The Tech space is gradually getting proliferated with lots of people over time. On a daily basis, tech start ups emerge from grassroots, local, national and even globally.

The gradual conglomeration of these successful emergence over time into the big tech space is gradually revolving into a beehive of great innovations. Suffice to say that perspectively, these finely structured inventions are intentionally tailored towards gearing up humanity for a new phase as the bewilderment never truly ends. With every blink of the eye, one can be very sure of the possibility of a new tech activity in the space and at such, the most striking reality is how they are usually tailored towards boosting and aiding humanity efficiently and effectively too.

There will be a need to measure the number of persons joining the space even in split seconds. Just recently, the METAVERSE was introduced and succinctly is gradually dominating the various discussions and conversations within the technology industry. While the world stands in awe of what the METAVERSE may truly be, it is quite possible that it's coming to effect a new narrative in the tech space.

Over time and decades past, more innovations and inventions have usually been credited to the male gender and to this end, the list is quite lengthy.

In reality, the tech space still has an issue with gender diversity. The ratio in this regard is quite noticeable but be it as it may, the tech sector sadly lags behind the rest of the job market when it comes to hiring women. While controversial technologies or flashy CEOs get most of the negative airtime, it’s the lack of women in the tech industry that seems to be the largest problem looming overhead. Dauntlessly, some women have done a great deal with the courage to infiltrate the tech space with clear cut and finely defined innovations geared towards solving humanities problem relating to different phases of life.
Technology impacts everything. It determines how we carry out simple daily tasks, like shopping and banking. It shapes how we learn, how we interact with others, and how we consume news and media. Oftentimes, it impacts who has access to resources and opportunities. Technology can be a great equalizer, but only if it’s driven by diverse, conscious creators and innovators.

Why are we going back through history when we are supposed to be talking about the the tech space? This is because I want us to understand our current stage in the awesome story of the roles women have played too which sadly may have been accredited to the male gender without much knowledge that such invention or innovation was by a woman as they've always raised to the occasion (which I believe is the future of not just the internet but our human race) but also for us to be able to filter through the noise and focus on what is really important.

Stated below are accounts of women who have took the silver spot and earned encomiums of no mean sort as they their invention has become a great deal in the tech age. Succinctly, they've carved their names in the sands of time and impressed it on golden templates. Amongst many others, below are a few;

1. KATHERINE JOHNSON: The NASA Mathematician
Katherine’s trajectory analysis as a mathematician for NASA was crucial to the success of the first ever US space flight. Her complex manual calculations were also critical in future space missions, including the first American in orbit, John Glenn. Katherine ran the numbers programmed into the computer at NASA for the flight by hand, at the request of Glenn. Katherine remembers him saying “if she says they’re good... “then I’m ready to go.” At age 97, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s highest civilian honour, by President Obama.

2. ALLISON ESPOSITO
Tech Ladies is a worldwide community of 25,000+ women in tech. It was founded by Allison Esposito in 2016, Tech Ladies connects women with the best opportunities in tech, and connects companies with the best women techmakers. The community has both free and paid membership options. The free membership option includes the Tech Ladies Facebook group, newsletter, and jobs board. The paid membership option is $99 every three months and includes an exclusive members-only Facebook group and newsletter, and other perks.
Women can join the free Tech Ladies Facebook group to share launches and exciting news about your startup, ask anonymously for advice or anything related to working in tech, discuss interesting articles related to tech, and find resources such as diverse speaker lists, applications for relevant scholarships, etc.

Founders and hiring managers looking to hire women techmakers can submit job postings to the Tech Ladies jobs board and newsletter. The community does not allow members to post jobs, recruitment messages, events, or offer promotions within the Facebook group.

3. ODUNAYO EWENIYI
Odunayo Eweniyi is a true entrepreneurial powerhouse. Not only is she smart and driven; she’s also using her genius for good. The best kind of tech entrepreneur.
Odunayo graduated top of her Computer Engineering class in 2013, and was just 24 years old when she co-founded Piggybank (and PiggyVest) in 2016. PiggyVest is the first ever online app for personal savings and investment in West Africa, and is now one of Nigeria’s most successful fintech startups. Their mission is to empower people to better manage and save their money—and, with over a million users to date, it’s safe to say that they’re making a huge impact.

