The biggest thing that I feel like these initiatives always miss is that the onus on fixing the problem of gender equality in tech shouldn't be on the companies at this point in the game (not to say that won't change), but on getting more women interested in tech in the first place. Overwhelmingly women don't seem to care about the technology field. We need to focus less on bending over backwards to find appropriate female candidates from such a small pool, and focus more on what organizations like Girls who Code[0] who are trying to get more young women interested in technology. Once there is actually a sizable amount of women involved in the field, then maybe the conversation over discrimination or lack of diversity may be worth having. But until then I cant just make female engineers poof into the interview room like magic and thats not for lack of trying.
This is a chicken-and-the-egg problem, so you can't narrow your focus, but instead approach it from multiple angles. Women aren't encouraged to get involved in tech because they can't find good role models, and there are no good role models because women aren't being encouraged to get involved with tech. It's important to have initatives like this to get more role models so we can encourage more women and get more role models to encourage more women ...
Citation needed. If I was going to go out on a limb, I'd say a large part of the reason women aren't drawn to tech at a young age is because it requires you sit alone in front of a computer talking to it for long stretches of time instead of interacting with other people, but I have as much evidence as you do that it has to do with a lack of role models. (I got into programming well before I knew any famous programmers.)
You are correct that that is another large contributing factor. There are a few other ones too, such as the lack of real-world application of what they learn, stereotypes, a terrible culture towards women in CS, and a few other massive problems. They all work against the on-going efforts.
As for the Role Model aspect in particular... It's actually difficult to provide citations, because it's so commonly accepted in the community. I attended Grace Hopper '13 last year, and it's just recognized as a given. When I go through research papers from the past 5-10 years, they start off by just recognizing that its a known problem and then move onto subproblems or their new solution. Unfortunately, I don't really have the time to go mining the work that led to this problem being recognized. Still, I can recommend a book, "Unlocking the Clubhouse" http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/unlocking-clubhouse which should cover this!
Surely both of these are factors. I would suggest:
1. That at an early age, programming role models in particular aren't as important as STEM role models in general. It's certainly anecdotal, but I moved towards programming as a practical job that somewhat satisfied my broader interest in science and engineering.
2. It might be beneficial to girls and boys alike if technology was taught more socially. Certainly tinkering and reading alone is important, but maker clubs and the like are an extraordinary way to get young people involved. As a bonus, they help with teamwork which is another big issue for (many) tech companies.
I clicked on that expecting some kind of study to refute my random theory, which I'd find interesting, but it's a high level vague theory from Neil DeGrasse Tyson about the evidence of bias in society. (Something we should give approximately the same weight as any theory based on anecdotes and personal experience.)
He'd be the last person to tell you his observations and this anecdote should be seriously used as a citation to lend yourself weight in an argument about the source of gender bias in tech.
And many more. If these women aren't role models enough, how is me investing multitudes more of effort and hiring one or two female engineers at a small startup going to create role-models.
I believe in investing in the egg as you call it, by getting women interested in tech at a young age, we can have more candidates to choose from and then not have to jump through all the efforts and hoops this website want's me to do. I see no practical reason to reword all my job postings and hire a female-centric recruiter when I can just hop on angellist for an hour.
The best role-models are not far away or long-dead, they are nearby and immediate. You can see their life and interact with them. Of course, there's also the problem of how many potential role models for women in computing don't really provide the level of support that their students expect (they got there without role models, so why should they hold their students hands?).
It's actually difficult to provide citations for the obvious problem of lack-of-role-models, because it's so commonly accepted in the community. I attended Grace Hopper '13 last year, and it's just recognized as a given. When I go through research papers from the past 5-10 years, they start off by just recognizing that its a known problem and then move onto subproblems or their new solution. Unfortunately, I don't really have the time to go mining the work that led to this problem being recognized. Still, I can recommend a book, "Unlocking the Clubhouse" http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/unlocking-clubhouse which should cover this!
Exactly. It is anectodal but, every women who works in our office (and mostly on other offices I see) is either business related, or semi-techie (QA Engineer). We just can't find any women coders that can actually pass a basic competency challenge for more than two years.
One of the major things that discourage women from entering tech is a lack of role models. So companies can have a big impact right now by hiring more women.
I can't speak for women, but I would have to think hard if companies put out calls for gay applicants. Do I want to be "the diversity hire?" I don't know if anyone inside or outside the company would take me seriously. Women might have a similar thought process when these kinds of initiatives happen.
[0] http://girlswhocode.com/