Celebrating Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day 2023

March 8 was International Women’s Day, and March was Women’s History Month, and I loved being able to proudly celebrate these events at Delphix with my colleagues. These two events are so important to commemorate— they’re such a great way to celebrate our women role models who have created such an incredible impact on their industries and paved the way for those of us who have come after them. And both events are a great way to inspire the young women of today to work hard and evoke even more change for the women who come after them.

The Importance of Women Role Models and Hard Work 

It’s especially important to me to celebrate role models today because I didn’t always have them. Growing up on a farm in the Midwestern U.S., I didn’t have women in tech in my life. I may have taken cues from certain people who had traits that I admired— like certain mannerisms, styles of speaking, or ways of carrying themselves. But there were no role models that I could look up to and think, “okay, I can envision myself in her career and dream about making it there. And I can be confident that those dreams can be real.” 

But I do owe a lot of my success to my family. To their credit, they instilled a very strong work ethic in me that prizes consistency, performance, and achievement. I carried that work ethic with me into my professional life, and as I progressed in my career, people came to see that they could rely on me to achieve, to consistently perform, and to hit whatever goal that was needed.

When I was coming up in my career, similarity bias was especially rampant. We tend to unconsciously show favoritism towards people who are similar to us, and this similarity bias continues to contribute heavily towards workplace inequity. In my own experience, I accepted who I am and decided to not consciously try to redirect people's opinions of me— that takes a lot of energy.  Instead I poured that energy into foing the work well and let the results speak for themselves. Over time, my work ethic really created my personal brand, which helped me get to where I am today.

Now that I’ve progressed in my career, I try hard to serve as a role model for other women– to help them find in themselves new possibilities for their futures. It’s important that women support each other in the workplace, and one of the best ways we can accomplish this is via mentorship.  Mentorship is not about talking at someone; it’s about bringing out someone’s interests and passions and leveraging those to guide someone’s career instead of fitting their career trajectory into the formulaic career ladder that’s existed for too long. 

Confronting the Challenges of Women in Technology

Women showing empathy to other women is so important in helping advance each other’s careers. But it’s just one part of empowering women in the workplace— and much more work still needs to be done to increase gender diversity and shatter the glass ceiling. This is especially true for the technology field— according to a study by Accenture and Girls Who Code, the ratio of women to men in technology roles has actually fallen in the past 35 years. And half of women who enter the technology field end up leaving it before they turn 35. 

One of the issues specific to technology is the struggles that technically-oriented women in particular face. Women only hold 28% of the computing and mathematical jobs in the U.S., according to a Zippia survey. While I am a woman working in technology, I’m not a technical person— but I’ve often seen technically-focused women get dominated in the workplace by technical men. It can be due to a variety of factors— women can sometimes be more soft-spoken compared to men, and similarity bias can manifest itself as men listening more to their male counterparts than their female colleagues.

In order to bring about change, we need to confront our own biases and work past them. Changing bias is like changing anything in life— if you want to change a habit, you first have to acknowledge that you have the habit. So, it’s vitally important for us to become aware of our own biases. Then, we need to both hold ourselves accountable to working past them, while also asking others to hold us accountable, as well. 

The Importance of Workplace Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

One of the best approaches to breaking bias is by talking to a variety of people, both to expose ourselves to more diverse perspectives and to consciously disengage the tendency to reach for that similarity bias. That’s just one of many reasons why diversity in general is so important to prioritize in the workplace. 

When I think back on the teams that I’ve built, I’ve found that making diversity a foundational aspect creates a safe place for everyone to bring their authentic selves to work. When people feel that they can be themselves and don't need to wear a mask, they feel safer, stronger, and happier. They’re able to better carry their enthusiasm into their work, and that not only creates a great, empowering work environment— it allows workers to inherently have a greater impact on the business, too.

That’s why I’m so proud to work for Delphix, which is committed to promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion throughout the company. One of my favorite initiatives that Delphix does to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion is our hiring practice of intentionally not extending an offer to a candidate without ensuring that we've had diversity represented in our interview pool. It’s resulted in a tremendous shift of increasing diversity within our teams, which I love. 

And to be clear— engaging this hiring practice doesn't mean we will always hire diverse candidates. It’s more about disengaging the tendency to engage in similarity bias. It’s about opening our minds, having important conversations, and talking to a variety of people.

A Bright Future Ahead

One of the most rewarding experiences with women in my field that I’ve had in my career involved meeting two special professionals who certainly carried unique perspectives compared to the rest of the workforce. It occurred in 2021, when I met the youngest-ever twins certified as Microsoft Power Platform Professionals— two inspiring and talented young women named Zara Khan and Zenubia Khan, who were 10 years old at the time.

During the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, Zara and Zenubia were at home with their family as we all were and kept hearing their father talk about Microsoft Power Platform as he helped Microsoft customers implement the platform. One day, they asked their dad, Microsoft Technical Specialist Adeel Khan, about the platform he kept mentioning. Adeel introduced them to online resources about the platform that they began studying. Adeel nurtured Zara and Zenubia’s learning through the process of passing the certification exam on their first attempt and achieving their historic feat.

At the time, I was serving as WW Vice President of Customer Success, Business Applications, for Microsoft, and I learned about the twins via LinkedIn. My team and I reached out to the girls’ parents, got permission to have a conversation with the twins, and ultimately had an amazing conversation with them where we got to hear about their hard work and their aspirations. 

I thought about Zara and Zenubia as I celebrated International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month. Speaking with them and witnessing their amazing energy was so inspiring— it shows how far professional women (and especially women in the technology field) have come, and how promising the next generation of professional women is. And it makes me confident that the future that women today are building for subsequent generations is going to be a bright one.