Q&A: Natalie Desty, Director of STEM Returners, on getting engineering careers back on track

Natalie, tell us a little a bit about your professional background before you found STEM Returners.

After graduating from Portsmouth University in the UK, I started a career in recruitment and worked for a large recruitment company for 12 years. After noticing an apparent lack of progress in diversity and inclusion within STEM industries and working with candidates struggling to return from a career break, I started STEM Returners to try and break down outdated practices and challenge recruitment bias.

What issues were you seeing within the industry?

What struck me the most was how hard it was for people who have had a career break to re-enter their profession. Returners were facing insurmountable barriers when wanting to return to STEM roles. These talented, educated and dedicated people – especially women and candidates from ethnic minority backgrounds – were being let down by outdated recruitment methods and bias that prevent them from getting an interview, let alone being offered the role. There is a perception that a career break automatically leads to a deterioration of skills. But the reality is, that many people on a career break keep themselves up to date with their industry, are able to refresh their skills easily when back in work and have developed new transferable skills that would actually benefit their employers.