“It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.” — Audre Lorde
Collaborative work is essential in all communities and sectors. Greater diversity in these creative processes enhances the quality of the final product, since different perspectives on the same project result in greater scope of vision and increase the credibility of any production.
Thinking differently should not be an obstacle to the evolution of collective work, but something enriching in the construction of our activities. In technology, we have seen this many times.
Scientific and technological innovation requires the effort of several minds. This is what happened in 1843, when Ada Lovelace, the first programmer in history, created an algorithm to be processed by Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine.
Thus, the concept of a programmable computer was only possible thanks to the collaboration of a woman, who gave her contribution to the work of a colleague. Together, they developed something that would lay the groundwork for modern programming.
That said, can you believe that women currently represent only 27% of the field of computer science?
The importance of diversity in the technological market
Societal constructs have been standardized and enforced patterns of behavior throughout history, artificially implanting humanity with the belief that certain activities should be assigned only to men, pushing women to domestic roles, or jobs supporting men in the labor market.
And yet…
Women like:
- Katherine Johnson (1918-2020) - mathematician, physicist and space scientist;
- Dorothy Vaughan (1910-2008) - mathematician and first black woman to be head of department at NASA; and
- Mary Jackson (1921-2005) - mathematician and NASA’s first aerospace engineer
were some of the core contributors to the launch of Apollo 11 to the moon in 1969. These and other women are indisputable proof of how backward it is to exclude or sideline women in scientific fields.
The lack of diversity in technology companies has been a major obstacle to the pace of recent technological advances. Joy Buolamwini, creator of the Algorithmic Justice League project, brought up an important discussion about the social implications of Artificial Intelligence.
In her master’s thesis Gender Shades: Intersectional Phenotypic and Demographic Evaluation of Face Datasets and Gender Classifiers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Joy Buolamwini analyzed big tech facial recognition algorithms and found that recognition error rates in white men are only 0.8%, while in black women the rate rises to 34%.
Considering the fact that AI is an essential component of an ongoing technological revolution and that machine learning carries coded information that in the future will be part of our most everyday activities, how is it possible to live in such a heterogeneous society, but with only one group responsible for the functionality of our technology?
If we seek to build a world with more social justice, with racial and gender equality, and equal pay, we will have to promote more diversity in the workplace.
Women in Tech
As previously said, a woman’s place is where she wants to be, and not just in domestic or subordinate spaces.
In this Women’s Month, we seek to reflect on how we can build fairer spaces, in which our differences can add up instead of dividing us.
At Azion we have a team of incredible women who integrate our work teams and help us to develop our modern solutions rapidly and efficiently. We are still growing, and we want this team to be increasingly diverse and creative.
We thank our collaborators, who are responsible for making every day the Women’s Day in our company.
These are days of struggle, reflection and construction. Step by step, we are innovating together.
ALESSANDRA TEIXEIRA - Administrative Analyst
ANNA LUIZA GARCIA - Customer Success Manager
BEATRIZ SANTOS - Revenue Solutions Analyst
BRUNA BERETA - Talent Acquisition Analyst
BRUNA SOARES - Designer
CAMILA ALVES - Technical Researcher
CAROLINE ZUCCO - Learning and Development Analyst
DANIELA RODRIGUES - People Operations Analyst
DANUSA ARAUJO - Designer
DEBORAH HAPP - Technical Researcher
ELISA GAIESKY - HR Manager
FABIOLA BORTOLON - Program Manager
FERNANDA BELCHIOR - Product Marketing Manager
GABRIELA KUHN - Designer
JESSICA CASTRO - Marketing Analyst
JULIA ANGST - Talent Acquisition Analyst
LUIZE BOYEN - Technical Writer
MARIA CELESTE CASALI - Technical Writer
MARIANA MACEDO - HR Analyst
MARINE LANZARIN - Solutions Architect
MICHELLE MACHADO - Revenue Solutions Analyst
MORGANA JOHANN - Designer
NATHALIA OLIVEIRA - Marketing Analyst
RACHEL KEMPF - Technical Researcher
RENATA DEBUS - Scrum Master
SABRINA MOREIRA - Product Owner
TAMARA VIEGAS - Designer
THAMIRIS RIBEIRO - Marketing Analyst
VANESSA FERNANDES - Solutions Architect
VIVIAN SEIXAS - Technical Researcher
