Women Who Code

Women Who Code
Name	Women Who Code
Formation	2011
Type	Nonprofit organization
Headquarters	San Francisco, California
Region served	Global
Services	Technical training, networking, mentorship, conferences

Women Who Code

Women Who Code is an international nonprofit organization that supports women and nonbinary technologists through training, community-building, and career development. Founded in 2011, the organization operates global networks of local chapters and virtual programs that connect professionals with recruiters, employers, and volunteer instructors. Its activities include technical workshops, leadership programs, hackathons, and speaker series, often aligning with major technology conferences and employer diversity initiatives.

History

The organization was founded in 2011 in San Francisco by a group of engineers influenced by movements such as Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, PyCon, and regional meetups like Silicon Valley coding groups. Early growth paralleled the expansion of tech hubs including New York City, London, Bangalore, Berlin, and Toronto, and the group established chapters in major centers such as Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, Paris, Tel Aviv, Sydney, São Paulo, Singapore, Dublin, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Barcelona, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, Tokyo, Mumbai, Kolkata, Cape Town, Johannesburg, Lagos, Buenos Aires, Mexico State of Mexico, Manila, Bangkok, Istanbul, Prague, Warsaw, Vienna, Zurich, Brussels, Munich, Milan, Rome, Athens, Lisbon, Helsinki, Oslo, Copenhagen, Budapest, Sao Paulo State, Quito and Bogotá. The trajectory of expansion mirrored trends visible at conferences like Web Summit and TechCrunch Disrupt and intersected with policy discussions at bodies such as United Nations events on digital inclusion.

Founders and early leaders drew inspiration from individual technologists and organizers—some of whom had previously been visible at events like WWDC, Google I/O, Microsoft Build, Facebook F8, Oracle OpenWorld, AWS re:Invent, and VMworld—and from activists associated with initiatives including Girls Who Code, Black Girls Code, AnitaB.org, Lesbians Who Tech, INCLUDE, and National Center for Women & Information Technology. Fundraising and visibility increased after partnerships with corporations such as Intel Corporation, Google, Facebook, Microsoft Corporation, Amazon (company), IBM, and Cisco Systems.

Mission and Programs

The stated mission emphasizes enabling career success for women and nonbinary people in technology through technical education, leadership development, and community support. Program offerings include intensive technical study groups modeled after materials used at Codecademy, Coursera, edX, Udacity, and Pluralsight; mentorship programs reminiscent of networks like LinkedIn and MentorNet; and speaker series featuring engineers and executives from Dropbox, Airbnb, Uber Technologies, Lyft, Stripe (company), Square (company), Palantir Technologies, Spotify, Pinterest, Snap Inc., Atlassian, Salesforce, Red Hat, VMware, HP Inc., Dell Technologies, Zoom Video Communications, HP Enterprise, Qualcomm, and NVIDIA.

Signature initiatives have included coding bootcamp partnerships and leadership tracks analogous to curriculum from General Assembly, Flatiron School, and Hack Reactor, as well as volunteer-driven events such as hackathons and code sprints in the spirit of HackMIT, TreeHacks, Major League Hacking, and Google Summer of Code. Women Who Code has hosted or co-hosted meetups with speakers who have appeared at TED Conference, TOC Conferences, and regional industry summits.

Membership and Chapters

Membership operates through free and paid tiers, with local chapters led by volunteer organizers who coordinate events, workshops, and mentorship circles. Chapters exist in university towns and commercial centers including Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of California, Berkeley, Columbia University, New York University, University College London, Imperial College London, National University of Singapore, University of Toronto, McGill University, University of Melbourne, and University of Sydney. Chapter programming often partners with incubators and accelerators such as Y Combinator, 500 Startups, Techstars, Plug and Play Tech Center, StartX, and Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator.

Volunteer organizers collaborate with hiring pipelines and corporate diversity teams at employers including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Accenture, Deloitte, PwC, EY, KPMG, and McKinsey & Company to run career events, interview practice, and resume clinics.

Impact and Outcomes

Evaluations cite thousands of local events, tens of thousands of members, and reported career transitions facilitated through the network, including hires at startups and global firms. Case studies highlight members who moved into roles at companies such as Adobe Inc., Intel Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, Google, Amazon (company), Meta Platforms, Inc., Oracle Corporation, SAP SE, Siemens, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Roche, Novartis, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, Sony, Panasonic, LG Electronics and Samsung. Impact reporting has been compared with research from groups like Pew Research Center, Catalyst (nonprofit), National Bureau of Economic Research, and World Economic Forum analyses on workforce diversity.

Partnerships and Funding

Funding has come from corporate sponsorships, foundation grants, and individual donations, with named supporters from the technology and finance sectors. Strategic partners have included Google, Facebook, Microsoft Corporation, Amazon (company), Intel Corporation, IBM, Salesforce, Accenture, and SAP SE, and grantmakers have featured philanthropic entities such as Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Khan Academy, Knight Foundation, Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and regional funders tied to city governments like San Francisco Board of Supervisors initiatives. Workforce development contracts have occasionally intersected with public-private programs at agencies such as U.S. Department of Labor and international development projects with UNESCO.

Criticism and Challenges

Critics have questioned reliance on corporate sponsorships tied to recruitment pipelines at firms such as Google, Meta Platforms, Inc., Amazon (company), and Microsoft Corporation, arguing this can influence program priorities and metrics. Debates mirror critiques leveled at peer organizations including Girls Who Code and AnitaB.org about efficacy, scalability, and measurement comparable to evaluations by Stanford Graduate School of Education, Harvard Kennedy School, and MIT Media Lab. Other challenges include sustaining volunteer capacity, equitable geographic representation in regions like Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, and balancing technical training with structural advocacy similar to tensions observed in Open Source Initiative and Electronic Frontier Foundation community governance.

Category:Organizations established in 2011 Category:Women in technology