Comment: how closing the gender gap will drive innovation

International Women’s Day is like an annual progress report on women’s rights, asking how far we have come. The answer each year is – not far enough.

This is especially true in STEM (Science, technology, engineering and maths). This year, for the first time, the number of women working in the sector topped 1 million, which is an incredible feat. Yet despite having met this impressive figure, women still make up just 24% of the total STEM workforce, whilst a mere 5% hold leadership positions in the sector. This isn’t a new problem. It’s an age old trend which begins in school, carries through to higher education, then pervades every single STEM profession.

The foundation for a career in STEM should be laid in early life, but at every stage of the education system, more boys study STEM subjects than girls. There are several reasons for this. Although society is working hard to move away from gender stereotypes, an unconscious, implicit bias still remains, and many people still associate scientific and mathematic fields as ‘male’ and the arts and humanities as ‘female.’ Another issue is the distinct lack of female STEM role models depicted in the media – only 22% of students in a PWC survey could name a famous female working in technology. Is it any surprise then, that many girls are subliminally dissuaded from STEM subjects from a young age?