At the 2007 Forum of 100 Young IT Elites in China, the crowd was overwhelmingly male, with female elites making up less than one-tenth of the attendees—like a few scattered chives sprinkled among the masses.
"Why are there so few women in the IT industry?" a reporter asked.
The panelists seated on the forum stage gave an awkward laugh and started asking each other: "Do you have any women in your upper management?"
"Yes, but very few." "None in my company." "We do have some, but most of those who reach the upper levels are either unmarried or already divorced..."
"On one hand, today's successful figures in the IT industry mostly went to school about ten years ago, when male students studying computer science held an absolute advantage. On the other hand, many women, due to physiological and family reasons, are unwilling to engage in high-intensity work," summarized Yang Bo, Vice President of Jinan University.
"But the situation is starting to change, and increasingly..."