Member Avatar for estherschindler

I’m thinking of writing a (hopefully both fun and useful) listicle with advice from “women who have been there” for spotting companies that really mean it when they say, “We want more geek women here.”

There’s lots of articles about negative things that should scare you away. What are your POSITIVE signs that the company is welcoming to geek chicks? Let’s help other women recognize them (or highlight them to enlightened hiring managers).

These can be (and probably are) small things you notice, even when you’re interviewing. For example:

  • The t-shirts they give out are available in women’s size small
  • Your interview schedule includes more than one woman, and nobody thinks to point it out as exceptional
  • The company benefits include on-site child care, extensive parental leave, or other family-friendly things
  • They actively recruit at women-in-tech events such as the Grace Hopper conference

I’m not planning to quote anybody; it’s the takeaways that matter, not sources. The most I might do is a first-name-anecdote (“Irene once interviewed for a programming internship, where this happened…”). I’ll take hearsay too (“My friend applied for a job where…”), because again I think it’s the “good ideas” that matter rather than fact-checked attributions.

What should I include? And why would you consider that item a heartening sign?

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Building on the thoughtful kickoff from and the practical notes from and , here are concrete, verifiable signals you can look for in interviews and during your quick pre-interview research. These focus on structural evidence and repeatable practices rather than one-off gestures.

Look for published career ladders and clear level definitions for engineering roles; an explicit compensation philosophy or published salary bands; regularly updated diversity metrics or a short D&I plan that names owners and timelines; formal sponsorship or mentorship programs with stated goals and examples; visible technical contributions by women (blog posts, engineering case studies, conference speaker lists); employee groups with executive sponsors and an allocated budget; and documented interview rubrics or hiring criteria used across candidates.

Sample, direct questions that probe those signals: "Can you share one change made here in the last year because of employee feedback?" "How many engineers on this team were promoted in the past 18 months and by what criteria?" "Who sponsors your engineering ERG and how is it funded?" "Can you point to an example of a woman who was hired here and moved into a technical leadership role?" Asking for a concrete example forces specifics rather than platitudes.

A short caution: be wary of polished language without measurable follow-through. Real commitments show up as data, budgets, named owners and repeatable processes; performative efforts are usually event-driven or anecdotal. Quick background checks (recent engineering blog authors, conference speaker lists, and LinkedIn team composition) often confirm whether the in-interview answers match reality.

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Member Avatar for rproffitt

Just some response if it helps. The last time I was interviewing was long ago and no t-shirts but the HR in the companies was lead by women.
There was no issue with gender at any company I've worked for since about 1979.

After my years in big companies I struck out on my own as an independant and haven't really interviewed in 20 years. But I do work with companies in US and Canada but few are large enough to have on site child care. In fact none are.

Sadly I fear many companies have farmed out their HR and no longer are the same. But that's a topic unto its own.

Member Avatar for estherschindler

HR most often is run by women: 73% of HR practitioners at the manager level are female. So I don't think that is a strong indicator of anything.

Member Avatar for Agilemind

I have interviewed more recently but only in academia not the business world. IME if people bring up parental leave/childcare options without prompting it's a good sign, but as others have said HR/admin is heavily dominated by women so you really need to see if there are women in the same career stream as your applying for in the workplace.

Though mostly it is all about how the male interviewers treat you. At least IME I've always been able to tell when men are treating me as equal, or when they are uncomfortable, or patronizing, or pedestalling - e.g. "Oooh look a girl that is good at computation!".

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