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Take a look at the senior management of Apple. Every senior executive is male. At IBM, it's 10 of 12. And at Texas Instruments, it's 3 of 12.
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Then consider how many technology companies have a female CEO. There's Yahoo, of course. Xerox. Hon Hai Precision Industries, Apple's biggest contract manufacturer. Then it gets more difficult.
Indeed, there are a number of top women executives slightly below the CEO level. Safra Catz has been one of Oracle's presidents since 2004 and started her second stint as CFO this year. Sheryl Sandberg is COO of Facebook after being a VP at Google. Linda Sanford is a Senior VP at IBM for enterprise computing.
But why so few at the top? Given that women are more than half the population and that young women now outnumber men in graduate schools, there ought to be more. Surely, as far as consumption of technology products goes, from iPhones to Kindles, women are a huge market.
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As the U.S. heads into the Labor Day weekend, one wonders if there will be some change over the next decade. Signals are mixed. But women were 50.8 percent of the U.S. population, the 2010 census reported.
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For one, girls are nearly 50 percent of high school students who take the Advanced Placement exam in calculus but only 19 percent of the AP computer science test takers, the College Board reports.
But in college, something happens. By graduation, women received only 18 percent of degrees in computing and information sciences in 2009, a sharp decrease from the 37 percent in 1985, according to the National Center for Women & Information Technology.
There are similar disparities in electrical engineering, the traditional source for semiconductor and computer industry talent. Both Bill Hewlett and David Packard were electrical engineers.
Of the 407,000 members of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), 90 percent were male in 2010, despite years of supporting technical education for women. The IEEE also supports a Women in Engineering initiative.
Statistics also show that women engineers and technologists often leave the workforce in mid-career because they want to raise children or spend time at home. But other figures show they leave the technology sector for another. So that by the time comes for promotions, there are fewer women to choose from.
In Silicon Valley, there are many women just below the CEO's office, like HP's Ann Livermore, an Executive VP, who have long been regarded as potential CEOs. Livermore was twice passed over for HP CEO and now, at least is a director.
One reason why Ursula Burns was elected Xerox CEO in 2009 was that then-CEO Ann Mulcahy was afraid to lose her to another company.
Livermore has an MBA; Burns is a mechanical engineer.
Then there are several stars who have either been serial successes or persistent innovators. Judith Estrin, an E.E., co-founded Bridge Networks, which helped form 3Com, then co-founded Packet Design which was bought by Cisco Systems, which made her Chief Technology Officer. Now she runs JLABS, another networking company.
