SPECIALFEATURE
African-American engineers, physicists and mathematicians at NASA in the build up to the first moon landing, it was a hit earlier this year. (Just look at these not-so-hidden figures: nearly £250million at the box office worldwide.) But I remember sitting in the cinema and thinking: ‘Why have I never heard of these women?’ And it quickly became clear to me this was a question on a lot of people’s lips. So diversity in the workplace is, quite
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rightly, a hot topic right now. Time and time again, research has shown that businesses that value diversity tend to do better. Indeed, a recent study from McKinsey & Company revealed that companies with gender-diverse workforces outperform their counterparts by 35 per cent. The number of women and minorities
actively being recruited in certain sectors is under fire, and hardly anywhere is this scrutiny higher than in engineering and the larger STEM [science, technology, engineering, mathematics] fields. The engineering industry is seriously
lacking in female role models, something that has been touted as a reason why more women choose not to enter the profession. Shockingly, only nine per cent of the engineering workforce in the UK is female, the lowest percentage of women engineering professionals in Europe. (You have to look east to see progress: Bulgaria, Cyprus and Latvia lead the way with close to 30 per cent.) Despite its size, however, the nine per
cent is packed with women doing some amazing things. The role models are there, they’re just calling out for more exposure – and a platform where their voices can be heard. In response to this, the Institution of Engineering and Technology has
here’s a good chance you’ve seen the Oscar-nominated film Hidden Figures. Telling the true story of a group of female
launched a campaign to encourage the next generation of women engineers and it wants you to get involved. #9PercentIsNotEnough showcases women from all fields of engineering, displaying the range of talent in the industry and confirming it as a realistic aspiration for thousands of young women. The aim is not only to attract more women to the field but also highlight the everyday role models working behind the scenes. So, what can be done about it? Well, things are getting better. Company and STEM initiatives are beginning to have an effect among young women. Colas Rail, for instance, takes advantage of social media to get the word out and is aiming for a 50/50 gender split on its graduate schemes in the near future. And civil engineering firm Bechtel revealed that one in three engineers working on the London Crossrail project is a woman. It needs to be said that seeking
out talent while the gender pay gap is still in force will likely be tricky, but this shouldn’t deter you. Nearly 270 CEOs have joined the ‘CEO Action for Diversity and Inclusion’ to advance the workplace. And the more women there are in engineering, the more power you will have to change the status quo. That being said, the demand for engineers is enormous – enterprises need to fill around 265,000 gaps annually – making it one of the best-paid industries out there, especially at a graduate level, where starting salaries are well above the average. But, despite the STEM subjects seeing an increase in the number of students choosing them at both GCSE and A-Level, women are still underrep- resented. Many switch off to the idea of engineering at a young age. But it’s not that there’s a lack of interest, it’s that there’s a lack of inclusivity. Having more female role models will encourage and instil confidence, while parents’
and teachers’ attitudes are important, too: 96 per cent of teachers would recommend a career in engineering. The way engineering is presented in
the media isn’t necessarily the reality. Some have suggested that engineering needs rebranding altogether, that the public image of the field is putting some women off. Instead of being an engineer, you would be a ‘problem solver’, a term that can automatically be applied to any context. Some, though, have dismissed this move as patronising. Rebeca Fartusnic is an industry
professional who disagrees with the concept. The recruitment and development adviser at Colas Rail says: “There is definitely a misconception surrounding engineering. ‘Getting your hands dirty’ is only a small part of the industry and not the reality for many people, like project managers. “But we’re trying to make students
more aware of the rail industry, and engineering in general, earlier on by arranging things like site visits. They have this wrong idea about the industry and what we do as a company. I don’t know if it comes from what they see in the news, but I can see it changing at some point.” It’s clear that students need to
be exposed to engineering at a younger age to improve perceptions. EngineeringUK’s The State of Engineering 2017 report found that around half of STEM teachers believed their students know what people in engineering do, but fewer than one in three pupils claim to actually do so. Engineering is all about making people’s lives better or easier. Coming in many different shapes and sizes, more clarity is required around what all the various engineering jobs actually involve on a day-to-day basis. Take, for example, bio-medical engineering, which has seen an influx of women join in recent years, working on a whole range of projects, like
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