Intelligent CXO Issue 19 | Page 29

FEATURE swiftly and successfully is a leading priority . Not surprisingly , this requires an extra hands-on deck but where are these going to come from ?
It ’ s a commonly accepted fact that women are under-represented in the IT and cybersecurity sectors . But what we don ’ t really know is what percentage of the cybersecurity workforce is made up of women .
There seems to be wide-ranging disagreement about this but most estimates seem to be that the cybersecurity industry workforce is made up of around 25 % women .
But what we don ’ t know is what role women are performing within the industry – I ’ ve heard reports that this number could well be inflated by the number of women working within administration .
it ’ s clear that women are massively underrepresented and the question is then what are we going to do about it ?
I think we should ask ourselves if there are any grounds for optimism in terms of women being better represented in the cybersecurity industry .
Faith in change
I believe we need to have faith in the ability of society to change . It wasn ’ t until the mid-19th Century that women were employed as teachers in the US but a shortage of males changed that although , unfortunately , they only received a third of the pay men got .
WE HAVE ALL HEARD JOKES ABOUT HOW THE CYBERSECURITY INDUSTRY – AND IT IN GENERAL – IS FULL OF COMIC BOOK AND SCIENCE FICTION GEEKS .
Even if we take the 25 % figure to be accurate
Although statistics vary , it seems safe to say that around 75 % of US teachers are currently female www . intelligentcxo . com
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