Ada Lovelace Day - Dr Vanessa Vallely on collaboration and the network effect

Women today make up between 22% and 29% of the global tech workforce, depending on who you talk to and where they are based. But only nine percent of people (of both genders) come from lower socio-economic backgrounds, in the UK at least. Such data appears unavailable for other advanced economies, such as the US, Canada or Australia.

So, statistically, it makes it all the more remarkable that Dr Vanessa Vallely, Founder of networking organization WeAreTechWomen and the UK's Women in Tech Week (12-16 October), should have had such a successful career in the sector.

Vallely grew up in public housing in a socially and economically disadvantaged part of East London, brought up by a single mother who took four jobs to make ends meet. On leaving school at 16 with few qualifications, Vallely struggled to find a job. As she recalls:

I didn't have the credentials or...

Copyright of this story solely belongs to diginomica.com. To see the full text click HERE