FWIW I did ask multiple times. Each time there was a 'next-time' excuse. I saw my shy fellow coworkers moving up but maybe they were better negotiators behind the door.
On my part, I did some research. Except the senior management whose salaries are publicly available, the women in the company that I'm close with either receive little to measly bonuses and have had a hard time moving up. Maybe it's because it's a large company or because I'm not someone to forcefully ask a raise just-cause. Either way it's nerve-wrecking to make up excuses for no obvious mistake of mine.
Thanks for the input! I've thought about it previously but the work I do is cutting edge and have room to learn a lot from colleagues, if I ignore the bias.
But you're right, in the long run I do plan to switch. I'll have to start passively looking out for new opportunities. I do dread having to spend time to prepare for the all day generic white-board interviews while I could be better off spending it on learning new tools or hacking on a side project.
I too, am a female engineer at one of the well known companies in the Bay Area. As a background, I have a masters degree in CS and am in my 5th year of working as an engineer.
Here's the problems that I faced:
1. Not taking my opinions seriously - I experimented with this one! My manager would endlessly argue over every small opinion I had but the same opinion that my colleague would have, would get noticed and sometimes even praised. Even on silly things. I can't get into project details but for a new project, I suggested that we try out the desktop version of Git to make transition from p4 easier. My manager was absolutely against it and asked me to setup a p4 project for the same and make it work with p4. A coworker(10 years my senior) suggested we use the same desktop version of git and we switched, no questions asked. I figured he changed his mind since both of us said it. This happened 4 times before I once, actually told my opinion to my colleague to convey to my manager and my manager complied with no questions asked. This is how I get my opinions across now. I do understand that I don't have 10 years of experience but I can be right sometimes. And no, the same did not happen to the new guy on the team. I noticed it only when my male colleague pointed it out to me and sympathized with me on being micromanaged.
2. Growth - I cared less about growth as far as I had a decent salary to live with. I am someone who likes to work for the challenges I can solve and not for the minor salary increases or bonuses. May sound stupid but each person is different. This was fine until I realized that I wasn't given more responsibilities because they were given only to senior engineers. Being promoted to different levels means a salary increase is a must(company rules). I definitely wanted more responsibilities. Each year it was a different story as to why I wasn't promoted and the hardest part? Being told that I work like a senior engineer and if I do more work, I'll get the promotion next year.
3. Being classified as the 'diversity quota' - I have as much qualifications as much as the next guy, if not more. I work on side projects during the weekends and am picking up machine learning out of interest on how to incorporate it in my daily work. Being the only girl on the team, people wanting to hire me to increase their diversity numbers but not plan on assigning me good work, being treated as the female-employee-at-work to boost the company's image alone, sucks. Imposter syndrome is real and these opinions contribute to it more.
I took up engineering to solve hard problems. It is sad that the culture of a company/valley contributed to me contemplating want to quit engineering to do something where I'll be treated right.
Not all problems women face have to be sexual harassment to get noticed, these workplace biases are hard to navigate. This is especially to people who diss diversity programs, there is the reason it's in place. I've received so much help from women-focused diversity programs and have even helped fix a problem or two along the way.
Finally, on a funny end note, I'm a big hacker news fan and have noticed how passing constructive feedback that can sometimes come across as negative but useful on a system/product/post is fairly common here. This post is hopefully taken in the same manner and not a female-ranting-about-things comment.
I too, am a female engineer at one of the well known companies in the Bay Area.
As a background, I have a masters degree in CS and am in my 5th year of working as an engineer.
Here's the problems that I faced:
1. Not taking my opinions seriously - I experimented with this one! My manager would endlessly argue over every small opinion I had but the same opinion that my colleague would have, would get noticed and sometimes even praised. Even on silly things. I can't get into project details but for a new project, I suggested that we try out the desktop version of Git to make transition from p4 easier. My manager was absolutely against it and asked me to setup a p4 project for the same and make it work with p4. A coworker(10 years my senior) suggested we use the same desktop version of git and we switched, no questions asked. I figured he changed his mind since both of us said it. This happened 4 times before I once, actually told my opinion to my colleague to convey to my manager and my manager complied with no questions asked. This is how I get my opinions across now. I do understand that I don't have 10 years of experience but I can be right sometimes. And no, the same did not happen to the new guy on the team. I noticed it only when my male colleague pointed it out to me and sympathized with me on being micromanaged.
2. Growth - I cared less about growth as far as I had a decent salary to live with. I am someone who likes to work for the challenges I can solve and not for the minor salary increases or bonuses. May sound stupid but each person is different. This was fine until I realized that I wasn't given more responsibilities because they were given only to senior engineers. Being promoted to different levels means a salary increase is a must(company rules). I definitely wanted more responsibilities. Each year it was a different story as to why I wasn't promoted and the hardest part? Being told that I work like a senior engineer and if I do more work, I'll get the promotion next year.
3. Being classified as the 'diversity quota' - I have as much qualifications as much as the next guy, if not more. I work on side projects during the weekends and am picking up machine learning out of interest on how to incorporate it in my daily work. Being the only girl on the team, people wanting to hire me to increase their diversity numbers but not plan on assigning me good work, being treated as the female-employee-at-work to boost the company's image alone, sucks. Imposter syndrome is real and these opinions contribute to it more.
I took up engineering to solve hard problems. It is sad that the culture of a company/valley contributed to me contemplating want to quit engineering to do something where I'll be treated right.
Not all problems women face have to be sexual harassment to get noticed, these workplace biases are hard to navigate. This is especially to people who diss diversity programs, there is the reason it's in place. I've received so much help from women-focused diversity programs and have even helped fix a problem or two along the way.
Finally, on a funny end note, I'm a big hacker news fan and have noticed how passing constructive feedback that can sometimes come across as negative but useful on a system/product/post is fairly common here. This post is hopefully taken in the same manner and not a female-ranting-about-things comment.
On my part, I did some research. Except the senior management whose salaries are publicly available, the women in the company that I'm close with either receive little to measly bonuses and have had a hard time moving up. Maybe it's because it's a large company or because I'm not someone to forcefully ask a raise just-cause. Either way it's nerve-wrecking to make up excuses for no obvious mistake of mine.