The Middle East and gender parity in technology: ahead or behind?

Companies like McKinsey are advocating for gender equality in the tech industry on a global scale, lamenting the decline of women in tech positions. Just 4% of Fortune 500 CEOs are women, according to a recent study by the Kauffman Fellows Research Center (KFRC).

According to Mashal Waqar, co-founder and chief operating officer of The Tempest, a media business focused on issues affecting women, "a company with a female founder and a female executive will employ six times more women." This is a quote from a Kauffman Fellows research paper. "However, there is a dearth of transparency and accountability outside of the start-up ecosystem."

Tides of SCIENCE

Waqar and others have been advocating for some time now that business executives in the Middle East take advantage of women's innovation and entrepreneurship. The world will be one step closer to solving this issue when "we start seeing leaders in this region publish organisational data with success stories," she said.

Female talent in the MENA area is abundant, but they are underrepresented in the region's workforces. Hire the appropriate women, not just women to fill a quota, Waqar urged. More significantly, make sure they aren't up against a glass ceiling in your company.

However, progress has been made, particularly in the education of women in technology, according to Sabine Holl, vice president of technical sales and chief technology officer at IBM Middle East and Africa. Holl noted that approximately half of the region's graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are female. According to her, this is significantly greater than in any other educational institution in the world. While she admits "there is great untapped female technical talent in the Middle East", she sees "more women entering technical roles than ever before".

She noted that in her 15 years of experience working in the MENA area, she had seen more women pursuing technical careers than in any other region.

Diversity is encouraged by governments

Sophie Leray, CEO of Naseba, a business facilitation firm specialising in emerging markets, emphasised the significance of government support for diversity-and-inclusion initiatives. In addition, she established the International Economic Conference for Women in Leadership (Global WIL).

Leray was cautiously optimistic about the region's development towards gender equality. "It is not so much that women are underrepresented overall, but more that they tend to be absent from the organisation chart in critical senior positions," she said, explaining that changes in policies and cultures have occurred over the past five years out of concern for a wasted potential in top-level female talent by business and government leaders.

Morphing mindsets

If governments and businesses in the Middle East want to outshine their global competitors in terms of diversity and inclusion, they will need to make more policy adjustments to address the gender parity gap and adapt to the realities of their present labour markets. Waqar, of the Tempest, has mentioned the region's clock-in culture as something that needs fixing.

She suggested that we move away from evaluating workers based on the amount of hours they put in and instead focus on how productive they are and the results they produce. She noted that despite the reluctance of MENA managers, remote and flexible work arrangements should be considered as a means of addressing the issues faced by women in the workplace regardless of their position or degree of seniority.

As the first members of Generation Z enter the workforce, Holl asserts that women now make up more than half of IBM's new hires in the area.

Developing microservices, crypto, the Internet of Things, and data science are all examples of in-demand digital skills that are emphasised in graduate programmes, as Holl put it. Diversity of thought, experience, and personal identity enhances creativity, agility, and engagement, and "women play a critical role in our business."

Keeping the bar high

As an example of a "standout success story from the region," Waqar highlighted Womena, a female-focused accelerator, and praised the work of regional organisations like Hopscotch that have concentrated on women's empowerment. Another major player in the startup scene, she said, was Sheraa (Sharjah Entrepreneur Centre), where 53% of the startups were run by women.

Leray of Naseba remarked that "most 'new tech' businesses are very engaged in working towards gender parity," praising the radical perspectives that have resulted in several in-house programmes on diversity and inclusion. Businesses are placing a greater emphasis on training and development programmes and hiring "smart young women in product-development roles," she said.

Leray noted that the healthcare sector was leading the way in terms of diversity policy shifts, but she argued that women's business ownership offered the best chance of achieving gender equality.

See what ladies in the Middle East have accomplished in the realm of technology

Women in the Middle East have made great strides towards careers and interest in a typically male-dominated domain, even as this is still a problem elsewhere.

UNESCO found that 57% of Arab nations' STEM graduates are female, and that 61% of UAE's university STEM students are female. According to another survey, women founded 34% of tech startups in the region.

As a woman in a leadership position, I appreciate the guidance and support I've gotten from my male colleagues and the efforts they've made to eliminate discrimination in the workplace. Gheed El Makkaoui, vice president of Careem Food, expressed her gratitude for the opportunity to "pay it forward" by mentoring other women at the company.

Women are increasingly holding places of power in previously male-dominated sectors, such as the transportation and food delivery industries. "This is extremely helpful because it promotes new ideas and different ways of thinking, both of which are essential to establishing long-lasting collaborations," she elaborated.

As a woman working in medtech, a traditionally male-dominated field, I am really pleased to see the steps society has taken to break the bias," said Reham Kilano, clinical operations manager at Eon Dental. That doesn't mean we're out of the woods yet, but we recognise that diversity in the workplace is essential for inspiring the next generation of leaders to realise their own potential, regardless of their gender, ethnicity, or other demographic characteristics.

Many regional businesses are actively promoting women's empowerment because they recognise the worth of a gender-balanced workforce.

It's common knowledge that women can be highly effective in the business world. The benefits of this approach are well-documented, and range from increased business profits to a more creative workforce. Women are assuming the lead like never before in establishing standards for leadership diversity thanks to ongoing discussions and encouragement. True, but what about the job in general? More and more businesses, including our own, are reevaluating internal policies with an eye towards empowering female workers and advancing the dialogue on how best to do so. Sophie Simpson, the Atteline's managing director and founder, said, "Our mantra is practises that help," including establishing concrete diversity goals and establishing programmes to support women in leadership roles.