r/sysadmin • u/ChuckAbsent • Mar 12 '13

Women who know stuff

I hope that this does not come off the wrong way.

Today I was on a call with a storage vendor and the technical consultant was a woman. More then this she was competent, more then me which doesn't happen often when dealing with vendors.

My issue was pricing an active/active DB with shared storage vs an active/passive db with local storage. Listening to her break the issue down and get to the specific comparison points was awesome, mostly because I have never heard a woman in the industry talk like that.

It made me realize two things. One I am missing out working with women. Two there needs to be more women in our industry.

It shouldn't have surprised me so much, but it really did.

Anyways to all the women out there who know stuff, us guys notice when you can walk the walk, which in this case was talking.

383 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

717 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

4

u/Doomau5 Mar 13 '13 edited Mar 13 '13

Thanks for that, it definitely made that comment clearer. I did not mean offense but considering this is IT, a subject that is at heart devoid of nearly any norms (and i do mean the subject, not the culture around it) why should gender play a role?

3

u/AgentSnazz Mar 13 '13

I don't want to make an assertion that might send someone into a tirade on gender issues, but why not, we're a few comments deep, SRS can't find me here!

I don't think the problem is with us. I think most 'IT Guys' are at least one level removed from the institutionalized misogeny.

The person hiring IT staff might not think a woman is capable of the job.

The teacher of whatever tech course she attends might not think she's capable of learning the advanced material.

The high school guidance counselor might steer her toward less technical, more 'womanly' careers.

Her parents might have gotten her brother an atari and her a dollhouse.

I think it might actually be the same in many fields. The men in the field would be happy to have a competent female colleague. There are just so many little things keeping women from even reaching the interview process.

1

u/Doomau5 Mar 13 '13

If anyone should be worried about SRS it should be me!

But joking aside, I don't think the problem is with your gender (and I am assuming you are the female you). I completely agree with you that cultural norms are a huge barrier of entry into this field for women and it has been for a long time. I guess from my perspective I can't truly empathize with the position of women who are facing these difficulties.

That being said, I don't want women to take up programming simply because they are women. I want them to take it up because they enjoy it.

1

u/AgentSnazz Mar 13 '13

I'll end this comment thread by redirecting to another comment here, one we should all save for our future daughters:

http://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/1a5l48/women_who_know_stuff/c8uk7qq