The State of Women in Engineering

Welcome

1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.Friday, October 28, 2016

The State of Women in Engineering

Jessica RannowFY17 President Society of Women Engineers

The State of Women in Engineering –

Framing the Discussion

Peggy Layne, P.E., F.SWEAssistant Provost for Faculty DevelopmentOffice of the Executive Vice President and ProvostVirginia Tech

Employedwomenwithinthescienceandengineeringworkforceasapercentageofselectedoccupations:2013

Source:Women,Minorities,andPersonswithDisabilitiesinScienceandEngineering:2015.www.nsf.gov/statistics.wmpd/

Source:AmericanSocietyforEngineeringEducation,2016

15.7%

10.5%

18.4%

23.2%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

Allfaculty Professor AssociateProfessor

AssistantProfessor

PercentageofWomenEngineeringFaculty

Source:AmericanSocietyforEngineeringEducation,2016

0

20000

40000

60000

80000

100000

120000

Allfull-timeworkers

Allscientists&engineers

Aerospaceengineers

Mechanicalengineers

MedianEarnings(dollars)

Men Women

Source:U.S.CensusBureau,2014AmericanCommunitySurvey

Why So Few? What Does Social Science Tell Us

About Women in Engineering?

Peter Meiksins, Ph.D.Vice Provost for Academic ProgramsProfessor of SociologyCleveland State University

There is no single answer• Need to consider what happens at each point in the life course:

• K-12• University• Leaks in the pipeline• Workplace• Race and gender

K-12 Pipeline: Why aren’t girls attracted to engineering?• Is the field still stereotyped as male?• Does engineering present itself so as to appeal to young women? • Is it about math?

Ø Math achievement?Ø Do girls enjoy/value math?Ø Do girls have options?Ø Stereotype threat

What happens in university?• Is there a chilly climate?

• Is the curriculum too “male?”

Are there leaks in the pipeline?• Do more women leave during college?

• Do women graduates enter the profession?

• Do women continue on to graduate programs?

What happens in the workplace?• Is there hiring bias?

• Work/family conflict?

• Are women’s contributions undervalued?

Women of color: Why even fewer?• Starting at community colleges

• Declining enrollment at HBCUs

• Need to address both race and gender

Established and Emerging Themes in Research on Women in Engineering

Kacey Beddoes, Ph.D.Assistant Professor of SociologyUniversity of Massachusetts Lowell

Leading ThemesEstablished

1. Explicit bias

2. Engineering gendered male

3. Math outcomes

4. Leaky pipeline

Emerging

1. Teamwork culture

2. Intersectionality

Emerging Theme: Teamwork Culture

• Growing body of evidence documenting gender biases in teamwork settings• implicit and explicit biases and sexism• Contributions not recognized / ideas not “heard”• microaggressions• team roles• project topics• evaluation

Emerging Theme: Teamwork Culture• Suggestions that teamwork culture distinguishes engineering

from other fields and helps explain underrepresentation

• Fundamental shift in thinking about underrepresentation

Emerging Theme: Intersectionality• Gender cannot be understood apart from other facets of identity

• Race and ethnicity• Socioeconomic status• Sexual orientation

• Forms of disadvantage not additive, but intersecting in complex ways

Promising Directions for Future Research• Stereotypes: where have they changed and where do they

still have effects?

• Workplace experiences of engineers outside the academy

• What can be done to make engineering more appealing to women?

• What are the gendered structures of engineering education and workplaces that impede change?

Promising Directions for Future Research• Rigorous studies addressing the intersections of race, ethnicity,

gender, and sexuality

• Meta-analyses that look across disciplines to make sense of conflicting findings and provide grounds for moving forward to advance research

• Gender in teamwork

Driving Positive Systemic Change in STEM Workplaces Through Critical Research,

Policy, & Practice

Heather Metcalf, Ph.D.Director of Research & AnalysisThe Association for Women in Sciencemetcalf@awis.org

AWIS Research Areas• Diversity, inclusion, & broadening participation• Equitable workplace policies, practices, & cultures• Leadership, promotion, & recognition• Innovation & entrepreneurship

Diversity, Inclusion, & Broadening Participation• Broadening Participation Report

