Women Engineers' Survey - Part 3

For the first time in Sri Lanka a countrywide survey was carried out to gather information on the status quo of the woman engineer living and working in Sri Lanka. This article is the third part of a series published in the SLEN newsletter of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka (IESL) to share the results obtained in the survey which were initially announced to the audience of the AGM of the WEF (Women Engineers' Forum) of IESL in March 2018. The full survey comprised of:

Section 1 - Identifying the status

Section 2 - Perception of engineering as a profession and the place of women in engineering

Section 3 - Identifying inhibitors

Section 4 - Engineering education

Section 5 - Identifying work place issues and barriers

Section 6 - Identifying a wish list

Part 1 of this series which covered the findings of the Sections 1 & 2 of the survey can be found on the page 7 of Vol. 54, No 03, April/May 2018 issue (http://www.iesl.lk/resources/Paper%20SLEN/NEWSLETTER%20-%20April-%20May%202018-web%20file.pdf); Part 2 can be found on page 9 of Vol. 54, No 05, September/October 2018 issue (http://www.iesl.lk/resources/Paper%20SLEN/NEWSLETTER%20-%20%20September%20-%20October%20%202018-web%20file.pdf) and covers the Sections 3 and 4 of the survey.

This article covers the findings of Sections 5.

Section 5 - Identifying work place issues and barriers

Issues and perceived barriers at the work place are known to be major hindrances to the career progression of women engineers elsewhere in the world. The questions were targeted at eliciting responses to issues that may be common to the woman engineers in Sri Lanka. As shown on Table 9, only half of the respondents felt that they were treated equally by their engineering colleagues. This, although may be viewed as just a "perception", can be quite damaging and demoralising.

Table 9: Do you feel you get treated as an equal in your work place among your fellow engineering staff?

Yes	No	Not sure
51%	30%	19%

Asked about their perception of the treatment they receive from the non-engineering male and female staff respectively (Table 10), a high percentage (55% and 67% respectively) responded with positivity while 23% and 17% felt they were being treated with less respect by non-engineers staff. It is a common practice and an unconscious bias among the general public to view male-dominated careers as being better suited and performed by males and therefore can also prevail among non-engineering staff, male or female; they see females being either unsuitable or not as skilful which leads to their unfavourable treatment or grudging accommodation of female engineers. A 7% and 4% of respondents, albeit a small number, feeling that they are treated with more respect is an encouraging statistic which perhaps is indicative of the appreciation of the female engineer who appears to be skilfully "managing' both the career and the family responsibilities. Those 2% responding as "Other" gave comments such as "This varies with the people. Some treat us better than males while some people disrespect.", "It depends on your attitude & style of management, not on your sex." and "It takes a longer time for a female engineer to earn the respect compared to our male counterparts. But once earned, it continues." indicating that there is a wide variance in perceptions.

Table 10: Do you feel you get treated equally respectfully non-engineers staff?

	Male staff	Female staff
Yes	54%	66%
No. With more respect/regard than for male engineers	7%	3%
No. With less respect/regard than for male engineers.	23%	15%
Not sure	14%	14%
Other (Specify)	2%	2%

The views regarding the gender separation during prior education and its influence on the development of a female engineer are shown in Table 11. There is no clear winner and ambiguity prevails with 69% and 78% respectively agreeing each system is "better' than the other which is expected because there are benefits to be gained from both systems; what is more important is to foster and nurture the positive attributes of one system in the other and attempt to make learning environments gender-neutral.

Table 11: Perception regarding basic education

Question	Agree	Disagree	Not sure
"All-girls' education up to A/L is better because gender issues never come up and girls grow up believing that they can do anything." Do you agree?	69%	18%	13%
"Co-education is better because it allows mutual understanding early in life." Do you agree?	78%	6%	16%

The next questions in this section were to find what team compositions and dynamics encourage the advancement of a career in Engineering. As shown in Table 12, having more females in the workplace does neither necessarily nor significantly help other females to achieve more. Having more females in leadership positions however does appear to have a marginally more influence. These responses are explicable: generally there is no formal obligation for female engineers to support other female engineers and when there is support, it is generally only informal and personality-dependent; role models in leadership positions on the other hand, can be direct or indirect inspiration for junior females. It should be noted that with a 71% agreement the respondents are clear in their view that a mentorship - be it male or female - will be of help. Only 12% seem to disagree while 17% are not sure perhaps because they have never been mentees, even informally, at their work places.

