The evolution of tech
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The conundrum about “what counts as working in tech” is a new consideration. For many years, before “tech” became the moniker for all things, I worked in I/S, or Information Systems. I/S was a function within an organization, known for keeping systems running, storing data, and putting machines on desks.
I/S wasn’t sexy back then. Most of us working in I/S were relegated to basements, sitting at modular desks near the computer rooms with air flow raised access flooring. We were the geeks hidden away in the recesses of buildings. We were code smashers, cabling jedi, machine architects, operations managers, and server jockeys. While we were essential to the business, we were not as important, say, as your commercial sales organization or your shiny spin doctor corporate leaders.
Enter the Internet.
As the internet took flight, so did those stereotypes of the awkward condescending I/S people. Then suddenly, the social capital of being an architect of web technology and building apps became shiny and desired. With the evolution of web applications to mobile applications and the explosion of serving data and services via smart phones and tablets, everyone became…wait for the trumpets…TECH.
Now tech is ubiquitous in all sectors and verticals. If you are not working in a tech department or role, you are selling tech products, using tech to deliver services, supporting tech solutions or dependent upon tech to work. To not have tech fluency, expertise, or access to tech is to live Flintstonian.
I’m going to answer this question differently by sharing what tech looks like and what counts as tech.
The Trenches of Tech. It’s probably easier to think about trenches of tech as more technical in nature. This means you work in an IT department smashing code, designing and populating data repositories, developing tech products, implementing cybersecurity solutions, supporting infrastructure, staging machines, working in a SOC, SAP development and bug checking, building cloud platforms, leading IT process, machine learning, data science work and LLMing, QA-ing, DevOps-ing, serving as IT support for systems and hardware, web design and development. If you work in the trenches of tech, you are responsible for building, designing, and delivering tech services and products. In tech companies, there are still trenches of tech. I think of trenches of tech as foundational roles. Without technical expertise in the truest sense of the word, TECHNOLOGISTS, there are no apps for phones, no platforms for operations, and no tech services to sell.
For a woman, working in the trenches of tech, you may have been the only woman for a very long time. You may still be the only woman on your team. For many years, the trenches of tech were dominated by men, and still are. For a woman to work in this space, it can and has been challenging because for most of us, we are the “onlies” (the only ones). For Black, Latina and Indigenous women, for a certainty we were and are still “onlies” in the trenches.
Tech-adjacent Roles. Boy, this is a controversial one. I consider tech-adjacent roles as those tech jobs/roles that require tech knowledge and some expertise, but the role does NOT require you to be a python ninja or be a Kubernetes expert. While personally I consider an IT project manager or scrum master to be a technical role, not all project managers are tech trench dwellers. As an example, if you are a PMO leader, you support the IT organization in the prioritization of projects, opex/capex, and processes. But PMO leaders may have never smashed a line of code or worked in a technical role. Other tech-adjacent roles are product managers. Especially when it comes to Agile, a product manager or owner is tasked with understanding the BUSINESS needs and translating those requirements to using tech to do your job!
What about Tech Sales? Again, controversy. I’ll give you the lawyerly answer: It depends. Many tech sales leaders must understand how the tech platforms work, what it will take to deliver systems, and the best solution for the customer problem. This requires some degree of technical acumen. If you are a tech salesperson and your job is to sell ServiceNow or Azure solutions, are you tech? Heck yes. Are you trenches of tech? Maybe you came from the trenches, but you don’t have to smash code or build cloud solutions to sell cloud solutions.
Bottom line: a tech-adjacent role requires a significant understanding of how technologies work so they can help design and deliver solutions but may not have a technician background. NOTE: I consider a digital marketing leader to be a tech-adjacent role.
Tech Leadership Roles. For me, this is easiest: Chief of Staff to the CIO/CTO or CISO, a CIO, CISO, CTO, Chief Digital Officer, Chief AI Officer, CEO of a tech startup. In a tech company, a Chief Innovation Officer may be a technical role. There are also VPs, SVPs, Senior Global IT Leaders, Agile Delivery Leaders, Automation Leaders.
In transparency, there are many women who do not get recognized for contributing to innovation and technology within their companies. I was thinking of the women who are cybersecurity analysts, software engineers, data/AI scientists, cloud architects, systems administrators, Agile leaders, project managers, SAP analysts, QA testers, web and mobile app developers, process IT leaders when I pitched the idea of celebrating these women via Indiana’s Women IN Tech Week. Most of these women are not seen on panels, invited to blog, or provided opportunities to keynote. In the 2023 New York Times article, “Who’s Who Behind the Dawn of the Modern Artificial Intelligence Movement,” they didn’t recognize any women, when there’s Dr. Fei Fei Li, Dr. Timnit Gebru, Dr. Joy Buolamwini, Dr. Daphnie Koller and many more women who are trailblazers in AI innovation and adoption. They were not recognized. Why?
There’s room for all in tech. In Indiana, let’s not repeat the mistake of the New York Times. Let’s recognize our trailblazers, innovators and script-flippers! Let’s show girls in this state that they can do this. Because when you see us, you can be us.