• > 68% of people who report “severe difficulty” walking are outside of the workforce, vs <14% of people with no difficulty walking

• LGBTQ+ women in physics: 3x more harassment• Since 2003, black women have earned 1% of PhDs in physics,

engineering, math & computer science, & geosciences respectively• One AWIS member was the only black person in the U.S. to earn a PhD in

astronomy when she graduated in 2011

Equitable Workplace Policies, Practices, & Cultures

• < 3/5 satisfied with work-life integration

• = importance by gender below 40• 54% women v 28% men responsible

for core household tasks• Men 16% more likely to report

workplaces that are family friendly• Women 10% more likely to report

negative career consequences from attempts to obtain WLI

EquitableSolutionsforRetainingaRobustWorkforceHow often do work demands conflict

with personal life demands?

Leadership, Promotion, & RecognitionAWARDS: Regardless of their representation in the nomination pool,

women were half as likely to win research awards

Service&TeachingAwards

Research&ScholarlyAwards

0% 15% 30% 45% 60%

PhysicalSciences

MathematicalSciences

Biological&LifeSciences

2011-2014:

%WomenTenureTrackFaculty

%WomenTeaching/ServiceAwards

%WomenScholarlyAwards

Innovation & Entrepreneurship• Five most entrepreneurial fields

• Highest industry funding• Lowest rates of women’s participation

• Women in STEM: • File fewer patents• Half as likely to start, own or manage a business• Half as likely to be tapped by tech transfer officers for commercialization• Receive <4% of venture capital (<1% to women of color)• Receive <14% of SBIR funding

• Bias and barriers in:• Funding & access to key networks/sponsors• Training environments• Reward structures & perceptions of commercialization• Promotion

GetinTouch

Engineering Culture & Female Attrition:Four Insights from SWE’s National Gender Culture Study 2016

Beth MichaelsPrimer Michaelswww.primermichaels.com

“I often refer to a subtle headwind that I have felt throughout my career. These results shed new light on just what I was feeling.”

Barbara Brockett, V.P. Engineering30+ yrs. of experience

The National Engineering Culture Study Questions

Desired Culture

Current Culture

Personal Values

What we tolerate is what we endorse.

Reported Constraints

BureaucracyCost ReductionHierarchyResource Constrained / Long HoursShort Term Focus

1) Women respond to the culture differently than men.

The Values Gap Driving Female Leaders’ Attrition: Accountability

2) Women have limited tolerance for values stretch.

3) Women sense time & fairness differently than men.

McKinsey 2016….89 European Companies% female leaders / 2 trustees =+48% pre-tax/int earnings+17% stock price growth =Criteria for investment decisions

Female Leader Outcomes

4) Diversity 101 – Gender Intelligence – has disappeared from corporate D/I outcomes.

Female Engineering Leaders’ Message to C-Suite:

Be accountable…• Decide what you want • Mean what you say • Take down the barriers and

let me do my job.

SWE Research

Roberta Rincon, Ph.D.Manager of ResearchSociety of Women Engineers

Climate Control: Gender & Racial Bias in Engineering• Study conducted with the Center for WorkLife Law at the

University of California, Hastings College of the Law• Joan Williams, Distinguished Professor of Law• Su Li, Ph.D., Director of Research on Organization Bias

• Survey of over 3,000 engineers• Focus on implicit bias

• Experiences of bias in the workplace• Effects of bias in hiring, promotions, performance evaluations, and

compensation

Prove-It-Again

“IhavelearnedthatIneverhavethebenefitofthedoubt…andmustmakeformyselfopportunitieswhicharegiventoothers.”– Hispanicfemaleengineer

“…Ihavetoprovemyselftostudent[s]andcolleaguesbeforeIcangettherespectthatamalewillgetbydefault.”– Whitefemaleengineer

WhiteMen Women EngineersofColor

IfeelthatIamheld toahigherstandardthanmycolleagues 40% 53% 60%

Ihavetorepeatedly provemyselftogetthesamelevelofrespectandrecognitionasmycolleagues 35% 61% 68%

