Why women are leaving the tech industry in droves (and What can I do about it)?

(*posted this on LinkedIn, but would appreciate SCN & ASUG specific feedback here too.)

As Tech-Guy for over 20 years, a Community Volunteer – and Dad to a fourteen year-old daughter who is interested in STEM programs, I read this LA Times article with great interest.

Why women are leaving the tech industry in droves
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-gardner-women-in-tech-20141207-story.html

None of the stories surprised me. Things are better than they were during the Dot-Com Boom days, but there is still a long way for us to go as an IT industry.

Over the last 10-years, we’ve (*thankfully) lost most of the “Booth-Bunnies” at TechnoIogy Trade-Shows, but I think ASUG and SAP need to work with groups like Women in Technology and Girls In Tech – to improve outreach and networking/mentoring opportunities for young-women in the SAP Ecosystem.

I help organize 3 meetings a year for ASUG Ontario in the Greater Toronto Area, plus our Golf event. I also volunteer at other SAP Community events in the US and UK.

When we post Speaker or Volunteer Opportunities on-line through “Public” channels like Twitter and SCN – the responses are 80-90% from Men.

So, what are the possible problems with that kind of outreach…?

1.) Women in Tech are not seeing those postings/don’t follow those Channels…?

2.) Women in Tech are unable / unwilling to put themselves forward…?

3.) They way we “pitch” Speaker or Volunteer Opportunities is not attractive or encouraging to Women in Tech…? (*One of my own examples that I am now second-guessing = http://scn.sap.com/thread/3578155 )

4.) We need to present a different “Value-Proposition” about ASUG Membership and Participation to Women in Tech..?

5.) We need to Establish, Fund & Promote specific “Women in Tech” SIGS (Special Interest Groups) within ASUG & the SAP Community Network to develop those Mentorship programs for Women within SAP.

Like I said during “The Expendables” presentation at the SABOUC Conference in September 2014, “The Future of SAP and ASUG is not white, it’s not old, and its not male“…. we need to find a better walk to walk-that-talk in 2015.

Look forward to hearing your ideas. Thanks!