Can a lady be a software engineer? (Critical Findings)

Are you in doubt wondering whether software engineering is a suitable profession for ladies?

Or thinking it’s a profession for guys and ladies can’t really handle what it entails.

Well, you’re at the right place and this article is meant to clear your doubt.

Without further ado, let’s start by looking at the different traits of ladies, that make them very suitable for the role of a software engineer.

Qualities of ladies that make them suitable for the Software Engineering Profession

1. Remarkable work ethics

Software engineers are known for their remarkable work ethics. They collaborate with other developers using code collaboration tools and pair programming.

Software engineers always work with different teams from pre production stage to post production stage.

2. Intelligence

The brain size structure of females is different than that of males. Although a male’s brain appears 10% larger, a female’s brain matures faster and is better optimized for intuitive thinking.

A female brain has a larger hippocampus and cerebral cortex defined for verbal functions. This combination improves their memory and language learning skills and makes females a bit smarter than males by default.

According to Malek Abu Jawdeh and  Shwetlena Sabarwal, “A study found that middle-school girls edge out boys in overall self-discipline.

Girls were more adept at “reading test instructions before proceeding to the questions,” “paying attention to a teacher rather than daydreaming,” “choosing homework over TV,” and “persisting on long-term assignments despite boredom and frustration.” 

These differences in male and female brain structures and in exposure to hormones might influence gender-specific learning advantages”.

3. A positive outlook on life

The positive attitude of ladies makes them resilient enough to overcome difficult hurdles.

They bother less about negative situations and focus their gear on possible solutions.

In software engineering, be rest assured that you’ll encounter a lot of challenges that are either people-oriented, product-oriented or process-oriented and only the rugged at heart can weather the storm.

4. Adaptability

Ladies have an outstanding ability to adapt to new situations and environments. This aids them to change their plans, behavior or mindset according to their current situation. 

As a result, ladies are also considered resourceful. An important quality with regards to successful career building. 

5. Curiosity

Curiosity is an essential component of the learning process and ladies are often curious and inquisitive, asking questions and they seek reasonable answers.

By so doing, they gain extensive knowledge of the subject at hand.

6. Motivated

Because of being curious-minded and adaptable, ladies are highly motivated.

They are seen to be more engaged in working and getting their tasks done, rather than slacking.

This can be quite helpful when you get stuck while coding and cannot figure out where you went wrong.

7. Exceptional leader

One major aspect of software engineering that’s often overlooked is team-spirited leadership.

A study conducted by Dr. Alice Eagly, a scholar on the topic of women’s leadership, found that women make better leaders because women tend to be more transformational leaders — meaning that they seek to develop others and listen more effectively, in addition to generally thinking more outside-the-box than their male counterparts. 

We know from various reports, such as the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs report, that the top skills needed to be successful as a leader of tomorrow are emotional intelligence (EQ), empathy, listening skills, coaching and mentoring, and innovation/creativity. Research has also shown us that women tend to be better at using these skills (i.e., “soft skills) than men.

What percentage of software engineers are females?

Although we have more males than females as software engineers, we can still see the gradual increase and participation of females in coding-related jobs.

A report by ‘Software Engineer Demographics and Statistics in the US’ suggests that the total number of software engineers is around 329,559 in the US out of which 22% are females and 78% are males.

What country has the most female software engineers?

HackerRank analyzed its data of 2M+ programmers and India tops the chart with 22% for the highest number of female developers, this includes female software engineers and programmers.

The United Arab Emirates, Romania and China follow suit with 21.0%, 20.6% and 19.6% respectively.

What country has the most skilled female software engineers?

Although India has the most software engineers, algorithms test challenges from a sample size of 20 countries with the highest number of female software engineers shows that Russia has the best female developers followed by Italy, Poland and China in 2nd, 3rd, and 4th place respectively.

10 Highest Paying Job Opportunities for Female Software Engineers

Here’s a list of the 10 Highest Paying Jobs For Female Software Engineers in 2022 which are the best ones in the tech industry:

1. Full Stack Developer
2. Data Scientist
3. Software Architect
4. SQA ( Software Quality Assurance) Engineer
5. Android Engineer/Developer
6. DevOps Engineer
7. Backend Engineer
8. Application Security Engineer
9. Machine Learning Engineer
10. Cloud Engineer

What is the average female software engineer’s salary?

On average, a female software engineer can earn between $118,511 to $120,085 annually. 

This value depends on certain factors like your job description, the company type and the individual’s experience level.

You should expect someone with higher software engineering experience to earn higher than an entry software engineer.

Google states that women who have an experience of five years or more, are more likely to earn $4,000 more than those who do not have such experience. 

Do female software engineers get paid less?

On average, female software engineers earn ~10% lower salaries than male software engineers.

This earning gap is not caused by gender differences but solely due to the fact that male software engineers averagely have more professional experience than their female counterparts.

According to Zippa, for every dollar that a male software engineer earns, a female software engineer earns ninety-two cents. Moreover, the average male income in this sector is $93,382 and that of the female is $86,299.

7 Top Female Software Engineers

1. Elissa Murphy

• Vice President of Engineering for Google
• Experience of working at Yahoo and Microsoft
• Holds more than 30 patents in distributed systems, machine learning and security
• Named ‘Most Powerful Engineers

2. Arquay Harris

• American software developer
• Former Senior Director of Engineering at Slack
• Vice President of Engineering at Webflow (as of April 2021)
• Named one of “America’s Top 50 Women in Tech” by Forbes Magazine

3. Tracy Chou

• Founder and CEO of Block Party
• Silicon Valley software engineer
• Coder for Facebook, Quora and Pinterest
• Appeared on the cover of ‘The Atlantic’ and ‘Wired’
• Awarded ‘Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business

4. Poornima Vijayashanker

• Founder of Femgineer
• Founding engineer at Mint, a finance site and app
• Author of the book ‘How to Transform Your Ideas into Software Products.