Ihavebeenmistaken foradministrativeorcustodialstaff 9% 45% 45%

Tightrope

“Ihadmywhitemalecounterpartengineerswhowerebeinggiventheopportunitytopresentpapers[ataconference].Mybosswantedmetowritethosepapersforthem,butdidn’twantmetogototheconferencetopresent.”- African-Americanfemaleengineer

“Iwasspecificallyaskedtogetcoffeeinthemiddleofmypresentationduringoneevent.”– Hispanicfemaleengineer

WhiteMen Women EngineersofColor

I seldomreceivepushbackwhenIbehaveassertively 67% 51% 49%

Iammoreoftenexpectedtodo“officehousework”ascomparedtocolleaguesincomparableroles 26% 55% 52%

Ihavethesameaccesstodesirableassignmentsasmycolleagues 85% 65% 55%

Maternal Wall

“Thebiggestobstacleisthenegativeperceptionofneedingaflexibleworkscheduleasasinglemother.”- African-Americanfemaleengineer

“WhenIwaspregnant,mybossreallydidn’tknowhowtohandleplanningformyabsence.HetookateamleaderroleawayfrommewhenIwasabout20weekspregnant‘justincase’Ihadtobeoutbeforemyduedate.“– Whitefemaleengineer

WhiteMen Women

Asking forfamilyleaveorflexibleworkarrangementswouldnothurtmycareer 63% 50%

Havingchildren didnotchangemycolleagues’perceptionsofmyworkcommitmentorcompetence 78% 55%

Workplace Processes

“Imissoutoninformalsocialnetworkingopportunitieswhenmycolleaguesgohunting/fishing/tolunchorhappyhouranddon’tinviteme.”– Whitefemaleengineer

“Ididn’trealizeuntilImovedupto[management]howmuchIwasunderpaiduntilIwasabletoseetheentireteam’spay.Ialsorealizedthetrendwasnotjustwithmebuttheotherfemalesontheteam.” –White femaleengineer

WhiteMen Women EngineersofColor

Ascomparedtomycolleagues,Iworkmorebut getpaidless 29% 40% 48%

I feelIgetlesshonestfeedbackonmyperformancethanmycolleagues 20% 29% 35%

Ihavebeengiventheadvancementopportunities andpromotionsIdeserve 71% 62% 53%

Ihavehad asmuchaccesstoinformalorformalnetworkingopportunitiesasmycolleagues 84% 67% 64%

SWE Research Site research.swe.org

STEM Reentry• Partnership with iRelaunch• Task Force Founding Members:

• Booz Allen Hamilton• Caterpillar• Cummins• General Motors Company• IBM• Intel• Johnson Controls

reentry.swe.org

2017 STEM Reentry• Task Force companies will include:

• Ford Motor Company• GE Power• Johnson & Johnson• Medtronic• Northrop Grumman• Schneider Electric

reentry.swe.org

Future Research• Minority Women in the Workplace

• Collaboration with NSBE• Experiences of early career engineers

• K-12• Community college pathways

SWE Magazine

Anne PerusekDirector of Editorial and PublicationsSociety of Women Engineers

From SWE’s Beginning

Aiding Governmental Agencies

1954 Women’s Bureau Bulletin, U.S. Department of Labor, compiled with SWE’s statistics

And at the Same Time“Women themselves will continue, for some time to come, to carry the major responsibility for development of equal opportunity in engineering.”

- Katharine Stinson, SWE’s third president, left, with Joan Barrage.

Stinson was the first woman engineer at the Federal Aviation Administration.

Documentation Through the Years

Profiles were published irregularly between 1963 and 1982. Research picked up again in 1993 with the release of “A National Survey of Women and Men Engineers: A Study of the Members of 22 Engineering Societies.” A follow-up was released in 2006.

SWE Annual Literature ReviewMore than 15 years running, issued every spring. All past literature reviews are compiled into a single document available at swe.org

Coming this Spring: Special issue of SWE Magazine• Devoted to research, presented in a manner that is accessible

to non-academics• Includes:

- Annual Literature Review- SWE’s research results- Insights from noted researchers- Digital format with print on demand option- Stay tuned through SWE social media, issue release will be announced in March

In Conclusion

Karen Horting, CAEExecutive Director & CEOSociety of Women Engineers

Questions?

Thank You

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