Social Good Engineering Magazine: GineersNow Social Innovation GineersNow Engineering Magazine Issue No. 001 | Page 53

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“So What If I’m the Only Woman
in the Construction Site?”
Huge projects like Hong Kong-Zhu-
hai-Macao Bridge and the high-
speed railway to Guangzhou are
under a crisis: they lack skills in con-
struction labor for years. This has led
recruitment firm Manpower to find
more engineers, casting its net wider
to target women workers as well.

This is how we met Sonia,
23 years old, an on-site assistant
surveyor.

In her class of 90 students,
only 20 were girls. She joined the
field two years ago after getting her
associate degree. Work was quite easy
to find after graduation because of
the demand.

She is making a close
amount to HK$20,000 a month.
That is one key attraction, other
than a clear career path and good
promotion for young women to
enter the profession. The job security
is also not a problem, since most big
projects last at least four to five years.

At work, being the only
woman in her department, she uses
that uniqueness to her edge – male
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colleagues are quite willing to take
care of her, as long as she is polite and
keeps a smile. Her greatest struggle,
however, is the dirty and dusty work
environment. Women aren’t usually
exposed to them so it is quite an
adjustment.

Other than that, there
isn’t much that women cannot do in
the construction site. She is a proud
engineer and she performs – that is
what matters. Who gives a damn that
she is a woman?