For the first time, a Brasscom study (Association of Information and Communication Technology Companies) shows that the growth in the hiring of black and brown women in the technology area (13.3%) was higher than that of white, Asian and indigenous women (10.3%) — and also in compared to that of black men (10.7%).
This happened in 2021, when 56.3 thousand vacancies were created for women in the ICT sector (Hardware, Software, Services and Commerce) and 34,500 black professionals were hired.
“We consider this number a victory, especially the increase in black women in the ICT sector. But we still have a lot of work to do to ensure racial and gender equity in the sector,'' said Brasscom president Sergio Paulo Gallindo.
During the year, the ICT area employed 1.1 million professionals. The majority (53%) were white, 25.8% were brown and 4.3% were black. In percentage terms, the representation of black and brown people in this market remained constant between 2019 and 2021: 30% of workers, which in 2021 meant 330,416 professionals.
According to the report, although women are the majority (51.5%) in the Brazilian population, they represent less than half (38.6%) of the professionals hired in ICT in the formal market — an improvement in relation to the 2020 number, which was 32.6%.
Women take on technical roles
The survey also shows that, despite the growth, black women are still less present in ICT hiring, accounting for 11.6% of vacancies — black men represent 18.4%. When taking a racial breakdown, black people occupy 30% of jobs, compared to 53% for white people and 1% for Asian people.
Women, in general, are still more present in support areas than in technical areas. According to the survey, they continue to dominate in areas such as Administrative, Financial and HR (where they occupy 63% of positions), sales and marketing (52%), but are a minority in the areas of ICT, R&D and Engineering (20%) and industrial services (30%) .
Furthermore, the growth in female representation in hiring occurred more in technical roles than in management. Although the presence of women in value-added positions has grown by 20.4% compared to 2020, they are still a minority in director and management positions (36%) and coordination/specialist positions (30%).
For Brasscom, these numbers reveal that there is still a need to promote actions that lead to increased employability of women, black and white, and black men in the ICT sector. And it highlights that training in technology is essential to enhance opportunities for the black population.
