Windows 7: Microsoft Women Worth Watching.

In the 25-plus years I’ve written about technology, I’ve interviewed fewer than 50 female Microsoft employees (by my rough estimate). In part, this is because there are less of them. Microsoft officials say women comprise 25 percent of the company’s total workforce. It’s also because many of the women who do work at Microsoft are in marketing, sales and support roles and aren’t among those who are “authorized” to talk to us press/blogger types.

There are a handful of women employees dotting Microsoft’s executive ranks, including two Senior Vice Presidents (Lisa Brummel,head of Human Resources, and Mich Matthews, head of the Central Marketing Group). But I wanted to meet some of the less-public techies — the engineers, product managers and programmers who work at Microsoft to find out how and why they’ve managed to buck the continuing trend of women not entering math/science careers. The women I’ve interviewed for this series have joined Microsoft via a wide variety of paths. Some knew since they were kids they wanted to be involved in technology. Others came to the Empire via a more circuitous route (master of fine arts in poetry, anyone?). Some are Microsoft lifers. Others are recent hires.

Today’s Microsoft Woman Worth Watching: Betsy Aoki
Title: Senior Program Manager, Online Services Division

What’s Your Typical Day Like? “I have an evangelist’s travel schedule,” Aoki, just back from SXSW and Mix 10, says. She also monitors the Bing Twitter account and handles a variety of public relations incubation projects. Her overarching goal is “to try to help marketing understand social media.”

Did you always want to be involved in technology? If not, what steered you this way? When Aoki was in the eight grade, her dad brought home a DEC computer and she “messed around with Random.h generation,” she recalls. But she also was really into English. “It might have been good to go for a CS (computer science) and English double major,” she concedes, but instead she went the English route and ultimately earned her Master’s of Fine Arts in Poetry. But her inner geek was always there, she says.

Today’s Microsoft Woman Worth Watching: Vanessa Feliberti

Title: Software Development Lead, Exchange Server

What’s Your Typical Day Like? For the past three years, Feliberti has been working on the calendaring functionality in Exchange Server 2010. She currently manages seven people. While she does some delegating, she also does a lot of working on problems, 24 X 7.

Did you always want to be involved in technology? If not, what steered you this way? “I remember the moment I knew I’d be in technology,” Feliberti recalls. She was being tutored in math (which she always had found easy) by a high-school student while in junior high. “He said computers were where the future was at,” she says. As an undergraduate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she “put together the logic in computing with the problem solving,” Feliberti says. “I knew right away that’s what I wanted to do.”

Margarita Naumova: Microsoft Women Worth Watching.

Title: SQL Server Consultant, Microsoft Consulting Services

What’s Your Typical Day Like? Lots of customer team meetings involving project delivery. She work both at big enterprise customer sites and in her home office. “I do more design, disaster recovery, SQL Server architectural work and performance optimization” than anything else, she says. “I usually play the role of project architect,” more than doing any coding, Naumova says, “so I often create teams of people comprised of customers and partners.”

Did you always want to be involved in technology? If not, what steered you this way? “I do things I like and follow things with emotion,” says Naumova. Math was her favorite discipline in school, leading to a focus on technology and databases at the University of Economics in Varna, Bulgaria. Science, mathematics and analytical thinking “was natural for me,” she says.

Advice for women (and/or men) considering a career in technology? “Women can become successful in any sphere as long as they can overcome the restrictions in their minds. They need to focus on and create opportunities, not focus on the obstacles,” says Naumova. “There is a place for every person who likes challenges.”

Interesting article Jan. I wonder if there is less of a glass ceiling in IT industries?
On the one hand techy stuff is geeky and has a frustrated masculinity about it whilst on the other there is a sort of liberalistic/democratic sense to it-open source, do no evil, freedom of speech, freedom of information and so on.
Just a thought,John