While taking the tech world by storm, Odunayo is also empowering other women to do the same. In January this year, she co-founded FirstCheck Africa together with Eloho Omame. FirstCheck Africa is an angel fund and investor community led by women, for women. As it stands, women are severely under-represented in tech, both in Africa and globally. In 2019, women-led companies received less than 5% of the global venture capital, with funding to women founders dropping significantly in 2020. Through FirstCheck Africa, Odunayo and Eloho hope to address this by investing in women-led startups from the very beginning, building a strong community of investors, and partnering with organizations to ensure women have access to the right networks.

In an interview with Akindare Okunola for techcabal.com, Odunayo credits her success to her willingness to learn and get stuck in: “I’ll learn anything I need to learn as long as it moves the needle. That’s just how it is. If I need to be X company’s COO, best believe I will learn everything I need to be that company’s COO. I don’t have a lot of life philosophies, but one of them is to do your absolute best in ANYTHING you’re doing. Anything at all.” We can’t wait to see what this extraordinary woman does next.

4. ELIZABETH FEINLER: The Original Search Engine
Between 1972 to 1989, Elizabeth ran the Network Information Center in California, which was a bit like a “pre-historic Google.” The NIC was the first place to publish the resources and directories for the Internet, developing the original "white pages" and “yellow pages” directories. Her group also developed the domain naming scheme of .com, .edu, .gov, .net, and many more that we use so commonly today.

5. DR. SASIKALA DEVI
Innovation is (almost) always a good thing. Sometimes it’s a case of improving the user experience of a product or service—and sometimes it’s a matter of saving lives. When the Covid-19 pandemic struck, Dr. Sasikala Devi did what all brilliant innovators do: She saw a problem (a rather monumental one) and came up with a solution.

Sasikala Devi is a researcher and academic at SASTRA Deemed-to-be-University in Tamil Nadu, India. As was the case in many countries, India was caught off-guard by the Covid-19 outbreak and needed to import certain equipment, such as diagnostic tool kits. Fortunately, deep learning and AI expert Sasikala had an idea. After studying 500,000 X-ray images from Stanford University, she came up with an initial prototype for what is now known as LungXpert—an affordable, 90% accurate AI-based prognostic tool that enables early detection of cardiovascular and pulmonary illnesses, including the coronavirus.

Sasikala acted quickly and leveraged her expertise at a time when it was most needed, literally giving healthcare professionals the tools to help save lives. It’s also worth noting that she did this while the country was in lockdown—meaning she didn’t have regular access to lab resources, nor could she engage her fellow scholars or students to help. Developing a game-changing healthcare solution while teaching daily classes, conducting academic research, and in lockdown? Incredible.

6. ANNIE EASLEY: The NASA Rocket Scientist
Annie was a NASA rocket scientist, and a trailblazer for gender and racial diversity in STEM. When hired, she was one of only four black employees at the Lab. 34 years later, she had contributed to numerous programs as a computer scientist, inspired many through her enthusiastic participation in outreach programs, and broken down barriers as equal employment opportunity counsellor. Easley’s vital work on the Centaur rocket project while at NASA laid the foundations for space shuttle launches in the future.

7. WHITNEY WOLFE HERD
If you follow the tech scene (or if you’re an avid online dater), you’ll no doubt be familiar with Whitney Wolfe Herd—founder of online dating platform Bumble. When Bumble first launched back in 2014, it garnered quite the buzz (excuse the pun) for its unique take on online dating. Between heterosexual matches, only women are able to send the first message. Whitney herself has described Bumble as a feminist dating app, empowering women to take the lead. In her own words: “Making the first move, whether a woman is matching with a man or a woman, gives her a boost of confidence right off the bat. It immediately puts her in the driver’s seat.”

The concept clearly took off, as Bumble is still going strong today—and, when Whitney decided to take the company public in January this year, she rose to a new kind of fame. Not only is Whitney Wolfe Herd the youngest woman to take a company public in the U.S.; Bumble is now worth $13 billion on the stock market, making Whitney the first ever self-made woman billionaire in the world. Whew.

Having created one of the most successful apps of our time, Whitney is certainly not oblivious to the unique set of challenges—and, sometimes, the dangers—posed by digital dating. A 2018 Bumble study found that one in three women had received unsolicited explicit photos from strangers online, and 96% of these women were not happy to have received such images. In response, Bumble introduced their Private Detector feature which uses AI to detect and blur explicit images sent in a Bumble chat. It’s then up to the recipient to decide whether to view or block the image. At the same time, Whitney and the Bumble leadership team campaigned for the unsolicited sending of lewd images to be deemed illegal in Texas, a law which passed in September 2019.

So what’s next for Whitney Wolfe Herd? A new kind of dating app, maybe, or something else entirely? Who knows—but we’ll certainly be staying tuned.

