International Women’s Day is celebrated annually on 8th March. The day is a global celebration all about unity, reflection, advocacy and action. This year’s theme is #BalanceforBetter, building a gender-balanced world where everyone plays their part. Balance will more effectively drive the working world, think about it… by providing a level playing field, we can create an all-inclusive community and draw upon a far larger pool of qualities and knowledge from all backgrounds. No brainer.
Driving balance in this industry is the ‘Women in Data Science’ technical conference held at 80 regional events worldwide. The event seeks to educate, inspire and support women in the field of data science. Envitia recently attended WiDS London, an event which addressed the challenges and trends in this field regardless of gender. There are a plethora of opportunities in this field but it was highlighted just how few females enter into computing at a young age and similarly, how even fewer carry it through to further education. The data science and analytics landscape is a place where anyone can thrive and an all-inclusive community is needed in this field with the demand for both data scientists and data engineers projected to grow 39% by 2020.
At Envitia we are a balanced collection of amazing people, all with different skills, personalities, and knowledge but together we are delivering for a single outcome, meeting the expectations of our customers and producing great work. We strive to be the change we want to see in this industry but we are not immune to the trend in the data world which sees a higher percentage of men maintain its space. But by providing completely equal opportunities, with no gender prejudice, balance can work its magic when you simply hire the best person for the job. Yes, we may have a male-dominated engineering team, but this data centred SME also has a female-dominated finance team and an all-female UK business development team. Balance is better and is exactly what you will find at Envitia.
but don’t just take it from me…
“In my 25 years of working in technology teams, the most efficient ones had the right blend of skills and characters – it’s no coincidence that the teams that made the most impact were balanced from a gender perspective too” – Heidi Joels, Project Manager
“In all the time I have worked at Envitia we have always had a good mix of both male and female. In this field, you can find companies that are male-dominated, so gender balance is an important issue in these specialist roles” – Michelle Scott, Facilities Manager/Sales & Purchasing Administrator”
“Gender balance is the first step to creating a diverse and accepting culture across the workplace. Working in the technology and in the defence sector it’s very common for us to come across male-dominated environments. Envitia is challenging the defence and technology stereotypes by having an all-female business development team which I am proud to be a part of. There is still a long way to go to achieve gender balance across the business, but I believe Envitia is striving for gender balance within our company” – Sophie Phillips, Business Development Manager”
“As a Recruitment Manager, I’m focused on two things: have I created an engaging candidate experience; and am I delivering what my organisation needs? Over the years, I’ve distilled this down to one word, Balance. Let candidates have a real, unbiased and balanced view of what it’s like to work here. Let them read the Glassdoor reviews, let them talk to lots of people in their interview process, don’t put in 6 interview stages just because it makes us feel important and let them decide whether, on balance, we’re a great fit for them. Equally, working with hiring managers to help them find balance in their teams, not clones. Colleagues who are going to challenge our established ways of working, who can bring a different take to a solution or simply help us better reflect on what we want to be as an organisation going forward. Balance will help us all win” – Kerry Beeden, Recruitment Manager
Written by Luca, Junior Sales & Marketing Executive
