The film Mountainhead, starring Steve Carell and Jason Schwartzman , is one of a half dozen dramas portraying tech executives obsessed with money and status.
“We are the smartest men in America. We literally have the resources to take over the world. Boom! The president wants to speak to us. Guys, we could actually do this!”
Of course, social scientists have observed arrogance and excess on Wall Street, in corporate board rooms, in professional sports circles and the military, but Professor Coleen Carrigan says the qualities of many tech executives are different.
She had worked at the U.S. Department of Labor, reading letters of complaint from women, wrote an academic paper on the subject, then went to work at a top tech company where she observed bad behavior firsthand.
“I was experiencing everything I had written about," she recalls. "The gross wage gap -- I was paid about 75% less than my male peers, but the worst part was being interrupted in every meeting, being talked over, my ideas being stolen, and then – finally – just a couple of really creepy co-workers who made it really difficult to feel respected.”
In her book – Cracking the Bro Code – she suggests that many men who are now running tech companies were brainy, nerdy guys in high school.
“I have a theory, and I call this theory the Geek Mystique. These men were usually geeks growing up, particularly during their teen years, and still have internalized that feeling of not being good socially.”
Now, their intelligence and understanding of a new, digital domain has propelled them to powerful places.
"When you have this new field that’s experiencing great wealth accumulation— money equals not only power but prestige and authority— you have these people who were formerly ignored, harassed, bullied themselves now have great power, and they are now going to punch down."
Women are rarely admitted to their inner circles – viewed as servants, not colleagues, and sexist behavior is widely accepted.
“Gender harassment is not just practiced by a few bad apples, but it’s highly tolerated by people not even the ones doing the violence. So this is where we have computer science up there with the military in terms of tolerating sexual harassment.”
When women do offer ideas for making their companies better, they may be subject to a kind of interrogation, suggesting they don’t know what they’re talking about or doing.
“Your leadership should be respected. Your talent has already been proven, and you’re trying to break that glass ceiling into the leadership positions, and you’re set upon with this kind of obstructionism and sexism.”
As tech bros accumulate money and power, they begin to see themselves as superior people.
“Someone who’s a superior being, who can know all domains of knowledge and be able to decide who counts in society and who doesn’t. I think that type of hubris has gotten us to the place we are both politically and in terms of being so dependent on these tools that don’t have a lot of public oversight or accountability," Carrigan explains.
After the Me Too movement gained cultural clout, some tech firms began keeping track of how they treated women and minorities, but Coleen Carrigan says that practice didn’t last.
“Unfortunately, now the new protocol for leaders in our country seems to be ‘Let’s not collect the data at all for anything we don’t want to be held accountable for.’”
She hopes her book will spark change – inspiring companies to recognize that they will be stronger and will serve the public better with a diverse workforce and leaders from varied backgrounds.
