Publication: Stepping Up Women’s STEM Careers in Infrastructure: An Overview of Promising Approaches
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2020-05-29
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2020-05-29
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This short note summarizes some of the findings from an extensive literature review, a global stocktaking exercise, key informant interviews, and five case studies in order to provide World Bank Group project teams with insights that they can use to support women’s science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers in infrastructure at each stage of their careers. The report is intended to underpin and expand the existing knowledge on gender equality issues, under the World Bank’s Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP).
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“Schomer, Inka; Hammond, Alicia. 2020. Stepping Up Women’s STEM Careers in Infrastructure: An Overview of Promising Approaches. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/43366 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication Stepping Up Women’s STEM Careers in Infrastructure(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2020-05-29)The five case studies detailed in this document describe a variety of contexts in which measures are being implemented to attract, recruit, retain, and advance women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) roles in the infrastructure sectors. The area of focus for each of these studies is as follows: recruitment; retention; advancement; attraction, recruitment, retention, and advancement; and recruitment, retention, and advancement: institutionalizing gender equality in project design.Publication Stepping Up Women's STEM Careers in Infrastructure(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-11-03)Stepping Up Women's STEM Careers in Infrastructure: An Overview of Promising Approaches describes a variety of ways to level the pathway for women entering into and progressing in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) employment within the infrastructure sectors—energy and extractives; water; transport; and digital development. It is composed of three volumes : Volume 1 distills the findings from an extensive literature review, a global stocktaking exercise, key informant interviews, and five case studies in order to provide World Bank Group project teams with insights that they can use to support women’s STEM careers in infrastructure at each stage of their careers—from initial attraction to the sectors and job recruitment, to retention within organizations, and advancement to managerial and leadership roles. The report is intended to underpin and expand the existing knowledge on gender equality issues, under the World Bank’s Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP).The case studies featured form part of the insight captured in the associated report Stepping Up Women’s STEM Careers in Infrastructure: Case Studies (Volume 1). Volume 2 is composed of five case studies that describe a variety of contexts in which measures are being implemented to attract, recruit, retain, and advance women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) roles in the infrastructure sectors across Ethiopia, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), North Macedonia, Panama, and Solomon Islands. The first three case studies profiled in this document focus specifically on recruitment, retention, or advancement. The remaining two case studies focus on organizations that are tackling the issue of women’s underrepresentation holistically, in each of the crucial stages of a woman’s career. The case studies featured form part of the insight captured in the main report Stepping Up Women’s STEM Careers in Infrastructure: An Overview of Promising Approaches (Volume 1). Volume 3 summary note provides a brief overview of some of the findings from an extensive literature review, a global stocktaking exercise, key informant interviews, and five case studies (featured in Volume 1 and 2) in order to provide World Bank Group project teams with insights that they can use to support women’s STEM careers in infrastructure at each stage of their careers.Publication Women and STEM in Europe and Central Asia(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021)In the last decades, developed economies have witnessed significant declines in wages for low-skill workers, increases in employment in high-skill occupations, rapid diffusion of new technology, and expanding offshoring opportunities. Labor markets in developed countries have reallocated labor from manual to cognitive jobs and from routine to non-routine work. Overall, workers are now required to do more complex tasks than before. 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This is not to suggest that a focus on gender is not of value, it is. But understanding the unique perspectives of women is the first step in addressing the larger issues of diversity and, specifically, gender, which has started to receive much attention from other organizations. This paper presents how and why ICT impact women and men differently and the implications of women's lack of engagement, participation, and leadership in the knowledge society through ICT for business and development. The paper will also highlight examples of best practices and weaknesses in assumed best practices to provide opportunities for full scale execution of efforts to achieve measurable outcomes in achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). An important focus is the need to move many of the carefully incubated gender policies and initiatives, developed through thoughtful leadership in specialized women's programs, into the mainstream. This will help ensure that well-designed initiatives do not inadvertently become 'ghettoized' or ignored by the mainstream programs that desperately need the knowledge to enhance and achieve their outcome goals.
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