Following its recent survey of women working in IT, the UCT Department of Information Systems has started a second study, giving men a chance to air their views on women in the IT industry.
The new study, by Nata van der Merwe and Adrie Stander, aims to determine how men feel about working with women in the information and communication technology sector.
Stander says: "We hope to gain some insight into the interaction that causes the low number of females in the industry." He says the idea is to get the feelings of men about their female colleagues and contrast the two viewpoints.
"As far as we know, there are no other male viewpoint studies around and we would like to publish the first report looking at the issue from both sides. We do not only ask for opinions, but also some background of the work environment of male employees, in order to do comparisons."
The department`s previous survey found that women in the South African IT sector wanted equal pay, flexible hours and more respect. Many women felt that their salaries were not on par with those of their male colleagues, and that women were under-represented in management.
The study also found that most women (79.72%) in the local IT industry were white and more than half were under the age of 35.
Stander says the results of the study were well received when they were presented at the Information Resources Management conference in Seattle in May. The results will also appear in revised form in a book early next year.
The questionnaire for the male viewpoint study can be filled in at http://itwoman.co.za. The survey will close on 31 August, and results will be available on the site.
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