next to her. Later, she posed another question, only to have the same engineer address her junior as if she didn’t even exist. Anne is no stranger to being overlooked like this, but it still stings just as bad as it did the first time. Even so, what can she do? If she complains, most people will brush her off as being ‘too sensitive’. Subconscious bias against women, especially in the technical field can show up in many different forms. Once, while waiting to be called in for an interview, I watched a hiring manager ask every male in the lobby whether they were ‘Maya’. It took him a few …

When Yasmin started her new job at a high-flying start-up, she was appalled at the lack of direction. The end-goal was very clear. In fact, it was the whole reason she signed up for this. But there wasn’t much else. No one could provide any guidance on how to achieve it. After getting a quick orientation, a backpack with some swag, and tour of the work space, she was left to her own devices. Sadly, Yasmin’s situation is not all that uncommon, even in larger, more established companies. Actually, she was pretty lucky to have a clearly defined goal. In many cases, new technical contributors are left to re-invent the wheel and inevitably repeat the same mistakes as their predecessors. And so, the chaotic cycle continues. So, what options does Yasmin have? Most folks I’ve mentored seem to treat it as a binary. You either quit in frustration, or you …