Women make only 34% of engineering workforce in IT: Belong Survey

Women represent only 34 per cent of the engineering workforce in IT firms, according to survey by Belong on 'the gender gap in the tech industry in India’.

The Survey, which was done with ITES companies with over 50 employees and the data was collected from around three lakh women, found that there is one woman engineer as against three men engineers.

Besides, when it comes to promotions of techies into managerial positions and data, the survey found gender-gap here as well. The men on an average are promoted to managerial positions usually after six years of experience while women moved to these roles after eight years of experience.

Further, as many as 45 per cent of women move out of core engineering roles after close to eight years, the survey revealed. After quitting engineering, these women prefer to move into marketing, product management or consulting.

It said, among the tech talent in India, there are more women in software testing roles (a less sought after skill) compared to core programming roles.

It also observed that the biggest drop-off in pure numbers is after the first five years. One of the major reasons for this is that women often take a break to start a family around this time in their lives, and many do not return to the workforce

However, there have been initiatives by many big companies to tap these lost talents and 'bring back' these women. From leadership development programmes and special incentives to refer women candidates, Indian IT companies are using innovative techniques to hire and retain tech talent of the opposite gender.