More and more young women are studying MINT subjects. At the same time, the proportion of female employees in tech roles is falling, current studies show. Why is this and how can HR counteract it?
Although women have increasingly acquired academic STEM qualifications in recent years, female employees in many places in Europe appear to be losing ground when it comes to tech careers. At least that’s what a new report from the consulting firm McKinsey & Company suggests. According to this, the proportion of women in IT professions has fallen from 22 to 19 percent in the past three years – precisely in a phase in which artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping many industries.
Tech: Bottleneck when starting your career
According to the information, the proportion of women with academic MINT degrees (Bachelor: 33 percent, PhD: 39 percent) has increased recently. But this is “hardly” evident on the job market. In particular, the transition from studying to a corresponding job role turns out to be “a critical phase in which many well-qualified graduates do not end up in tech jobs permanently.”
The report cites the increasing spread of AI systems as one of the main reasons for this. Among other things, automation through AI tools “presses the demand for many entry-level profiles,” according to the team of authors around Anna Lieser, Henning Soller, Kristin Tuot and Lieven Van der Veken. This particularly applies to the product development (-17 percent) and software engineering (-13 percent) segments. The opposite trend only applies in the core area of “AI, data and analytics”, where so-called entry-level jobs are increasingly being offered and filled. However, there were also differences between the genders: growth was stronger for men (+11 percent) than for women (+7 percent).
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The upward career space is getting thin
As the proverbial career ladder progresses, the air becomes increasingly rarefied for female tech specialists. The proportion of female employees in “all” major job areas “decreases significantly with increasing seniority and responsibility”. According to McKinsey, this is most evident at the threshold of the first leadership role. Declines of between 20 and 52 percent were recorded here. Overall, only 13 percent of management positions and a full 8 percent of senior management roles (e.g. “director” or C-level/board level) are filled by women.
Still macho culture in IT?
Apart from that, according to the study, “cultural barriers and discrimination” apparently still exist in many companies: a good half of the women (49 percent) reported “sexism or bias in the past year”. More than three quarters also stated that “they have to do more than men in order to be recognized”. What is also striking is that in many cases it is female employees who take on “additional, career-neutral team and organizational tasks” – with an average amount of “around 200 hours per year”. Examples include coordination or record keeping.
An analysis by the industry association Bitkom recently came to a similar conclusion: According to this, in 2026 “43 percent of companies are still of the opinion that men are better suited for IT and digital jobs”. At the same time, 39 percent of the companies surveyed admitted that there was a “glass ceiling”, i.e. structural factors that put women at a disadvantage with the same qualifications and performance. Bitkom President Dr. Ralf Wintergerst says in a statement: “Stereotypical role models are still anchored in too many companies.”
What can HR do?
In order to remedy the situation, experts point to various approaches and instruments. However, in many cases these are not yet being used sufficiently, at least Bitkom believes. German companies generally want “a higher proportion of women in IT and digital specialist areas”. However, only four percent said they had “set internal goals in this regard and had already achieved them”. Only 9 percent report that they have set “defined goals with a schedule” and a quarter report that they have set “general goals”. However, more than a third said they had no such intentions.
According to the industry association, there are more activities, especially in the area of recruiting: 79 percent of companies are using “at least one measure” “to actually attract more women specifically for IT and digital professions”. The most popular instruments include collaborations with universities and schools, special entry programs such as traineeships, women-specific career events or special social media campaigns for female professionals in tech jobs.
Info
For analysis „Women in Tech and AI in Europe: Can the region close its gender gap?“ became according to McKinsey disclosures Data from 27 EU countries to „Tech-Workforce and education“ evaluated. In addition, be around four Millions Linkedin–Profile as well as job categories out of over 500 companies in 37 countriesn and others The analysis the Talent-Data-Platformin Getro and Find it incorporated.
McKinsey: Talent development through KPIs
At McKinsey you can see other levers: It is important to consistently align “leadership with measurable results in talent development” – for example with clear goals that are then linked to KPIs.
It is also important to “interlink further training with real projects” and to “expand structured programs for re-entry into tech professions”. According to the advisory, “an additional 140,000 to 200,000 women with a STEM background could be activated for tech roles.” However, how they arrive at these numbers is not explained.
Finally, internal company sponsorship also plays a central role. After all, female tech employees with advocates are “three times more likely to have their ideas implemented” and internal acceptance of them increases. McKinsey cites another study by Cassandra Melvin and Jolie LeBlanc.
“Companies that systematically develop women in growing tech and AI functions sustainably strengthen their innovation and competitiveness,” concludes Melanie Krawina, co-author of the analysis and associate partner at McKinsey in Vienna.
