Women in tech: Drawn to technology like a moth to a flame

A research study by The National Center for Women & Information Technology showed that “gender diversity has specific benefits in technology settings,” which could explain why tech companies have started to invest in initiatives that aim to boost the number of female applicants, recruit them in a more effective way, retain them for longer, and give them the opportunity to advance. But is it enough?

Two years ago, we launched a diversity series aimed at bringing the most inspirational and powerful women in tech to your attention. Today, we’d like you to meet Netta Doron, senior developer at Wix.com. 

Profile: Netta Doron, senior developer at Wix.com

Netta’s career spans over ten years and three companies. The last five years have been spent at Wix, working as senior developer, team leader, and mentor. Her love of clean coding and TDD have helped her build microservices in Scala that run Wix Pro Gallery, Wix Photo Albums, and the brand new Wix Logo Maker. She has two wonderful kids, who don’t yet know how to code but enjoy a good pairing session.

What got you interested in tech?

I guess I’ve always been into technology. It’s not something that I can really explain (kind of like a moth to a flame ). I remember playing around with computers from a very early age.

Even though I’ve always been a techie, I pretty much ignored and dismissed this calling until college. It was then that I took my first programming course, in hopes of getting into a program called
Digital Media Design, which was a mix of design and engineering.

I took the course because I had to for this program, never even considering it would change the course of my life. When I finished this class I had fallen in love with programming and decided to go for a degree in Software Engineering instead.

A day in Netta’s life

I currently manage a small backend team in a company called Wix. We work on a few microservices which mostly aim to meet the needs of photographers.

Why aren’t there more women in tech? 

I think it has to do with a lot of things. It starts from an early age where we see parents giving girls dolls and boys things like Legos. In general, I think boys get pushed towards the things that have spacial thinking, where girls don’t. So this kind of steers the way young girls think about things.

Then if you find yourself drawn to computers, you are picking something that you are sort of an outsider in. You realize you are the only girl in class or one of the only girls in the class. You might look at other classes and realize all your friends are there having fun with each other while you are all alone. So this is also an issue. When you get older and we start having kids it becomes harder to juggle the life of a programmer with kids. We see many women drop out at that point as well.

And again, you find yourself the only woman in a room full of men. So this also causes some women to eventually leave the profession. I think that staying in a situation where you are a minority can sometimes be difficult. 

Tips & tricks

First of all go for it! Second I think being well informed of the gaps is very important. Be prepared for what you are walking into.

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