Women in IT: Yvonne Parle

by Dahna McConnachie

March 7, 2006 —

Yvonne Parle started working in the technology industry in the 1970s where she was the only female in a data center in London. Since then, she has played various roles in the banking, insurance, petrochemical, health, resources and education sectors.

She started out as a computer operator then moved into systems programming, then IT management and business analysis before she then landed a role in information management and project management at the World Health Organization. She is currently the manager of information management at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Western Australia.

Parle speaks with Computerworld about what it is like to be a woman in an IT world.

When did you start being interested in IT, and what triggered that interest?

I was working as a medical secretary for a pharmaceutical firm and had organized its medical library using a card index system. One of the lab technicians insisted that I could write a program to do the same and persuaded me that if I could understand a complex knitting pattern (which I used to do during lunch times) then programming would be easy. I ended up working with him to transfer the system to computer and I was hooked!

As a school student, did you feel encouraged or discouraged to follow a career in IT by teachers and career advisers?
Way back then IT didn't exist, but I was encouraged by my teachers to choose science subjects and physics was a favorite subject of mine.

What technology related courses or degrees have you studied?

I have completed many and varied courses over the years from IBM to Novell to Microsoft as technologies have come and gone. I've also completed tertiary studies in IT project management.

Have you found the approach to IT investment is vastly different in each organization that you have worked for?

The approach to ICT investment certainly has differed significantly in terms of decision-making.

For example, while working with non government organizations (NGOs) through the World Health Organization (WHO), I found there was a huge motivation and willingness to adopt Internet-based technologies and open source applications, because NGOs are often operating on an extremely tight budget.

Conversely in the booming resources sector in WA of late, ICT investment has been focused around increasing throughput and the speed at which mineral resources can be extracted and exported with budget taking less prominence compared with leaner times. Each sector has its own culture that brings its influence to bear on ICT culture in turn.

The WHO is bureaucratic in nature because all decisions taken have to be transparent to the donors, so there are multiple layers of authority required to take investment decisions and I would imagine this would be similar to public sector companies which are beholden to tax payers.

In comparison, I have found private sector companies, whilst they are extremely rigorous in their accounting practices as a whole and ultimately responsible to their shareholders, are sometimes better able to be flexible in their investment decision-making based on both short-term and long-term outlooks.

What has been your hardest professional role in IT and what made it hard?

Probably the hardest professional roles were the early years when gender discrimination was alive and well, this was in London in the 70s and I was the only female in the entire data center! It was also difficult in that boyfriends didn't understand what I did or why it was my responsibility to make sure the overnight batch worked, because if it didn't, it meant the bank's core system didn't produce the balances for the day's trading!

Which role have you enjoyed most, and why?

Probably my favorite role was my first shot at managing a technical team. That was at the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York. I found that I naturally enjoyed managing teams and I really loved getting the opportunity to manage projects from start to finish instead of being involved only in a phase or two of the work. I think I was hooked on project management from that point forward!

Are there unique challenges involved in being a female working in IT?

Although the number of women working in IT has increased, it still can be seen as an unusual career choice for women particularly in the more purely technical roles. I've found myself on many occasions explaining why I work in the field and on some occasions I've been very disappointed when my technical advice was accepted only after being validated by a male colleague. It's not like being a nurse or in another female dominated profession where preconceptions are accurate. I've been stopped at airports because I have a tool kit for example and regarded with suspicion, because after all why would a woman want to travel with a tool kit in her purse?

As women advance in their careers and gain more experience and confidence I think this happens less and we are judged less on these preconceptions and more on the results we produce for our organizations. I think it is terribly important that those women, who have made a success of working in an ICT role, act as role models and mentors to younger women who are making their way along the career path. That is the whole premise of Go Girl, Go for IT Careers Showcase.

What do you find most rewarding about working in IT?

Problem-solving and business process improvement, without a doubt. ICT touches everything and it has become more and more exciting to work in this field as ICT has moved out of the back office and into the mainstream. ICT is more vital and interesting now than it was in the past. More people understand technology, use it themselves in their work and home lives. Adoption of technology isn't a problem - instead the problem solving is around fitting the right solution, at the right time, at an acceptable cost. I am delighted that the "us and them" or "IT and Business" is being left behind and ICT staff are working collaboratively with other areas of their organizations to extract maximum value from ICT.

What does the future hold for your career or are you content with where you are at?

Longer term I am looking at how I can add 'coaching' skills to my kit bag, so right now I am studying a Post Graduate Diploma in Executive and Life Coaching at Curtin University. At the same time, I am really enjoying my current role. I am contracted to the Chamber of Commerce and Industry WA to assist them in the strategic planning and transformation of ICT. Part of that transformation will be to move ICT from being purely IT focused to a more diverse approach of managing all information in line with strategic goals.

You are a founding member of WIT WA. Can you briefly explain what this organization is?

WIT stands for "Women are IT."

We aim to provide a framework upon which women in information technology can extend their network and expand their knowledge in an environment that encourages open conversation and debate. We want to encourage women to choose IT as a career and raise the status of women in Australian business, in the IT industry in particular. I started WIT WA after meeting Jenny Barbour, the founder of Women are IT (Melbourne) and being inspired to start up a chapter in WA. In part, it was because I was isolated in my role as a female IT manager and I had a desire to increase my professional network to include other female managers.

How many members does WIT WA have?

We now have more than 300 members - women and men who have in common the goal to see more women enter the ICT profession and stay there to make their unique contributions.

You will be speaking about the history of women in IT at the Go Girl, Go for IT showcase. Who are some of the notable women that you will be discussing?

Ada Lovelace - the daughter of the English poet Lord Byron. She was a mathematician, and worked on the analytic engine with Charles Babbage, devising a method of programming based on the cards used on a Jaquard weaving loom. The US Army's programming language ADA is named after her.

Also,Grace Hopper who developed the first compiler for the Univac computer in the mid-fifties. Her work continued the development of Fortran and Cobol programming languages, which she helped write and later refined and standardized as a member of the Standards Committee.

There's also the beautiful 1940s actress Hedy Lamarr, who was behind the development of the Spread Spectrum and the six women that joined the World War II effort as "computers" for the Army's Ballistics Research Laboratories in a Philadelphia project where they worked on a new, top-secret machine. These programmers were handed the schematics of the machine and told to make it perform numerical calculations for the war effort, which is what they did, using hundreds of cables, dozens of digit trays and 3000 switches.

Computerworld Today (Australia)