After 35 years working in an almost totally male environment (across two very different engineering industries) I have spent the last 5 years working in an environment where 50% of my close colleagues are female. I have also spent many years trying to recruit professional engineers, and finding (like many others) that it is extremely difficult to find good staff. 

So why (rhetorical question) do we seem to go out of our way to discourage 50% of our potential engineering resource? 

Speaking to my female colleagues, and others I meet (e.g. I am pleased to be a Mentor in the excellent Women in Rail programme) most or all have absolute horror stories to tell of the way they have been treated through their careers. I see one of my close colleagues, who is doing much of the engineering on our projects, left out of emails and sidelined in conversations. I see another, an FIET who is not just senior to me but a senior figure in our industry, who is ignored if there is a man (e.g.  me) with her - begging of course the response from me “you need to talk to her, she's the boss!!" And so on.

Yes, as per the post above, many people in the UK don't see a problem. Because if you're a white male then you don't have a problem. Except for wondering why you can't find enough good engineers to recruit…

Some people make better engineers than others (and remembering that the term “engineer” covers a huge range of skills and attributes). Some people have different sex, gender, race and ethnicity to others. In my personal experience, which is pretty wide in the engineering field by now, the graphs of these two areas are orthogonal. But the prejudices in our industry (again speaking w.r.t the UK) on all these issues are huge.

I came into engineering because I was interested in creativity, innovation, and exploring all possible approaches for solving problems. What I found, and seem to have spent the rest of my career battling against, is significant sectors of the profession obsessed with maintaining the status quo…the absolute opposite of what had attracted me. 

Oh dear, I think I need to go and find the last of the afternoon sun after all that…

Wishing you all the best with this initiative…keep at it!!!!

Thanks,

Andy

After 35 years working in an almost totally male environment (across two very different engineering industries) I have spent the last 5 years working in an environment where 50% of my close colleagues are female. I have also spent many years trying to recruit professional engineers, and finding (like many others) that it is extremely difficult to find good staff. 

So why (rhetorical question) do we seem to go out of our way to discourage 50% of our potential engineering resource? 

Speaking to my female colleagues, and others I meet (e.g. I am pleased to be a Mentor in the excellent Women in Rail programme) most or all have absolute horror stories to tell of the way they have been treated through their careers. I see one of my close colleagues, who is doing much of the engineering on our projects, left out of emails and sidelined in conversations. I see another, an FIET who is not just senior to me but a senior figure in our industry, who is ignored if there is a man (e.g.  me) with her - begging of course the response from me “you need to talk to her, she's the boss!!" And so on.

Yes, as per the post above, many people in the UK don't see a problem. Because if you're a white male then you don't have a problem. Except for wondering why you can't find enough good engineers to recruit…

Some people make better engineers than others (and remembering that the term “engineer” covers a huge range of skills and attributes). Some people have different sex, gender, race and ethnicity to others. In my personal experience, which is pretty wide in the engineering field by now, the graphs of these two areas are orthogonal. But the prejudices in our industry (again speaking w.r.t the UK) on all these issues are huge.

I came into engineering because I was interested in creativity, innovation, and exploring all possible approaches for solving problems. What I found, and seem to have spent the rest of my career battling against, is significant sectors of the profession obsessed with maintaining the status quo…the absolute opposite of what had attracted me. 

Oh dear, I think I need to go and find the last of the afternoon sun after all that…

Wishing you all the best with this initiative…keep at it!!!!

Thanks,

Andy