Uvaro Impact Scholarships: Why We Did It
We’re Giving Away $50K in Memberships — Here’s Why
We created the Uvaro Impact Scholarship program to increase representation of marginalized groups in the workplace, so that all constituents of our global society may realize a better future. We’ve launched the program with our Women in Tech and Women of Colour in Tech scholarships because we believe achieving gender parity and increasing diversity in the tech sector is how we can maximize our impact.
We didn’t launch these two scholarships alone. Garage Capital and BWOSS are our partners. BWOSS specializes in helping Black, Indigenous, and Women of Colour, grow and succeed in sales. Garage Capital is one of the world’s leading seed investors in businesses operating in the tech sector. Together, they represent what must change: the people and the workplace. On a macro scale, aligning these two groups is required to close the gender gap.
There is a mountain of research and evidence to support that closing the gender gap makes sense and will lead to a better future for more people. Research shows that empowering women, investing in their education, and supporting their equal participation in the workforce, drives massive societal, environmental, and economic benefit.
In big business, educating women and creating opportunities for career growth in the workplace leads to significant economic gains. Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on their executive teams are 21% more likely to experience above-average profitability than companies in the fourth quartile. Companies with low rates of both gender and racial diversity are 29% more likely to make less money, and inclusive teams make better business decisions up to 87% of the time.
Twelve trillion dollars could be added to global GDP by 2025 by advancing women’s equality.
Why tech
The “tech sector” used to be an ivory tower, high in the clouds. Very few people could even see it, much less enter into it. Now, technology permeates every single aspect of our lives. The tower has become an ocean that covers our entire planet. No industry remains untouched. Almost every single aspect of human subsistence is digital technology enabled. The tech sector is literally everywhere.
Not only is the sector ubiquitous, it is also a driver of social change. People look to workplaces in the tech sector to innovate and set new examples; and the sector pulls people along, whether people opt in to being pulled or not. The pace of globalization and digitization, recently catalyzed by the COVID pandemic, has made these realities painfully obvious at every socioeconomic level.
As an omnipresent driver of global change, we believe the tech sector has a responsibility to act with intention.
Why now
We got here by looking at recent trends. Most recently, working women have been disproportionately impacted by COVID, and women in tech have been twice as likely to lose their jobs than men. When evaluating representation of the 25% women working in tech, Hispanic women account for 1%, Black women account for 3%, and Asian women 5%. Right now, representation in the sector does not match the world around us. There are many fewer women, and even fewer women of colour, working in the sector.
If representation continues to increase at the current pace, it could take 12 years before women see equal representation in tech; globally and more broadly, if we continue at our current rate, it could take 170 years before we see gender parity. But the rate of growth within the tech sector has never been faster, which means there is no better time to act than now. Any changes we make to the rate of representation will be amplified and we’ll reach gender parity sooner.
Given how quickly the tech sector is growing, if we don’t try and achieve gender parity at this point in time, we risk accruing more debt and making the problem worse. The sector is in a state of growth, which means systems and structures to support that growth are scaling. If these systems grow too large too quickly, before we’ve set a foundation of equality, then we risk building systems that will propagate and amplify the gender divide versus close it.
What’s next?
Spread the word. We’ll be sharing more information about how to apply to the scholarship in the coming weeks. If you are a self-identified woman or woman of colour who wants to have a fulfilling career in tech sales, or know someone who fits that description, we want to hear from you.
About Donna Litt
As COO and co-founder of Uvaro, I tell myself a lot of things. Such as, I only have 24 hours in a day, and that it’s always better when we’re together (something my husband and I frequently remind each other of). Most commonly I tell myself that the only constant is change. But the thing I tell myself that grounds me most of all? If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together. Connect with me and together we’ll go farther, I promise.
