I came across this ignite talk on “How to Get More Women in Tech in Under a Minute“ by Caroline Drucker. As I watched this, I literally cheered out loud. I completely agree with her message and I love her use of humor to get her point across.

As a woman in engineering, I run into this wording of girl vs. woman issue over and over again. Since college (when I started paying my own taxes, actually), I identified as a woman rather than a girl, particularly in a professional setting. When I worked in industry, I remember confronting my manager through an awkward conversation about how I preferred not to be called a girl, which he had done a number of times without a second thought. Apparently, in his mind we were all boys and girls, which baffled me. Did he really think of himself as a boy rather than a man? I had my doubts. Regardless, after that, he was a little more conscious about using the word girl in reference to me (and hopefully other woman engineers). Honestly, I think I was the first woman engineer he had ever actually worked with or managed.

As much as it annoys me to deal with gender issues, when I really just want to do engineering work, I think it’s important to set things straight even if it is incredibly difficult and awkward to initiate those conversations. That’s why I like this video. It’s a way of bringing up a serious topic with a thread of humor without directly attacking anyone. Even if not everyone agrees with the message, at least it starts the conversation about gender issues and language usage in engineering/tech.

This menstruating taxpayer fully supports this approach to more women in tech, confronting sexism, and inverting the power structure!