Table 12: Effect of the team composition and dynamics

Question	Yes	No	Not sure
Will having more female members in your work team/division/department encourage you to achieve more?	40%	31%	29%
Will having more females in leadership positions in your work place encourage you want to succeed more?	48%	27%	25%
Will having a mentor (male or female) in your workplace help you to succeed?	71%	12%	17%

It was established earlier (Women Engineers' Survey - Part 1, Table 7) that nearly half of the respondents felt that there is a need to spend long hours at work in order to progress in a career in engineering. Given the high demand on their time, the responses to the next few questions reveal that the difficulties women face in balancing the acts of achieving career ambitions and family responsibilities can sway them towards lowering their career ambitions. Table 13 shows that an overwhelming majority of the female engineers have to choose between family and career at some stage and a sizeable majority tend to choose their family over career (Table 14).

Table 13: Do you think that there was (will be) a time in your engineering career when you had (will have) to choose between family and career?

Yes	61%
No	25%
Not sure	14%

Table 14: If you have to choose between family and career which did (will) you choose?

Family	52%
Career	10%
Not sure	12%
Not applicable	26%

The next question was for those who chose/will choose family over career and Table 15 summarises the responses to that question.

Table 15: If you chose (will choose) "Family' what kind of compromises did you have to do (are you ready to do)?

Answer Choices	Responses
Give up work completely	8%
Choose to work part-time	33%
Forego an opportunity for promotion	22%
Forego an opportunity for further studying/training	23%
Not applicable	34%
Other (please specify)	7%

Because the respondents have more than one answer choice 8% may appear small, but it still is significant; choosing to completely give up a career in engineering is a massive blow to the profession. Foregoing opportunities (22% and 23%), and some of the "other' choices (not on the table) such as "Diversify my Career in to different fields", "Went for another job which had more time for family", and "Early retirement" all indicate a departure from the field of engineering which is a great loss to the industry. Table 16 summarises the answers from those who chose/will choose career over family which reveals that sharing the additional load with family members or domestic helpers is the commonest approach in Sri Lanka.

Table 16: If you chose (will choose) "Career' what kind of support did you get (will you seek) to reduce impact on your family?

Answer Choices	Responses
Help from parents, relatives and extended family	23%
Help from domestic helpers	18%
Help from husband to take on an increased share of family responsibilities	26%
Not sure	3%
Not applicable	29%
Other (please specify)	1%

The good news is that most females do want to return to engineering after a long break in their careers as shown in table 17; only 2% consider stopping work all together. "Other" responses vary from hopelessness: "But the engineering field might not give a chance to the women who want to" and "There will be no opportunities for career for women after a long break", to anticipation: "May choose for another line of work such as academic, teaching or research path". The nature of the engineering industry in Sri Lanka does not seem to provide pathways for women to return to work in engineering with relative ease as in some other countries. Women's desire to prioritise family conflicting with the need to invest long hours to engineering work, and the perceived difficulties in balancing life and work in an engineering career as opposed in other work/trades may all contribute to females not wanting to study engineering in the first place.

Table 17: Would you consider returning to a career in engineering after a long break taken for family reasons, or would you choose a different line of work?

Answer Choices	Responses
Like to go back to engineering full time	53%
Like to go back to engineering part time	10%
May not return to work	2%
Choose other line of work	9%
Not sure	13%
Not applicable	12%
Other (please specify)	1%

Shown in Table 18 are the other factors that have affected the respondents' career progression.

Table 18: Do you think any of the below affected your performance or career progression at any stage of your career?

