Abstract
The authors of this chapter provide a lens of the challenge women face with being successful in the labor force. Readers will learn about the importance of addressing gender inequity for women who seek education, training, and governmental resources for employment just as their male counterparts. The authors also detail how women of different countries and cultures such as Bangladesh, Israel, Kenya, and the United States of America face the challenges for closing the digital divide. When women's employability increases, societies improve. Women with technological skills bring new skills to the workplace, reduce economic needs, boost welfare and growth, and better provide for their homes and families. Readers will gain a better understanding of how governmental agencies and policies, educational institutions, and employers can work toward the same goal, and that is closing the gender digital divide.
TopBackground
Women’s role in the labour market is globally decreasing, widening financial disparities between the genders (World Economic Forum, 2019). This trend is because women are employed in increasingly automatized sectors (i.e., drones, cognitive technologies, and artificial intelligence (AI). Women comprise a significant source of untapped talent in the global workforce and increasing their digital fluency can help move them into the jobs that employers have trouble filling (Sweet, 2016).The low participation of women in the labor force is at times impacted by girls being encouraged to marry at early ages and urban and rural families preferring to invest more in men than women for career skill development. In addition, flexibility is needed, especially since women remain the primary caregivers in the home globally. Therefore, flexible work and part-time employment options are required to help to reduce attrition and increase the number of women who enter and remain in the workforce over the long term (Schomer, & Hammond, 2020).
Women lacking a formal education also affect employability. The barriers faced by women may also include attitudinal, social, and financial constraints, inappropriate training environments, hazardous job environments, lack of security in access and accommodation including sexual harassment and information and knowledge gaps, low prospects for decent work, and low self-confidence, and fear of challenging the status quo (International Labour Organization, 2012).
Women often face gender-specific challenges to their full participation in the labor force, which may require policy interventions beyond those aimed at promoting economic growth and the efficiency of rural labor markets (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 2011). For example, the International Labour Organization (2009) offered, “They [women] are rarely provided with any formalized training for these occupations and learn through exploitative practices that do not value (i.e., monetarily) their participation in labour across sectors” (p. 10). But a rising tide lifts all boats. When women gain knowledge and skills for urbanization and industrialization, it makes for a more skilled labor force (Faulkner, et al., 2019).
Women have often been considered undereducated and untrainable compared to their male counterparts. However, in a report by Accenture (2016), it is predicted that if the pace is doubled at which women become frequent users of technology (i.e., digital technologies), the workplace could reach gender equality by 2040 in developed nations and by 2060 in developing nations.
At the current pace, such equality will not be achieved until 2065 in developed nations and 2100 in developing countries. For each of these goals, leveling the pathway for women in infrastructure sectors requires changes at all levels of engagement—in national policies, educational systems, sectors and industry levels, and workplaces.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Employability: An individual's ability to be employed and maintained based on their skills, knowledge, and experience.
Gender Inequality: Term used for stating females and males are not equal.
Labor Force (Labour Force): Refers to individuals working along with those who can work but are not; basically, it accounts for individuals employed and unemployed.
Gender Mainstreaming: A strategy based on public policy that values input from females and males regarding concerns and experiences on implementing programs and legislation.
Gender Responsive: The act of being aware of, providing for, and valuing the particular needs of women, such as with gender-responsive prisons.
Industry 4.0: Refers to the new age networking system including machines in the ICT industry.
Gender: Term used to determine an individual’s role and responsibilities as female and male. These roles are learned and vary among cultures across the world. Gender is not sexual or biological; instead, it is a social being.
Digital Divide: This applies to those individuals who have access to digital devices such as the Internet, computers, and other technologies and those who have no access.