Re: How do you know if the company where you're interviewing is women-in-tech friendly?
Esther Schindler dijo [Thu, May 10, 2018 at 04:16:33PM -0700]:
> I’m thinking of writing a (hopefully both fun and useful) listicle
> with advice from “women who have been there” for spotting companies
> that really mean it when they say, “We want more geek women here.”
> (...)
> What should I include? And why would you consider that item a
> heartening sign?
I don't know if there is (or should be) a real difference between
wanting "more women here" and wanting "more geek women here". I mean -
I know your work, and I know the peculiarities and distortions our
work field poses on us. However, laboral oppression is not exclusive
to the "geeky" side.
In my university, a protocol for handling abuse against women in the
workplace was enacted maybe two years ago. I am part of the "inner
council" of a smallish research institute in the university. Of
course, it's a completely different issue mandating something and have
it properly implemented. There was a recent complaint about a male
worker who hit (seemingly jokingly) a woman. We got many complaints
stating this person's behavior is recurrent (although we cannot
_legally_ act on many of the things we were told, as they happened
years ago and weren't followed through). Our Director explained to us
that the appropriate administrative steps were taken, but the
university's legislation makes it clear that the penalization at this
stage should be between one and eight days on unpaid leave.
Anyway - What I wanted to point towards: I knew about many of the
details because I'm part of this Council. I think this kind of
procedures and the reasoning behind their resolutions must be clearly
communicated; violence over women is something for which we must push
the culture to change. Making aggressions and consequences known
might sound harsh and invasive for the aggressor, but it _has_ to be
known (and it has to be known to be addressed) if we ever expect it to
really stop.
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