9 years ago I wrote my first line of code.
In the final years at my all-girls school, we were encouraged to aim for a range of one word career pathways: teacher, doctor, lawyer. It was never encouraged – or even suggested – that we might pursue a career in the tech industry.
We are living in a world where 70 per cent of the fastest growing roles require some level of technical skills. Ninety-five per cent of Australians will need to reskill on emerging technologies such as AI, robotics, and advanced data science. By 2030, our tech workforce will be more than 1 million people and there is an ongoing labour shortage in technical roles, nation-wide.
But only 30% of roles in tech are held by women.
By 2030, the estimated cost of the tech labour shortage in Australia could be as high as $16 billion. The Australian Computer Society’s 2021 Digital Pulse Report found that increasing gender diversity across the technology workforce would create almost 5,000 full-time equivalent jobs on average and grow Australia’s economy by $1.8 billion every year on average, over the next 20 years. In a world where the cost of living pressures are rising and we are all feeling the pinch, just imagine what a $1.8 billion injection into the economy could do.
The discovery of this gap is how I came to found She Codes Australia. A community of women who are curious about technology but lack either the skills, networks or confidence to enter the sector.
If there is one thing that 2023 taught us, it is that investing in women can have huge economic benefits. Key economic movements driven by women last year were Taylor Swift and her Eras tour, Beyonce and her Renaissance tour, the Barbie movie – which broke records — and our beloved Matildas who took Australia’s hearts and minds by storm.
How do we make 2024 as big a year for women in tech, and our economy, as 2023 was for Taylor Swift?
We need to rewrite the narrative about what kinds of people fit in technical roles. People in tech are not all men, and not just nerds. It’s a broad industry that is just as suitable for feminine women as the stereotype of a quick-typing, hoodie-wearing man.
Unbelievably, women in the She Codes community have been told they are “too fun” to be in STEM and that it’s not a “safe” career option. Some have been questioned by lecturers if they had signed up for the right course because they “didn’t fit in” to computer science. In 2024, it’s past time for a shift in the way we think and talk about the technology sector.
Later this month I will be in Canberra as a nominee at the Australian of the Year awards. I am hopeful that this national spotlight on women in tech will have ripple effects through my industry, and on the next generation.
Because as the Digital Pulse Report says, “Increasing diversity across Australia’s tech talent pool is not only the right thing to do, it’s an economic imperative.”
We are at the cusp of a critical moment for Australia. Australia’s economic future will depend on us being able to meet that imperative and investing in women is an obvious way to do so.
I encourage you to think about what your role is in building our future. Hire women, train women, invest in women. Help us reshape the narrative. Our audacious goal is to inspire 100,000 women across the country by 2025.
My even bigger goal is for organisations like mine to no longer exist.
This article was previously published in The West Australian
