According to the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) (2018) there is a small gender gap in the average working hours of ICT specialists compared to other occupations. This is because women in ICT jobs work more hours in average (36.9 hours a week) than women in other occupations, such as health sector (34.5 hours) (ibid.). A research conducted in Sweden’s IT-service shows that both men and women face tensions between work and family responsibilities (Holth, Bergman, & MacKenzie, 2017). Men could work longer hours because their partners could take over the family responsibilities. Women’s choice of prioritizing roles related to family responsibilities over the roles requiring high degrees of spatial and temporal work were less valued. Work–life balance policies help employers to retain and recruit women who feel they are or might be “punished” because of combining career with family responsibilities (EIGE, 2017). The policies that might prevent the spillover between work and private life include, for instance, rights related to parental-leave and care-related leave, flexible working-time and -space. In the Nordwit project Pillar 1, we see closer to how women who work in ICT reflect over the balance between family and career and how ICT organisations talk about and regulate among others flexible working-time and -space.
Gilda Seddighi
References:
EIGE. (2017). Gender Equality Index 2017 – Measuring gender equality in the European Union 2005-2015. Retrieved from: https://eige.europa.eu/rdc/eige-publications/gender-equality-index-2017-measuring-gender-equality-european-union-2005-2015-report
EIGE. (2018). Women and men in ICT: a chance for better work–life balance Retrieved from: https://eige.europa.eu/rdc/eige-publications/women-and-men-ict-chance-better-work-life-balance-research-note
Holth, L., Bergman, A., & MacKenzie, R. (2017). Gender, availability and dual emancipation in the Swedish ICT sector. Work, Employment and Society, 31( 2), 230-247. doi:org/10.1177/0950017016651378
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