Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!gatech!mcnc!ecsvax!uk.ac.ed.edai From: cam%EDAI.ED.AC.UK@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU (Chris Malcolm cam@uk.ac.ed.edai 031 667 1011) Newsgroups: comp.society.women Subject: Re: Women competing with men Message-ID: <6978@ecsvax.UUCP> Date: 6 May 89 02:58:04 GMT References: <6938@ecsvax.UUCP> Sender: skyler@ecsvax.UUCP Organization: University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Lines: 42 Approved: skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Moderator -- Trish Roberts) Comments-to: comp-women-request@cs.purdue.edu Submissions-to: comp-women@cs.purdue.edu In article <6938@ecsvax.UUCP> gatech!cs.utexas.edu!cu.warwick.ac.uk!cudat@mcnc.org (J M Hicks) writes: >"... advice ... to young women determined to make the most >of a career in ... computing? > >"'Enjoy being a woman and don't compete with men on their own terms.'" > >Would readers agree or disagree? It seems the strongest competitive strategy to exploit one's natural talents (where these are appropriate) rather than trying to emulate other people's. To emulate men would either be an admission that womanliness was ill-fitted to computing, or else that the computing culture was irretrievably male-dominated. If I were a woman I'd take a LOT of punishment before agreeing to either possibility - which is the kind of thing a man _would_ say :-) But you do have to _compete_ in a hierarchical meritocracy, whatever the flavour of your gender. If you want to win without the overt aggression of open competition, there is always the old schoolyard strategy of the clever cissy: trade brains for dominance in an alliance of mutual benefit with someone more frightening but less smart. This strategy can quite often be observed in male managers in large high-tech organisations - an upwardly mobile couple, one who can dominate people but doesn't understand technicalities, and the other, an irretrievably ineffectual techie, who can tell him when and who and why to dominate, and who gets promoted in the monster's wake. Most radically, start your own non-competitive organisation. Some studies have suggested that the best code is produced by non-possessive programming teams who collaborate freely as a matter of course in all phases of programming, without either wanting the personal kudos of the star or fearing the shame of public mistakes. It sounds an easier style for a female team. -- Chris Malcolm cam@uk.ac.ed.edai 031 667 1011 x2550 Department of Artificial Intelligence, Edinburgh University 5 Forrest Hill, Edinburgh, EH1 2QL, UK