Women contribute a lot to the development of the economy, there however remains a number of constraints that curb them from excelling in the tech industry.
I talked to Bernard Chiira, Incubation Manager at Strathmore University and exactly how their partnership with Standard Chartered Bank is helping women to grow themselves, their businesses and startups:
What you do and how long have you been doing this?
My name is Bernard Chiira and I’m the incubation manager at Strathmore university. The incubator, iBiz Africa has now been running for four years. The incubator is a platform which is heavily focused on innovation and that seeks to encourage entrepreneurship and innovation in our community. We provide entrepreneurs and students a place where they can work on their ideas, we also help in nurturing those ideas, giving them mentorship training on how to thrive in their startups and businesses.
What is the Standard Chartered Women in technology program?
This initiative came about when we realized the very vibrant tech ecosystem in Kenya is not well represented by women. We also noticed that the women in these fields are not being given the space to thrive as they should due to the many barriers that encompass them. Thus the program seeks to help women stand on their own by breaking these said barriers and helping them own and drive their businesses.
The program provides a 3 month mentorship period, training on entrepreneurship from the best faculty in Strathmore University. We will also link them with a wide pull of mentors from Strathmore and our partners, especially Standard Chartered Bank and both locally and globally. We will also provide extended support of up to a year to make sure these businesses grow and they are able to stand on their own.
Why do you think there’s a lack of women in technology industry?
This has been a growing global problem and there are dynamic factors that surround this. I think it stems from how women are brought up to how they take up sciences and math as a career. Most women are only encouraged to take up these subjects at a tertiary level and by then more and more men have already injected themselves into STEM program early. Not that men should not also be encouraged but I believe that if we start teaching women about sciences and its benefits at a younger age, we will see the numbers significantly shoot up.
There are other factors especially cultural barriers in developing countries but a peak in interest in the technological industry at an early age might see us having more and more women in this industry.
Have we grown as a country in terms of giving women access to digital training?
Yes we have. We have seen organizations and the private sector actively engaging themselves in taking technology to the youth and the rural areas and we are purposely making sure that these opportunities are available to women.
In as much as we aren’t where we need to be, we have made significant strides.
In Kenya, we have a very big number of some of the most highly educated women in East and Central Africa. This has happened despite all the challenges that women face on a day-to-day basis like FGM and Early Child Marriages and by this, I believe we are doing the same in the tech industry; that in spite of the challenges we are facing in getting women significant access to the digital space, we are making significant progress.
How exactly does the program intend to break the barriers women have in getting into the technology field?
Inclusivity and mentorship are key things that we are focusing on. In Kenya, we still suffer from many cultural barriers and you find that women are excluded even when it comes to development in their own communities. Inclusivity of women in even the smallest of development projects sees a huge difference in this.
In mentorship, the moment one gets someone who’s already a leader in a certain sector to walk with them, they gain a lot of confidence in what they are pursuing. The moment these women see other successful women in this industry, they are encouraged to keep on; they are shown what to do and are even picked up by these mentors when they fall.
The Women in Incubation program will have these mentors walk with these teams until they are able to see their businesses and startups become fruitful?
When it comes to young girls getting interested in STEM programs, most of them are only exposed at tertiary levels where opportunities are very few. What do you think we should do to break this?
This problem actually cuts across the genders. In the rural communities, many young people are exposed to sciences at tertiary levels and sometimes only if they excel to the point of being selected to come to schools in major cities. With sufficient and well-drive policies, we can ensure that we not only include sciences in these schools but also science and technology based programs so that they get exposed at a young age.
How can women be encouraged to work in these fields?
One thing I feel we don’t give women in this industry is support. The tech industry is generally associated as a male-dominated industry, when a lady wants to get in that sector, she isn’t given the support she truly needs. At other times, she is even discouraged from pursuing that career saying that she won’t succeed in a pre-dominantly male space. This is wrong.
The moment a woman is uplifted, she can do great things and it starts especially with the men who are already in this industry. Support and strengthen these women.
What do you think are the biggest barriers for women entering and staying in the tech industry? How can we overcome them?
Lack of funding when trying to get into technology driven businesses is definitely a very big barrier, lack of support services to grow their businesses, lack of direction and sometimes, some of these opportunities and spaces to grow are very competitive and most of the times women are locked out.
As much as we have grown, we need to promote the Inclusivity of STEM from the grassroot level, continue working to break cultural barriers, promote family values and moral values that will help in avoiding teenage pregnancy so that these girls can stay in school
Mentorship is also crucial. We should have more successful women in the industry to encourage the youth who are seeking to get in the field.
What gives me hope even as we embark on this journey is that the Kenyan woman is already capable, she just needs that opportunity. A lot of them have already gone to school, a number of them are already in leadership positions. What we need now is to make deliberate strides in making opportunities like this more accessible to more women for them to thrive.
