And leadership skills arn’t a requirement that women (or men) need to get into the tech sector.

For the record, I was too sick to take part on the panel. People are still asking if I was really sick. Yes, I was! I hate it when speakers lets moderators/oranisers down so I’d never do that purposely.

Milo and I have a very similar opinion on the matter anyway.

Actively seek them out. Recruit at campus organizations for women in tech, invite specific women you meet in the community to apply. Once you have the resumes judge them by the same criteria as men, obviously – but there’s nothing wrong with actively seeking female applicants.

Hope that helps

-Leigh

Here are my final thoughts on the panel:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/milo_yiannopoulos/blog/2009/04/22/men_perform_better_in_many_technology_jobs_must_we_apologise_for_that

1) As the IT sector in India demonstrates – a stronger focus on science and technology in education across both sexes is needed. In conjunction with this, as Hermione Way rightly points out, we need to work to dispel the bad image tech still has (geeks, nerds, white coats, hard hats) that puts younger girls off choosing science and tech at GCSE, A-level and above.

2) We must create role models and mentors (as Bindi from Microsoft points out) – people girls will aspire to be like. Right now it’s usually a model, a pop star, an actress – why not a tech entrepreneur? Entrepreneurship is the new rock n roll at the moment with programs like Dragons Den making it mainstream. Let’s use this window of opportunity to attract more girls into the tech sector!

The first of these will need government funding of course – perhaps even a paradigm shift in curriculum that’s too much to ask. But we’ve only got to look to at other economies where there is a stronger cultural tech focus and corresponding better gender representation to realise something will need to change here in the UK if we want to be competitive on the global stage.

And let’s not underestimate the importance of 2. Everyone of us can think of a person we wanted to be like when we were young. For me in my teens it was my mum – a successful business woman and a great role model. Then in my twenties it was Martha Lane Fox – running a dot com tech startup, getting rich and being on the cover of magazines – how cool was that!

Fundamental to all this is the issue of choice – we need to give girls more science and technology choices at GCSE and A-level and we need to make those choices more attractive. Later on down the line – and I have to disagree with Zuzanna on this one – I don’t think there needs to be a choice between career or family. Newsflash – you can have both!!!! In fact, a technology career is going to give a woman more flexibility than almost any other sector. Sophie mentions Worldeka’s chief developer being home to have dinner and put the kids to bed – I’m the CEO and I do exactly the same thing.

One of the wonderful things about the tech sector is everyone is judged on their own merits without a thought given to gender, race or age. This is nothing like City culture and I’m proud to be part of it! It’s a wonderful sector to work in and if more younger girls knew that we’d eventually see more women at tech conferences.

I’m sorry I wasn’t at geeknrolla yesterday – I would have loved to have contributed to the debate first hand. The reason wasn’t that I happen to be pregnant with my 3rd, but that I was busy with the deployment of the new Mydeo m3 site J

http://www.andyskipper.com/biz/geeknrolla-panel-discussion-girl-geeks/