While the proportion of women working across STEM-qualified industries has increased since 2016, in Australia, less than a quarter of all STEM graduates are female.

To promote gender equality in cybersecurity, it is essential to embrace both innovation and technology, as they have the power to transform the industry.

Greater female representation in Australian ICT organisations won’t come about by accident, notes BeyondTrust’s VP Talent Management, Laura Edwards-Lassner

I started building my career to escape the limits set for me by my background, but today I continue to do it because it's what I love.

Advocating for women and helping to bridge the gender gap in tech is not something done on the side. Instead, it must become a mindset.

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, closing the global gender gap has increased by a generation from 99.5 years to 135.6 years.

In celebration of International Women's Day, Megantic highlights its success in helping female eCommerce leaders with its program, Megantic Mentors, since 2021.

"Mentors are the key to success for every professional. A good mentor is a coach, a guide, as well as a vocal advocate."

Both last year’s #choosetochallenge and this year’s #BreakTheBias themes for International Women’s Day should serve as a wake-up call to the IT industry.

Making a career in the sector more appealing would see more women applying for advertised roles, writes Barracuda’s Angelina Liu.

"We agreed that the next phase in our relationship would be to jointly build programs that have a larger positive impact on our community.”

“The new mentorship is an opportunity to expand our support of the LGTBQI+ community working in tech startups to help them embed diversity and inclusion into their company culture."

“Diverse teams make better and faster decisions 87% of the time compared with all male teams, yet the actual number of women in our field fluctuates between 10 and 20%. What ideas have we missed by not including more women?”

With connectivity being a key driver to the success and growth of regional SMBs, the ThinkBook Mentorship Programme will focus on upskilling the businesses digitally.

The initiative aims to plug the industry’s talent gap, spur female participation in cybersecurity, and transform the role women play in Singapore’s cyber defence.

“We’re the ones putting technology in front of kids in the first place. This isn’t about making money it’s about investing time in the future of New Zealand."