8. ANGELICA ROSS
You may recognize Angelica Ross from her starring roles in Pose and American Horror Story, but that’s not why she’s on our list. In addition to her acting skills, we’re here to celebrate Angelica’s entrepreneurial spirit and activism within the tech industry.

Angelica is a self-taught coder and a trained actor, having studied theater at Florida Atlantic University. In 2014, she founded TransTech Social Enterprises, an “incubator for LGBTQ Talent…a co-working, co-learning community dedicated to empowering trans, lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer people and allies with practical, career-ready skills.”

TransTech Social was inspired by Angelica’s personal journey. She first taught herself to code using video tutorials, then branched out into design (fun fact: she designed backstage flyers for artists like Ludacris and Cedric the Entertainer). Today, the TransTech community is thriving, with members getting access to training, workshops, professional equipment, office space, mentorship, and job opportunities—a wealth of resources that can help them to build a career in tech. And, in 2017, Angelica launched the annual TransTech Summit. With a host of expert speakers, attendees have the opportunity to learn about specific career tracks including design, web and app technology, and general career development, as well as topics such as human rights and racial and social justice.

Angelica Ross is the very definition of talent, drive, and empowerment. She taught herself the tech skills she needed to succeed, and is now helping others to do the same. In her own words: “I discovered my path to independence through technology, as well as the potential for a global lifeline for trans people around the world who were looking for the same.”

Moving forward, trust you're gaining insight.

9. STEPHANIE LAMPKIN
When leveraged in the right ways, technology has the potential to make the world a fairer, more equitable place—and that’s exactly what Stephanie Lampkin set out to achieve when she founded Blendoor. Driven by data analytics, Blendoor is a recruiting tool which seeks to mitigate unconscious bias in the hiring process; an issue that Stephanie has encountered throughout her career.

Stephanie achieved a B.S. in Management Science & Engineering from Stanford University, and an MBA in Entrepreneurship & Innovation from MIT. Since then, she’s forged a long and successful career in tech, building and managing enterprise software solutions at companies like Microsoft, TripAdvisor, and Deloitte. But, as a woman of color, she has faced “immeasurable bias in gaining entry-level positions at tech and VC firms.”

Speaking to Women Who Code DC, Stephanie explains that the inspiration behind Blendoor came, in part, from being knocked back by Google for not being “technical enough for a data analyst role,” despite having majored in data analytics at Stanford. With Blendoor, she wants to “show the world that disruptive technologies can be built by non-white/non-Asian/non-male ‘bro-grammers’.”

Since its inception in 2015, the Blendoor platform has now evolved into an all-round inclusive hiring solution. Companies can quickly and easily identify diversity gaps and non-compliance issues, and tap into a diverse, anonymized database of talent.

Inspired by Stephanie Lampkin and her work? Of course you are. Check out this video of her #NotAPipeLineProblem presentation, where she talks about bias in hiring and shares her own personal story.

Trust you're getting giggy already, there's a little more to know, let's head up.

10 . SARAH HAWLEY
Since the Covid-19 pandemic struck, remote work has become the new norm for many—especially in the tech industry. Sarah Hawley was well ahead of the curve, though. As CEO, she helped to build Grow My Team from the ground up, a recruiting company dedicated to hiring and integrating the best remote talent on a global scale. Now, Sarah’s bringing a new venture to the scene: Growmotely.

Growmotely will be the world’s first all-in-one global platform for sourcing, growing, and managing remote teams. That’s a pretty exciting space to be in right now, given how the workplace has changed over the last year. Sarah founded the company in August 2020, and the beta site is yet to launch—we can’t wait to see it when it does!

So what’s so great about Sarah, besides the rather impressive fact that she’s founded eight (eight!) companies since 2009? Once again, it’s the drive to “do good” that sets Sarah apart. Diversity and equality are central themes in Sarah’s work; she believes in doing business that’s “good for people and good for the planet.” Sarah is also driven to provide opportunities and empower others. In her own words, she “came from a broken home, barely graduated high school, and due to poor grades, wasn’t accepted into any university or college programs as a school leaver.” While carving her own path to success, Sarah launched the League of Extraordinary Women—a community aimed at connecting and inspiring women through meet-ups, events, and conferences.

Sarah is proof that you don’t need to be an academic superstar to achieve success or make a difference in the world. You can read more about this incredible woman and her work on her personal website.