Answer Choices	Responses
Workplace culture (including harassment, discrimination & being disadvantaged)	19%
Long working hours and difficulties balancing career and family	17%
Lack of support from management	17%
Lack of networks or difficulty maintaining networks (isolation)	8%
Gender pay gap or the lack of transparency in pay scales	5%
Lack of visible role models	10%
No transparent career path	11%
Political interference/influence	10%
Not affected	1%
Other (please specify)	2%

Apart from the given answer choices the specified "other" responses vary from lack of technical exposure ["There is misconception among managers that female engineers are willing to do management related activities more. Most of the time they don't offer equal opportunities to female engineers. Therefore the real technical exposure to ladies are less. This highly affects the career progression."], through office politics ["Political interference in the sense of Office Politics; which is biased towards male engineers ], to dynamics characteristic to male dominated industries ["Being left out of important decisions made by the all males club (male colleges drinking after work with boss.)"] all of which are very concerning.

Considering the responses to this part of the survey we can come to several conclusions and make a few recommendations:

• The perceived differential treatment towards female engineers by other engineering as well as non-engineering staff may arise from deep-rooted unconscious biases and belief systems embedded in a society. However, non-acceptance from counterparts as an equal is in direct contradiction with two significant reinforcers of engineering occupations (altruism and autonomy; others are comfort, safety, achievement and status) that drive individuals to pursue a career in Engineering in the first place. This is a dangerous slippery slope that can only get worse unless corrective adjustments in the attitudes are made to happen.

• Ambiguity with regard to segregated- or co-education is not surprising. There is research evidence showing segregation caused people to develop strong stereotypes and in-group biases while there is also evidence that segregated education is a personal choice and those who take that do thrive in that environment. The best way to achieve unbiased mindsets will be to foster gender-neutral learning environments for children from a very young age regardless of whether they are in the company of the opposite sex or not.

• Arranged mentoring by more experienced senior engineers is clearly a matter that should be taken up by the engineering industry and institutions seriously. It is a much needed and an extremely beneficial process that helps (particularly female) engineers to forge ahead successful careers. Engineering institutions overseas have initiated such mentoring programs and individuals as well as the engineering industry in general reap significant benefits.

• Lack of visible role models is a hindrance to improving the status quo. Engineering institutes and the industry must incentivise senior female role models in the profession to take initiative and empower/support junior female engineers based on a medium- to long-term plan focussed on measurable outcomes.

• More often than not it is the female in a family that "sacrifices' career progression when faced with the choice between career and caring for children and/or ageing parents. Their overwhelming desire to return to engineering after such a break is commendable; however, considering the variety of hurdles that a returning female engineer encounters - logistical (finding the right work pattern and childcare arrangements), professional (refreshing skills) and personal (confidence, and image) - and there being no provisions by the industry to help the female engineer to overcome them (as we shall see in Part 4 of this series) it is not surprising that there seems very little hope, if any, that a return to engineering is a possibility in Sri Lanka. Every engineer leaving the profession is a loss to the industry that needs to be halted

• Without the sincere corporation, participation and buy-in from the male counterparts it will be impossible to get rid of the barriers such as negative stereotyping, unfavourable workplace culture and attitudes of "boys' club'. There should be more exposure of male engineers to the plight of the female engineers and their perceptions, the reasons for the lower participation of females in engineering and how they (males) can contribute to ameliorate the situation. The senior male engineers who witness for themselves the barriers their female offspring face in male-dominated industries in particular can use that true eye-opener to take the initiative to play an active role in supporting this cause.

To be continued...

Authors:

Dr. Achela Fernando (Adjunct senior lecturer, Griffith Engineering, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia);

Eng. Mrs. Mangala Wickramanayake (Coast Conservation Department, Sri Lanka); and

Prof. Niranjanie Ratnayake (Emeritus professor, Faculty of Engineering, University of Moratuwa.)

Comments and feedback on this article will be entertained until 30^th of September 2019.
Please send them to a.fernando@griffith.edu.au.