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By Natasha Lomas, 8 December 2008 14:32

ANALYSIS

Only around one-in-five of the UK IT workforce is female, and the 2008 silicon.com Skills Survey reveals broad consensus the lack of women is bad for the industry.

silicon.com readers were quick to responding to the survey, with explanations of why the industry has become so male dominated.

Anthony, an IT helpdesk worker from Dartford, said most IT deptartments are "screaming out for some female influence". He goes on "As for the whole 'shortage' thing, well of course more men are going to be in the IT industry, as boys grow up being into computers and tech stuff many of them naturally progress in this area.

"Girls, by and large (generalisation alert), couldn't care less about graphics cards and CPUs etc and there's nothing wrong with that, but there will never be an equilibrium in the workplace until its reflected in society first and I can't see that happening in the near future."

Another reader, Michael Hart, an IT director from London, argues: "To get more women into IT all you have to do is get more women to like IT, then get them to prioritise work over family when it comes to calls on their time," he claims, adding. "Not easy but is it even desirable?"

An anonymous reader from Suffolk adds: "There can be a large amount of knowledge to acquire to cover all IT (platforms, operating systems, packages, licensing, networking, database design, mobile convergence…), more than most other professions, which for the remuneration, job satisfaction and life/work balance may not be considered worth it… could be that women have already analysed this…"

But female IT manager Tracey, who has 15 years' experience in the industry, argues the image of IT doesn't help: "Perhaps the picture that's being painted of life in IT just isn't that enticing to many women: monotonous work done by boring people in grey cubicles and dingy server rooms," she says, adding. "Then again that's not exactly attractive to a lot of men I know either."

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She adds: "Being the only woman (or one of) in a team of men has occasionally worked in my favour - you're more visible as a minority and sometimes your opinions are more likely to be heard. At other times it's been frustrating and annoying, dealing with bigotry and put-downs from male colleagues seemingly unable to accept having a woman with technical knowledge/skills ('surely she's just playing at this and will disappear soon to have a baby or her hair done') on their patch…

"My other female friends/colleagues in IT have experienced much the same. None of us wanted to be hairdressers, beauticians or any of the clichés. We are smart, innovative, highly organised problem solvers, who for the most part happen to have great social skills to boot (like several of the men in IT I've been lucky to work with). We're also extremely fussy about where we'll work and for whom."

The notion of IT having an unattractively geeky image is echoed by another reader - M Rizzo, a consultant from Suffolk. "A lot of techie blokes are frustrated that there don't seem to be many women who take an interest in IT, and worse that many women perceive IT people as boring geeks," he says.

But for software developer Anthony Hunt, from Kent, the apparently anti-social nature of the work is the deal-breaker. "Maybe social interaction is lacking. You can't chat with a computer. Men don't feel the same need to discuss everything [as women]," he claims.

Responding to the question of whether women in IT suffer active discrimination, IT worker Simon from Cumbria, believes it's more a case of being a minority in a male orientated industry.

He says: "I've worked with several women during my career, and always found them as capable as anyone else. But… some of them were 'Tom boys' - taking on men on their 'home turf' as it were. I think this points to a situation where women have to be more resilient and prepared to fight hard for their status - something which is bound to put a lot of people off."

Meanwhile, having both male and female perspectives is something worth striving for as it makes for "healthy" IT teams, according to an anonymous inventor: "The male bias tends to be towards how the machine does the job it's doing, the female bias towards what it's doing and why. Males are typically good at narrow focus, high specific achievement, whilst females typically have a broader perspective.

"Without in any way wishing to imply that either sex is limited to one mode or the other, it's surely right that both perspectives are indispensable to healthy IT development."