Navigating the gender structure in information technology: How does this affect the experiences and behaviours of women?

Kenny, Etlyn and Donnelly, R ORCID: 0000-0001-8424-2039 (2020) Navigating the gender structure in information technology: How does this affect the experiences and behaviours of women? Human Relations, 73 (3). pp. 326-350.

Text Accepted version of HR paper.docx - Author Accepted Manuscript Download (76kB)

Abstract

How do women, outnumbered and outranked, navigate work and careers in information technology? Only one in six information technology (IT) specialists in the UK is female. Such extreme male dominance potentially gives rise to a gender structure that affects women’s experiences of IT work. Using data from interviews with 57 technically skilled female IT professionals, we examine how women orient this gender structure and how they make sense of their gender identities as women working in IT. Our findings elucidate how the IT gender structure shapes women’s careers in this field of work. They reveal how women use their agency to assert notions of femininity into technical careers, disentangle narratives around whether women have unique and different (but less technically focused) strengths in IT and interface with ‘geek’ and ‘nerd’ identities to achieve successful IT careers. In doing so, they provide insight into how technical women continue careers within a structure that externalises them through gender norms. This understanding can be used to aid efforts to retain women within IT as well as other fields facing similar challenges.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	female IT professionals, gender diversity, gender inequality,, gender norms, gender structure, information technology, IT, structure and agency
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	16 Jan 2019 14:28
Last Modified:	19 Jan 2023 01:06
DOI:	10.1177/0018726719828449
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3031383