Did I crack glass?

Sometimes I surprise myself with how long it takes me to catch up. How something was right in front of my eyes and I had no idea.

You see, the problem with the glass ceiling is you can’t see it.

It’s transparent and so the only way you know it is there is when you feel it. Sometimes it’s easy to feel, other times it sneaks up on you. You hit up against it feeling the push back or you eventually discover that you’re stuck on the wrong side when you notice all the guys you went to uni with are getting paid twice your salary.

Because you can’t see it you don’t always know when you’ve passed through it. You don’t realise you are on the other side and ready to keep going onwards and upwards. It’s invisible, so you didn’t see the ‘caution glass’ sign as you transcended places others hadn’t gone before.

So when I realised- about 12 hours ago -that the frustration I have felt for much of my career was in all likelihood that pesky glass ceiling, I had to laugh at myself. I hadn’t realised what I had been doing, even though in hindsight it was pretty obvious.

I’d been part of a team that won a high-profile national government award for our ceiling busting efforts to get more women into government tech and I didn’t see it.

I convinced industry leaders to pay for themselves to fly to Adelaide (some from international locations) and give up their time to talk about the impact of the digital world and women’s participation in this new world of knowledge. I didn’t see it then either.

There was that time that I was going on and on about data and then I ended up being one of the very few women at the table helping design the Stretton Centre and the Playford Data Observatory. Still didn’t see it.

I still didn’t see it those times I was one of a small number of women at the startup table being recognised as a finalist or winner for my work to bring government services into the digital world, knowing full well that the data on women in technology startups was even more challenging than the data in the government world I’d been occupying, while simultaneously running workshops to get more women to be creating their own innovative ideas using tech.

I just saw these as things I was doing as part of my role, things that I was excited to talk about. I hadn’t realised that actually, these were developing areas of thought and I was helping to lead the discussions.

12 hours ago, in the middle of a carpet store, I had an ‘aha’ moment. Instead of being frustrated at often being the only woman at the table (in particular a woman at the tech table) I realised I needed to see it for what it was - a new frontier.

I was on the other side of the ceiling and I didn’t even know it. There was a reason I was often the only woman or one of a small number at the table- we were the first to squeeze through the cracks of women in government tech, making it easier for the women flooding in behind us. No wonder it felt hard - glass ceiling busting is not easy, especially if you don’t know you are doing it.

It wasn’t just that I was in rooms talking tech. I was in rooms where women weren’t in senior leadership either. There was me - right around the time I turned 30 and still in reasonably junior leadership roles - at the table representing as one of the most senior women in my field, at tables full of senior executive men.

Which I think is the point.

I wasn’t there as a woman. I was there as one of the leaders in my field and I just happened to be a young woman. I was unusual because the fields I was walking in to were both reasonably new fields and ones that in the past women hadn’t really been that interested in or had access to. Women weren’t at the table, I was one of the first.

It would have been pretty obvious if I’d looked at any of the work that I had been doing about women in tech or women in leadership and included myself in that equation, but for some reason I didn’t. I was there at the table doing the work, not realising that the data applied to me.

In hindsight, the frustration I’ve felt in much of my career to date probably was (and still is) the frustration of pushing up against - and breaking through - the glass ceilings. The leadership ceiling and the tech ceiling, simultaneously. The great thing about breaking glass is that once you know how to do it, it gets easier to do it again and again. You learn what to look for, what the work feels like and you can bring others through with you. Fill the tables up, making it easier for everyone.

Onwards and upwards!