She can’t park, he never shows his emotions. She is technically ungifted; he never cleans up after himself. You probably have a million other stereotypes popping up in your head right now, that you are confronted with daily. Sometimes you’re the one putting someone in a, or you are getting pigeonholed yourself. Yes, society did make a massive step in the right direction trying to eliminate the gender gap. But especially in the working world prejudice against women is still very much present and complicates the way to the top. Woman are still hugely underrepresented in the STEM field. And we at hy think - no reasons why!
Here are 10 women in tech that will fill up your pigeonhole in no time. Enjoy!
1. Brina Lee @leebrina
She worked as a software engineer for the big guys! First Google, then Facebook and now the man dominated android team of Instagram is happy to have her on board. Problem-solving through coding let her heart jump a beat. With this passion, she managed to, amongst others, develop the direct messages tool for Instagram. Thanks Brina, thanks to you my mom can now send me funny cat videos not only on WhatsApp but Instagram too!
2. Megan Smith @smithmegan
2014 she was put in charge by no other than Barack Obama as the first female Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of the United States. She was delighted with the task to unleash the potential of Tech, Data, and Innovation and therefore to help achieve political goals and needs of the citizens.
3. Reshma Saujani @reshmasaujani
When Reshma, who studied law, ran for U.S. Congress, she visited multiple schools and found a vast disparity of gender in computer science. Thereupon she found “Girls who code” to excite more women and give them a platform to exchange thoughts and come together.
4. Joanna Stern @joannastern
Mobile phones, tablets, PC's - you name it. Joanna knows all about the newest developments on the market. She works as Tech-Journalist for the “Wall Street Journal” and helps us to make hard decisions with her articles and videos weekly… Apple, or Samsung?
5. Jane McGonigle @avantgame
Computer games are fun for guys. But for girls too - also the older ones! Jane McGonigle is a professional computer game developer. Watch her TED Talk hear why she thinks computer games can change the world.
https://www.ted.com/talks/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world?language=en
6. Jen Simmons @jensimmons
As so-called “Technology Evangelist” Jen engages in panels, conferences, or user meetings and tries to bring Tech closer to others. She is the host of the well-known podcast “The Web Ahead” and helped with projects for CERN, W3C, Google, and Drupal. Any questions?!
7. The ENIAC Women
There's sadly no twitter handle that comes with these beautiful women as they are unfortunately not with us anymore. But we think they can’t be not on this list. These women programmed the first computer in WW2 and thereby set an enormous milestone for the information era.
8. Verena Pausier @verenaDE
As founder of Fox and Sheep GmbH she and her international team of illustrators, animators, developers, and game designers create apps for kids in preschool age. With the help of these apps, she wants to enable parents to bring their children close to the digital world cautiously. The Berlin raised power woman was nominated as “Young Global Leader” by the World Economic Forum and, no doubt should be part of our list of remarkable women in Tech.
9. Sofie Quidenus @SofieQuiedenus
You might’ve lived with your parents and dragged yourself to uni every day with the age of 21. But Sofie established “Quidenus Technologies” and started building her first robots at that age. Now she manages a startup in AI that makes extraction of information in documents easy and super fast. We all can take a leaf out of her book, that’s for sure!
10. Dr. Diva Tommei @dtommei
We all know it. We have to sit inside and work while everyone is having fun in the sun. Dr. Tommei also experienced this unpleasant feeling when she was studying for her doctorate in biotechnology at Cambridge. So she created a solar-powered robot that would help you get natural light everywhere in your house any time. https://solenica.com/howcaiaworks/
These were 10 stories of incredible women that don’t give a sh*it about what they’re meant to be good at and what not. They JUST DO and are highly motivated and successful in their work. Man or woman, passion is gender-neutral. So, what are you waiting for, lure your pigeon out of the hole, it’s been in there for way too long!
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