Women in Engineering

This year marks the centenary of the Women’s Engineering Society, formed in 1919 via the National Council for Women which encouraged women into work in order to release men into the armed forces. Following the men’s return from the forces however, this group of women faced pressure to leave the workforce to make way for the returning men, and so the Women’s Engineering Society was born, to resist that pressure and promote engineering as a rewarding job for women.

Where we are

Current statistics from the Engineering Report (2018) suggest that just 12% of all engineers in the UK are women. Statistics for the future are not particularly encouraging either. Whilst 46% of girls aged 11-14 would consider a career in engineering, that number is just 25% by the time those girls are ready to leave school at 16-18. So what changes? Where and why do those barriers develop when those girls are still in education? Interestingly, girls outperform boys in Engineering fields of study both at A-Level and University. We also know that in a survey of 300 women in engineering, 84% were either happy or extremely happy with their career choice. So, the girls who do study engineering-related studies do very well, and the ones who progress into careers in the field are happy too. So why are so few actually doing so?

Far from anything resembling an expert on the matter, I will make no hypotheses here, nor will I offer potential solutions, to do so I feel, would grossly oversimplify the issues at hand. I will point out however, that the Engineering Report mentioned above, also identified the need for an additional 1.8m new engineers and technicians by 2025, so there’s a clear disparity between supply and demand. Therefore, even if the issue was gender discrimination in the hiring process, hiring managers can’t afford to take that stance any longer given the disparity just mentioned.

How we can get to where we want to be

I spoke with Kerrine Bryan, an award-winning chartered electrical engineer, who felt the need to tackle the issue at its roots by writing career-themed children’s books such as ‘My Mummy is an Engineer’ (https://www.butterflybooks.uk/). According to Kerrine, even as early as the toys designed for girls vs boys often implant the idea into children’s minds that engineering is for men, and that these ideas once implanted, are very difficult to shift. Kerrine’s experience mirrors the 84% of women surveyed above, who are either happy or extremely happy with their career choice but did point out that in previous roles, she’s perhaps been required to prove technical competence more than a male colleague might have needed to. Kerrine believes that the biggest way we can influence the number of school-age girls moving into engineering is to have more engineers going into schools and talking about the various roles available. ‘There are so many roles within engineering that there is something for everyone’ she said to me, which certainly makes a lot of sense.

Clearly then, women who have chosen careers in engineering are happy with their choice, and given the need for a further 1.8m new engineers by 2025, it’s high time we started to do something about it. As Kerrine pointed out, this starts at grassroots level but it continues all the way through to employers in the hiring process. In recognition of the outstanding work done by the Women’s Engineering Society, we owe it to the women of the past and of the future to make it as easy and attractive as possible to enter a career in engineering.

I’d love to hear the thoughts and experiences of other women in engineering or ideas on how else we might go about encouraging stars of the future to choose engineering as a career.