There will be a shortfall of 300,000 qualified IT staff across Europe by 2010, the European Commission has predicted. As a result, firms are being urged to support initiatives to attract more females to the IT sector to protect against potential skills shortages.

According to the EC, there is a distinct downward trend in the number of women working in IT. Females accounted for only 22 percent of European IT graduates in 2006, a three percent drop compared to 1998. In the US, this proportion is 28 percent, while 38 percent of IT graduates in South Korea are female. The low numbers are reflected across the UK workforce, where women account for only around 15 percent of IT roles.

Carrie Hartnell, programme manager at IT trade association Intellect, said her organisation had seen a “very obvious fall” in the number of female IT workers in the UK. “We have concerns that there have been numerous programmes and pieces of legislation to encourage more women and people in general into computer science but at the moment they don’t seem to be making a difference,” she explained.

Hartnell said that obstacles to women joining the technology sector included a lack of female role models; the “geeky” image associated with the industry; and concerns over the future stability of the UK IT market in the face of rising competition from offshoring. “From an education point of view, IT isn’t at the top of the list for careers advisors and teachers, so that also hinders who takes up the subject,” she added.

Hartnell said that Intellect supports programmes that involve the government working with businesses to solve the lack of female IT workers, such as programmes at skills body E-skills UK. “As an industry, we’re also not very good at talking about all the different jobs and areas technology is involved in, such as climate change initiatives and IT marketing roles,” she added. “It’s important for firms to have different skillsets on their IT teams. If you only have one type of employee, you can’t innovate as effectively.”

Recent research from IT training provider The Training Camp revealed a rise in the number of women booking IT courses. However, although the number of female applicants had increased by 27 percent, this was on management-focused courses such as Prince 2 and Itil, while male applicants favoured technical courses such as training in SQL and Oracle databases, or vendor-specific systems administration.

In an attempt to increase the proportion of women working in technical positions at BT, the telecoms giant launched a £200,000 campaign earlier this month to attract more female apprentices. This included funding for a brochure and adverts featuring current young female engineers. The intention is for women to account for 25 percent of the new apprenticeship intake, compared to the current eight percent.

Although the BT apprenticeship programme is currently dominated by men, Adam Oliver, BT’s head of corporate social responsibility, age and disability research, said that bringing more women into BT would give the company a “fresh perspective” on issues. “It’s good to have more female engineers available to visit homes, for example,” he explained. “There’s a perception among some girls that it’s all about being out in a van in the cold. There is some of that, but we offer all types of apprentice roles.”

Amandeep Sehmi, a BT Openreach apprentice based in the Midlands, admitted she was unsure about joining the programme at first.

“My uncle worked at BT and suggested I went for the apprenticeship programme when I left school,” Sehmi said. “I wasn’t sure as I didn’t have any technical training, but he pointed out that the course would give me that. I’ve had lots of support and training since joining, and I did a BTEC in my first year here.”

Sehmi, who is currently working as a technical office-based fibre planner, strongly encouraged other women to consider IT and telecoms roles. “Being a female hasn’t been an issue for me at all. There are a lot of men in my office, but everyone has been really nice and customers are always happy to see a female engineer,” she said. “The apprenticeship programme is a good option as you get to carry on studying, but get paid and have a job at the end of it. And it’s great working at such a large company - I definitely want to work my way up the ladder here.”