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Please read the article about Ada Lovelace Day & help promote it!

The article talks about the topic of women in tech who feel disempowered because of their gender, please take a look at the article your self to get the full story, but the part that I found particularly interesting is this -

But what to do? Well, let’s pull back from the anger a little, and start to look instead at why it might be that  women feel  less secure in their abilities than most men, and what might
help change that. Undoubtedly it’s a complex issue, but
recent research may shed some light: Psychologist Penelope Lockwood discovered that women need to see female role models more than men need to see male ones.

Well, that’s a relatively simple problem to begin to address. If women need female role models, let’s come together to highlight the women in technology that we look up to. Let’s create new role models
and make sure that whenever the question
“Who are the leading women in tech?” is asked, that we
all have a list of candidates on the tips of our tongues.

Thus was born Ada Lovelace Day, and this pledge:

“I will publish a blog post on Tuesday 24th March about a woman in technology whom I admire but only if 1,000 other people will do the same.”

— Suw Charman-Anderson

Pretty interesting hey!

Consider these examples:

If you think about it, perhaps if you were a female actress at the beginning of your career, there would certainly be famous female actresses that you admire and look up to as a role model, and those women would certainly encourage you to achieve great things in your career.

Also, if you were a new mother, taking on the responsibility of raising your child and perhaps taking on other challenges if you’re newly married such as managing a house and caring for everyone in it…  if you had other women in your life who had already taken on that challenge, and you greatly admired how they raised or are raising their children and managing that life, then they would be such an inspiration and encouragement to you as a mum.

In the same way, if you’re a woman taking on a career in technology, knowing of other women who have already achieved great things in this area would be a great encouragement and inspiration to you and most other women in this career.

Difference between those three?

An actress doesn’t have to look hard for some female inspiration, they’re featured in movies and right throughout the media.

A mother would not find it as easy to have great role models to encourage them, they’d have to be fortunate enough to actually know them as friends or through friends, etc. If they don’t know any, perhaps attending a playgroup or something of the like would broaden their acquaintances and give them opportunities to see how other women with the same responsibilities manage their lives. I am fortunate enough to know of and am good friends with heaps of mums who are incredibly inspirational – there are some very strong women out there with a lot of love and wisdom to give – and I know where their strength comes from.

As for women in technology, thanks to Ada Lovelace Day, they will hopefully soon know of many inspirational women in IT who will inspire and encourage them. We are hoping that the Geek Girl Blogger series we have been writing will be some small inspiration for women in this category.

The Ada Lovelace Day story helped me to be more compassionate and understanding towards the women who are trying to succeed in their tech careers but are obviously feeling held-back by glass ceilings and lack of mentors and role models.

We are signing the pledge and will be one of hopefully at least a thousand other people writing an article on Tuesday 24th of March 2009 about a women in technology whom we admire.

We encourage you to do the same.

aManda