40% of women in the technology sector agree that their decision to stay in their current role hinges on the care responsibilities they have.

This dismal but ultimately unsurprising statistic is from this year’s Tech Talent Charter (TTC) 2023 Attrition Report, which surveyed 500 women throughout the UK working in digital, IT or tech roles.

The TTC was founded to support diversity and inclusion across the technology sector, with aims to secure the talent pipeline, but their surveys have consistently found societal gaps and pressures are keeping women out of the tech sphere.

It’s a well known fact that tech has a gender gap – UK averages show that just 22% of the tech sector is made up of women, with this statistic winnowing as it tracks up to senior and C-suite roles.

TTC therefore attempted to examine the current landscape for attrition of women in tech roles, finding a high degree of mobility among the subsect.

The survey found that job changes are common across all ages of women in tech, with 64.8% reporting they had changed tech jobs in the last five years.

Delving in a bit deeper into this stat however, it is ultimately on par with national averages in the UK: 57% of tech workers changed jobs just in the last year, according to research from CWJobs.

Further, over half of young tech workers (54%) are considering a complete career change, according to research commissioned by HiBob and Eight Roads, which matches the drop off of changes seen once women reach 45.

Slightly more to the point, however, is that around a third (32.2%) of women said they were planning on leaving their current tech job, and only half of that number (16%) had been in their tech role for more than a year with no plans of leaving.

The stability that tech jobs claim to offer may not nearly be enough to keep women, or people as a whole, attached to a company or role – those in London, abundant with tech jobs, were more likely to move to a new job (39.2%) than those further afield (32.5%).

While women may be on trend for changing their tech jobs, what they change to is more troubling – while over half (55.4%) did leave a tech role for another tech role, over a third (36.2%) left with no plans of re-entering the tech world.

While a decent proportion of these women attributed their move to caring responsibilities (11.4%), over a quarter (24.8%) of the total sample stayed in the workforce in a non-tech role instead.

Among those who are currently planning to leave a tech job, over a third (34.8%) are planning to work in a non-tech role.

Clearly, something is wrong with the tech industry as women are not turning away or pushed out of work completely.

TTC investigated further, finding some of the top reasons women are leaving the tech world.

Career Progression Concerns 

The number one factor with the highest level of agreement among those surveyed was career progression, with four out of five (79.9%) agreeing that they were dissatisfied with their career development.

TTC’s research made it quite clear that women were not the problem in this case – they were more likely to hold degrees than the wider survey population, and that majority of them either actively disagreed (55.2%) or had no feelings (21.5%) that the difficulty of their role was a factor in their decision to leave.

Women in junior tech roles were even less likely to find the technical aspects of their job too difficult than the rest of the respondents.

The Big Three: Pay Gaps, The Cost of Living, and Care Responsibilities  

The interplay between the big three concerns amongst women in the workforce cannot be understated: the overall gender pay gap, which is exacerbated by the lack of women in senior roles, the cost of living crisis, which has been shown to more greatly affect women, and societal pressures disproportionately placing care responsibilities onto women.

These interwoven issues affect career progression, family decisions, and future outlooks of women in the overall workforce.

Salary dissatisfaction was among one of the top reasons women considered jumping from their tech roles, with over two thirds (67.9%) leaving because of it. Despite tech roles being estimated to pay nearly two thirds (64%) higher than the UK average, women tend to be left out of the more lucrative roles.

Gender diversity in senior-level roles drops by six points, and women are already in typically less highly-paid tech roles, TTC research has found.

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According to the World Economic Forum, women were bearing the brunt of the cost-of-living crisis, with women in the UK bringing home on average $696 less per month than men in 2022.

With family responsibilities, this issue only gets worse, with even women in a two-parent household giving survey responses that childcare costs were their sole responsibility.

Analysing the data by age group, with priorities fluctuating between work life balance to salary. Salary was the highest priority for those between the ages of 25 and 34, and lower amongst those under 25. Those over 55 prioritise non-salary benefits, and 45-54 year olds gave preference to career progression as a reason to leave their role.

Work Life Balance

The majority of women surveyed cited work-life balance as a key issue impacting their decision to leave their role. Many of these women then went on to relate the subject again to the issue of caring responsibilities.

The TTC’s research reflected the complexity of caring arrangements, which not only included child-rearing responsibilities, but elderly and disabled care, and family-forming priorities.

This tied into the oft-cited need for more flexible working arrangements, which would enable more women to balance their care responsibilities as well as their work load, which would at least reflect a work-work balance between a company and a household.

Company Culture

Women also cited company culture as a reason for leaving their tech roles – this was lower among those in younger age groups (18-34) but higher in those above 35. Culture tended to be a bigger factor for those without children as well, coming in as the fourth highest ranked factor after career progression.

Of the surveyed women who left their tech roles for a role outside of tech, culture was more important than for those who moved from one tech role to another.

The research also found that women with caring responsibilities were more likely to stay in tech, citing flexibility in their job.

Despite a degree of retention, the tech industry’s culture is still driving women away.

Joanna Kori, head of people at Encompass Corporation, commented: “It is both concerning and disheartening to see these figures, which highlight women being forced to alter or give up their careers in technology – and especially when a primary cause is centred on a lack of flexible working practices.

“With women saying they have left roles to better fulfil care commitments, this only emphasises, again, the importance of giving employees the opportunity to make work work for them.

“These commitments should not be a barrier and flexible working policies, for example, can be central to empowering women, and all workers, to prioritise the life and wellbeing choices that are important to them while meeting professional goals.

“Organisations should regularly evaluate whether their existing workplace policies match the needs of their employees, and evolve them as necessary to ensure all staff are well supported.

“Despite progress, the number of women in the technology sector is still too low. Unless we see tangible action and commitment to change, this will only continue, with talent and potential remaining untapped.”