How to Attract Qualified Women for Tech Roles?
World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap, 2018 report predicts that it could take up to 108 years to bridge the education, economic, health, and political gap between both the genders. And the wait might get longer if the women workforce share drops in the near future.
While on an individualistic level, women are making strides in the tech industry, but on an organizational level, they are still lagging. Here are a few facts that attest to this claim.
You cannot and should not neglect the contribution and value of the other half of the population especially when they are proving their mettle in every industry. Here are a few strategies that you should follow to find and attract more qualified women in tech.
Here is a complete guide to help you attract qualified women for tech roles:
- Promote in The Right Place
- Employ Diverse Hiring Strategies
- Build and Encourage Opportunities for Women
- Build Pipeline for Better Engagement
Promote in The Right Place
The key is to advertise in the right place, where you can reach maximum women in one go. You can take the help of communities, and online forums that specifically has a network of women in technology. Some of the websites and forums to name are Women in Tech, Girls Who Code, MotherCoders, Code Like A Girl, and Tech LadyMafia. These forums and websites have job postings and career boards where you can promote vacant jobs to attract female candidates.
Also, you do not need to drop conventional posting practices, just incorporate your usual recruiting strategies with an advertisement on sites that cater only to technically skilled female talent. Adopting this strategy will more likely attract female candidates for vacant positions and promote your company culture as women-friendly.
Employ Diverse Hiring Strategies
Make an aim to hire diverse and qualified female talents. Regularly assess all job postings and descriptions for exclusionary language and rectify them at the earliest. Also, associate with organizations that provide diverse talents, such as Women in Technology and Resources for Recruiting & Retaining a Diverse Team, by Chaya Cooper.
These organizations can help you create recruitment collateral with a diversity focus. Also, participate in various career fairs that target gender diversity and partner with organizations that are focused on getting women into their workforce.
Read More: 10 Checklist Items You Must Tick to Empower Women of 2020
Build and Encourage Opportunities for Women
One of the most common reasons that drive the workforce out of the tech industry is inadequate opportunities. Conduct mentorship programs and training sessions to help them grab and navigate opportunities. It is an excellent way to break their inhibitions and push them to the fore; it also shows that you are professionally invested in providing them growth opportunities.
Promote yourself as a diverse employer by encouraging women to attend conferences and training workshops. If possible, sponsor these opportunities and provide additional incentives to the volunteers. Women will be invested in your company if are invested in their goals.
Build Pipeline for Better Engagement
Creating a more diverse tech workplace is not an easy task and certainly, a mammoth to tackle. The initial step to creating a diversity-friendly pipeline is to start building relationships with schools, technical programs, and organizations.
To improve engagement and showcase your company culture as ‘women-friendly’, organize job shadowing or internship programs. This will not only give young talented girls a platform to test their ability but also provide exposure to all the possibilities tech careers can offer.
Additionally, you can also promote programs that require women volunteers to speak to college or high school STEM sponsors or groups and training institutes.