More Women in Tech: Industry Fuels Trend to a New Innovation Culture

Tech companies are evolving rapidly and creating a new culture of innovation. Will this open up new opportunities for women? On a mission to find out, a group of researchers set up the #100TechFrauen (100 Women in Tech) project and recently published their findings.

The “Making the Future Visible: 100 Innovative Women in Tech” project saw female scientists from the Institute for Research in Social Sciences (ISF) in Munich, Germany, and the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg study the tech industry to discover whether it is creating opportunities for women. The project’s researchers interviewed 100 trailblazing women who are driving a new culture of innovation and transformation at tech companies, but don’t necessarily have a background in STEM.

100 Women in Tech

The results of the study are in, and one thing is clear: women have a bright future in tech. This was also the message from the female trailblazers who were interviewed as part of the project.

“Our key finding is optimistic: the digital transformation is opening up new opportunities for women,” Kira Marrs from ISF Munich says. It is important here, she notes, to think about how digitalization and gender equality fit together. We need to consider how we can break with existing structures and look at what we can do to create even more possibilities, she says.

According to Christine Regitz, cofounder of the Business Women’s Network from SAP, head of SAP Women in Tech, and president of the German Informatics Society, the number of women in tech has stagnated over the last 15 years. Yet the sector needs women who will shape its progress, especially given the skills shortage, she says. “We need digital sovereignty to make conscious decisions. It’s about more than programming,” she continues. “We also need the skills and expertise to make digital technologies work for us.”

Anja Bultemeier from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg agrees that it is no longer about the technology itself, but about how people interact, which is why new factors, such as customer and user experience, are becoming increasingly important. “Seeing technology through this new lens has created opportunities for women who do not have a technical background,” she says. One quote from a study participant explains this change very neatly: “I don’t sell technology; I sell solutions.” Increasingly, non-tech women are heading up technical teams and shaping the strategies and visions that will produce the best possible customer experience.

From Literary Studies to Google: Examples of Innovative Career Paths

The researchers also found that taking a less traditional approach to hiring makes it easier for women to get a foot in the door – after all, when roles are flexibly defined, they are open to people who have an atypical background. Take these women for example.

Eva Bacon’s patchwork and rather unconventional career path took her from studying literature to working for Google in New York – a perfect example of a non-tech woman at the center of the tech world. Bacon now oversees transformation projects as a senior program manager at Google. “Anything is possible in this job,” she says enthusiastically. Part of her work involves motivating and guiding her employees. At a workshop, she recalls, the participants were tasked with building houses out of spaghetti, and the instructor said to her, “You need to be the glue that holds everything together. We have enough people building houses. We now need someone who can make a city out of them.” Being a born organizer, she found that an easy task. Abstract thinking, she says, is something that comes to her naturally. What really helped her gain a foothold in the tech world, though, was the fact that she had taken the time to learn about HTML. Whenever she needed to know anything else, she would ask the computer geeks, adding that it is nevertheless important to have “a certain affinity for technology and to have the confidence to tackle new topics and ask questions.”

Back when Sarah Mang-Schäfer was at high school, she set an ambitious goal in her art class of one day coming up with the advertising image of the century. These days, as head of a public cloud engineering team, she flexes her creative muscle in a more technical capacity. Although she went on to study computer science, she found that art and technology were not so different after all. “To solve problems, you need to be creative,” she says. She worked initially in neuroscience, which taught her the importance of networking. She then poured her energy into cancer research, teaming up with doctors to test software. It was in this role that she realized what successful IT implementation was all about, namely understanding what customers want without them needing to ask for it. Today, we call that customer or user experience, fields which are growing in the IT industry and where women in particular have the breadth of skills and expertise required.

Driving Change to Shape the Future

At BSH, one of Europe’s largest makers of home appliances, the officer in charge of manufacturing strategy is Fiona Taylor. A scientist by training, Taylor is on a mission to attract more women into manufacturing, because she firmly believes that gender diversity benefits companies. With so few women in industry, she knows all too well how it feels to be the lone woman in the room, which is one reason why she wants to see the situation change.

Passionate about her work, she loves the variety her job brings: “I work with so many different people across the company, from purchasing and manufacturing to logistics.” Her task is to ensure everyone on the operational side pulls together. “Being one of the people who determines where we invest and where we build new manufacturing plants, I can help ensure that we remain competitive as a German company. And it means I can influence our corporate culture.” When she returned to work after having her second child, Taylor was pleased to discover that the company’s thinking had shifted. She was asked to head up manufacturing for the very reason that she thinks out of the box and asks the questions that need asking – and would be an ideal role model for combining a leadership position with working part-time. Taylor urges women to “have the courage to start the conversation and drive change,” and calls on other female leaders to reach out to two other women to help them progress as well.

Stephanie Karger, head of Standard and Safety at BSH, is further proof that you do not have to work full-time nor have technical expertise to be an effective leader. “We’ve adopted a new leadership style, one that is based on trust and equality,” Karger says. “Whenever I need specialist technical knowledge, I simply ask my team.” Women are more likely to see leadership roles in this way, which is something their team members appreciate too, because it gives them the autonomy that many of them desire.

Anja Schneider has been global head of Premium Engagement & Advisory, Customer Services & Delivery at SAP, since April 2024. Prior to this, she was chief operating officer of Technology & Innovation for many years. “I enjoy creating impact – and being the person who is ultimately responsible when customers have a problem,” Schneider says. “Bringing together a whole network of experts to find a solution is rewarding.” At SAP, she says, she has never encountered anyone who doubted women’s ability to lead. Schneider’s career has taken an unconventional path, too: she joined SAP from Germany’s civil service. Leaving the public sector for the private one was a leap into the unknown for her. But, as Schneider puts it, challenges like this push us out of our comfort zone so that we can learn and grow. In her case, it took an open mindset and an interest in technology. Besides, she adds, having a different perspective is also an advantage when it comes to being an advocate for the customer. According to Schneider, a team of developers does not need another developer to lead it.

AI Creates New Opportunities and Reduces Bias

Eva Zauke, executive vice president of SAP Enterprise Adoption and engineering location lead for SAP Labs Walldorf and St. Leon-Rot at SAP SE, is involved in examining how artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the way we work and creating new careers for women. “AI is opening up opportunities to women who are ready to enhance their skills.” For instance, AI is leading to new roles in IT beyond traditional programming ones. According to Zauke, data scientist, prompt engineer, ethics expert, interface designer, model engineer, and user experience designer are just some of the careers emerging in the field of AI. They also appeal to a wider spectrum of applicants, including graphic designers, people with a humanities background, and psychologists. However, while AI can unlock opportunities for women, it can also perpetuate gender disparities because, as Zauke says, data is biased: “AI inherits bias from the humans who program it, who, more often than not, are white men.” Having more women working on AI would, Zauke believes, not only reduce data bias but also help fill the talent gap in Europe’s tech sector.

Verena Laumayer is a member of the SAP Women in Tech strategy team, which is part of the Office of the CEO. She often finds herself at business events where not one speaker is a woman. Whenever she mentions this to the organizers, invariably the answer is that they simply could not find one, which is why she calls on women to have more confidence in their expertise and to increase their visibility. Public speaking skills can be learned, she says. Laumayer has no doubt that women need to be at the forefront of the tech economy and help shape its future.

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Photo copyright: Markus Seidl, SAP
This feature first appeared on the German SAP News Center.