Generalizing, actually. But I don't think that it's necessarily a bad thing.
Taken individually, you'll find folks all over any given spectrum, but if we're going to address "Women in Tech" vs the implicit "Men in Tech" then we can't just say "well the two are exactly the same and therefore there's no discussion to be had."
Of course there's differences between men and women. Different values, different priorities, different sensitivities. Maybe there are issues in nursing and education which men are more sensitive towards, and that's why there's such a larger opposing gender disparity in those fields? That doesn't mean that either gender is necessarily "weaker", just "different".
If we want to help technical managers retain women, then it would be helpful to determine which issues women are generally more sensitive to, even if they're the same issues men have faced for however long but which have not driven them away from the industry.
Can you pick out any problems in particular pointed out in this article, that are more frequently picked up on by women?
Most of the common ones seem to be a company or manager's words not matching their actions. The sample sizes I've experienced may be fairly small so far (very few female colleagues, as ever), but I've seen men and women leave in equal measure for that type of transgression.
I don't know of any studies, anecdotes aren't data, and I don't know of any particular issues listed in the article that might affect women more than men.
The only point I'm trying to make is the obvious one: men and women are different. It's a stupid point, taken at face value, but it's one that seems to get lost every time someone says "but men face those same issues" or "that doesn't seem like a gendered issue to me".
Yeah, I agree that on aggregate, men and women have subtly different tendencies.
The reason I bring it up though, is that I don't see or experience any particular bias around most of the the issues in the article. Most of the points raised really don't seem like gendered issues.
We need to find a way to figure out which of those differences are important, then. YC seems to be trying via this Ask a Female Engineer series, but if we ask those female engineers which issues are most important to them in regards to what would drive them away and the answers they give aren't satisfactory, then what conclusions can be drawn?
If the issues listed are largely the same issues faced by men, and if the issues have an equivalent impact on male engineer retention, then the answers are incomplete or we're asking the wrong women. Maybe we should ask female former engineers why they left the industry?
Taken individually, you'll find folks all over any given spectrum, but if we're going to address "Women in Tech" vs the implicit "Men in Tech" then we can't just say "well the two are exactly the same and therefore there's no discussion to be had."
Of course there's differences between men and women. Different values, different priorities, different sensitivities. Maybe there are issues in nursing and education which men are more sensitive towards, and that's why there's such a larger opposing gender disparity in those fields? That doesn't mean that either gender is necessarily "weaker", just "different".
If we want to help technical managers retain women, then it would be helpful to determine which issues women are generally more sensitive to, even if they're the same issues men have faced for however long but which have not driven them away from the industry.