5. Mina Markham

• Staff Engineer at Slack
• Built Pantsuit, the UI library for the Hillary Clinton campaign
• Teaches for Black Girls Code
• Presenter at Front-End Design Conference, Midwest.io and Distill.

6. Jade Raymond

• Game Producer
• Creator of games such as The Sims Online, Assassin’s Creed, Assassin’s Creed II, and Assassin’s Creed: Bloodlines, Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist and Watchdogs.
• Worked at Electronic Arts and Ubisoft Montreal.

7. Jennifer Dewalt

• Founder of Zube
• Built 180 websites over the course of 180 days
• Made toys and games like the Sushi Jiggler and Minesweeper
• Developer of ‘How we’re feeling?’

These are just a few examples of how women can be amazing software engineers.

If you are a lady trying to get into this profession, do not relent because we’ll tell your own story on this blog too someday.

Let’s wrap this up with a few tips on becoming a software engineer.

A self-taught female software engineer

How to become a software engineer

1. Get enrolled in software engineering programs

Enrollment in software development programs is the first step one can take closer to becoming a software engineer. The most common languages taught are Java, Python, C/C++, and JavaScript. 

It not only provides you with a chance to develop your interest in this field but also helps you experiment with it while learning. Moreover, you get to know more about yourself on the way too.

To excel at such programs, you do not necessarily need a background in coding.

It could be your startup. But, having previous experience can help you get on track easily and learn better by merging already learned concepts with the new ones.

In order to get into such programs to attain a full-time job, you need a bachelor’s degree. But some people also go for associate degrees which make them eligible for entry-level positions.

2. Go for internships

An internship is a very good way to jump-start your career. It can get you hands-on experience in the world of technology and sharpen your skill set.

You meet new people, learn new tech-related information and gain professional confidence.

This broadens your mind and makes you better as a software engineer alongside building a professional network.

3. Earn certifications

Many institutes all across the world allow you to complete a year-long certificate program that strengthens your skills such as problem-solving, software project management and programming along with algorithm development.

The ones enrolled in such programs are also given certain projects to work on that can help them build a strong portfolio. 

Certifications such as ‘Oracle Certified Java Programmer’ or ‘the Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer’, can help you understand the duties of a software engineer.

It also provides aid in case you are confused between 2 or more career paths related to computer science.

Furthermore, certifications can help you score a job much more easily with any company or even as a freelancer. 

Such certifications can be of two types: Undergraduate level and Graduate level. Undergraduate certifications deal with simpler concepts and do not require that you hold a degree.

However, the minimum requirement for graduate certifications is that you have a bachelor’s degree. These programs are much more advanced too.  

4. Determine your specialty

Choosing a specialty takes you one step closer to your successful future as a software engineer. You can either specialize in application software or system software.

Application software are the applications that we use on our computers to carry out specific tasks namely word processor, google meet, chrome and photoshop.

On the other hand, system software refers to the software that users hardly interact with and is used for maintenance and proper functioning of the old computer systems.

These include computer operating systems like file management, utility and debuggers.

Having a specialty in mind, you can direct yourself in the right direction.

You can choose software engineering programs, internships or certifications related to your specialty and gain expertise regarding that without being double-minded.

This can immediately lead you to your dream job.

5. Learn new skills

If this is your startup and you don’t really know which direction to go into, different learning platforms are your solution.

Start looking for ways to learn new skills that will help you in becoming a software engineer.

For example, if you don’t know how to code, that is where you start. But the question that comes to mind is, ‘which language to choose?’.

There is no specific language that if you learn, you will become a software engineer.

You need to get a grasp of different languages to build a successful career. Now how do you do that?

Different ways exist to learn new skills. Some of them are listed below for you to choose from:

• Youtube tutorials
• Online sites such as geeksforgeeks
• Academies
• Friends or classmates
• Joining societies or clubs at schools/colleges

6. Create your resume

A resume is the most important thing that will determine your career as a software engineer.

It’s your introduction to hirers. It’s how they know your worth and your skills. It’s basically your first impression. And you know what William Hazlitt once said, “the first impression is the last impression”.

So, make a resume for yourself. Add all your previous experiences and the skills you have to it. Keep it updated; every time you learn something new or complete a project, add it to your resume. 

Make it count people because your career depends on it!

7. Build your portfolio

A portfolio is a collection of your projects -the ones that were assigned to you or you worked on them on your own.

Throughout a bachelor’s degree, many institutes assign students projects at the end of a semester. They are about programming if you are studying something related to computer science.

These projects can be a part of your portfolio. Or even if you start developing a simple app or game on your own, that goes into your portfolio too. 

This portfolio is a showcase of your skills. It shows people not only what you have learned, but also how you implemented it. That is a big hit when you go for interviews for jobs or internships.

8. Continue your education

Once you complete your undergraduate degree, do not stop there. At this point, you actually start the learning stage.

Go for graduate degrees, certifications or software engineering programs. Keep on learning, because the more you learn, the more worth you have.

Lastly, I’ll leave you with a short 2 mins video containing elite inside advice from female software engineers that have passed through the same journey as you.

Final Thoughts

Software engineering is not confined to any gender as ladies can be software engineers and also ascend to the peak software engineering levels just like their male counterparts.

It all boils down to availing oneself with the right learning tools and resources, consistency and individual interest.

And as you’ve seen above, ladies do have specific traits that make them excel well in software engineering profession.

So if becoming a software engineer is your dream, I’d encourage you to go for it.

As Rachel Gray said, “She believed she could, so she did.”

And it’s a wrap.

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Happy Coding!