TALKING
‘‘ business
cCan you tell us about your role and how you landed in your position ?
My current role is to basically distil very complex , technical concepts into something that people can understand . F5 is , at its core , a very technical company . We deliver applications and we secure them , so we ' re into everything from the network to applications – the Internet is very much where we operate , so there ' s a lot of moving parts . It ' s my job to look at that , look at the trends and technologies that are coming and see how that impacts what we do , how we interact with applications , how we make them faster , how we secure them , as well as then try to explain all that technical jargon to the market at large .
I started as a developer and moved into this publishing testing world where we would test all sorts of technical equipment and then write about it . I was really good at the technical piece , not so good at the writing piece to begin with , because that ' s something you have to learn – not everyone just has that talent . Through the eternal patience of many editors , I learned how to write in a way that was consumable and eventually ended up at F5 . I moved around F5 for years into different roles until I landed in the office of the CTO to help with strategy and vision and thought leadership .
Why is the technology industry such a male-dominated field ?
I don ' t know . I ' ve read many reports and studies – some of them conflict , some say one thing , some say another . From personal experience , my mother was technical – she started out as programmer in the 70s on mainframes doing COBOL and moved into project management and successfully ran all sorts of technology projects at her company . Growing up , I was interested because she talked about her work which got me into playing with computers , so I went into it . I have four children – two daughters and two sons . They have had the same kind of role model , they had the same encouragement and my youngest daughter says she prefers to work with animals . Technology just went right out the door . My other daughter said she wanted to be a mum right now and then figure out what to do later . I don ' t know why animals were more interesting than computers .
entering the workforce and getting educated and so it became male-dominated .
Do other females in the industry feel the same ?
It ' s not often discussed because it seems so superficial – for example , wearing heels might be a big deal to you because it ’ s an expression of you . I want to be me and that includes how I express myself and other women have said the same . When you consider the fact that we ’ re trying to get teenagers involved in STEM , if we keep putting this image of IT and technology in front of them that says you have to look a certain way , it can be off-putting and they might start to think , ‘ I want to be me , why do I have to be like that . That ' s not me , so that means I ' m not for STEM .’
How far do you agree that cloud technology has acted as an enabler of opportunity for women in the industry ?
I think it ' s been very good for women . I know a lot of women entrepreneurs , because of cloud , because they could start up without having to go and build this IT and tech and basically deal with people who maybe weren ' t so excited to go work for a female CEO , but the cloud gave them that flexibility . I think it ' s really been an enabler because the cloud is technology and the cloud doesn ' t care if you ' re a man or a woman , or however you identify . Women can really take advantage of that and they have .
Lori MacVittie , Principal Technical Evangelist , Office of the CTO , F5 Networks
In terms of the industry being male-dominated – in the 70s , when this was just opening up , it was very femaledominated so to see it change is strange . I think a large number of men decided they could do these things and flocked in droves . Whereas women were still just
Why is today ' s digital workforce made up of only 17 % women ?
I don ' t know – because only 17 % of women have gone into tech . If we look at the data , that ' s about all
www . intelligentcio . com INTELLIGENTCIO EUROPE 39