11. RADIA PERLMAN: The Mother Of The Internet
Nicknamed “Mother of the Internet”, Radia’s invention of the algorithm behind the Spanning Tree Protocol (STP), was instrumental in making today's internet possible. Her work made a huge impact on the way networks self-organize and move data, and put the basic rules of internet traffic in place. Radia has delivered keynote speeches across the world, and is still a computer programmer and engineer for Dell EMC.

12. LILLY MITTENTHAL
Lilly Mittenthal describes herself as a user-centered designer who strives to innovate for the greater good—and that’s exactly what she’s doing with maro, one of the most exciting apps we’ve come across in a long time.

Officially launched at the end of 2020, maro seeks to help parents navigate “tough growing-up conversations” with their children. With a heavy focus on mental health, the app provides access to a library of expert-vetted content, as well as a journaling feature for parents to log key information about their kids’ mental health, which they can export to a clinician if necessary. For example, parents can use the app to learn about the science behind anxiety, how to explain anxiety to kids, and how to incorporate anxiety relief into family life.

In an interview with Afdhel Aziz for Forbes, Lilly and her co-founder Kenzie Butera Davis describe how the idea behind maro stemmed from their own personal experiences with mental health and sexual assault. As Lilly explains, the pair teamed up to create maro because “we wish our parents had what we’re creating today. If we had a better system in place to educate families around mental health, sex, personal safety, etc., we might have known what resources to turn to before things got too bad. We truly believe it would have made all the difference in our experiences.”

At present, the app is geared primarily towards parents of elementary-aged kids, but they’ll soon expand their content to appeal to a middle school audience, too. Maro has huge potential for positive social impact, and we look forward to seeing where Lilly and Kenzie go next. In the meantime, make sure you check out Lilly’s awesome design portfolio.

13. ADA LOVELACE: The World's First Computer Programmer
Ada was the daughter of romantic poet, Lord Byron, and his wife, Anna Isabella-Byron. Her mathematical talent shone through in her early life, and her skills and interest in machines lead to a working relationship with Charles Babbage. Babbage was the inventor of the “Analytical Engine”, a complicated device that was never actually created, but resembled the elements of a modern computer. As a result of her work on the project, Ada is often referred to as the “world’s first computer programmer”. It was Lovelace's notes on the Analytical Engine that Alan Turing used as a form of inspiration for his work on the first modern computer in the 1940s.

14. KRISTINA ASHLEY WILLIAMS
“Innovation without diversity is either one of two things, a failure or plagiarism.” Those are the first words you’ll see when you visit Kristina Ashley Williams’ website, so you already know she’s up to great things.

Kristina wears many hats. She’s an artist, a futurist design strategist, a critical race educator, a social justice champion and, as of recently, a tech founder. In July 2020, Kristina launched Unpacking, a data-driven platform which delivers diversity training through gamification. Brilliant, right? Several studies have shown that, unfortunately, traditional diversity training does very little to actually change people’s behavior. This leaves a huge and dangerous gap—one which Kristina hopes to close with her new, innovative, and highly immersive approach. Gamification is known to increase user engagement, and that’s exactly what Unpacking promises to do. Users don’t just learn about diversity and unconscious bias; they’re immersed in it. Unpacking creates an experiential learning environment, engaging the user in collaborative, interactive game play.

Although the startup is very much in its infancy, Unpacking has already graduated over 200 alumni—and been endorsed by Beyoncé. That’s a pretty impressive start! And, with the new platform set to launch in summer this year, we’ve no doubt that this is just the beginning. Stay tuned!

15. GRACE HOPPER: The Esteemed Computer Scientist
Undeniably famous in the tech world, Rear Admiral Grace M. Hopper was an esteemed computer scientist and one of the first computer programmers to work on the Harvard Mark I. Her work led to the development of COBOL, an early programming language we is still used to this day. In 1947, she recorded the worlds first ever real computer bug, and it is also said that she coined the phrase: “it is often easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.”
All the women on this list have come from different walks of life—and they’ve all faced obstacles along the way. If there’s anything we can learn from them, it’s that everybody has the potential to make a change in the world. Do you, too, want to forge a career in tech and shape the world we live in? Read this post to figure out which tech career path is right for you, or try out a free short course in UX, UI design, web development, or data analytics.

At this point, I trust that you have found this insightful and quite useful. If you’re a newbie, you surely will be able to avoid the hurdles most people went through and more so, you’d be able to know a few women doing great stuffs in the tech space. For others who may have been in the space for a long time, this will serve as a simple reminder and guide yet still.

I trust it must have been a smooth sail through this amazing article, I know so because I got thrilled too, oh Yes, I did. Let me know what you think in the comments and feel free to post any questions.

Cheers.