A Seat at the Table: Amplifying Women in Development During Women's History Month

March is Women’s History Month, a time to recognize the contributions of women across the industry. It also underscores a pressing challenge: the high rate at which women leave development roles, even as the demand for developers continues to outpace supply. That gap points to an opportunity to rethink the workplace and open source communities so that women have clear paths for growth and long-term careers.

The conversation often starts with visibility. Being the only woman in the room remains a common experience, and bringing more women into technical spaces means actively inviting them to contribute, share ideas, and take on leadership. A new series from The ReadME Project joins that effort, gathering stories and guidance from women shaping the development landscape today.

What Companies Can Do Differently

The first feature examines how organizations can reverse female developer attrition. The piece, titled Creating Opportunity for Women in Development, looks at leadership buy-in, internal investment, and rethinking hiring pipelines as strategies for building a more inclusive workforce. The underlying point: inclusion benefits everyone, not just the women who stay.

Community-Driven Change in Python

A second profile, How Python is Building a Welcoming Community for Women, offers a close look at how the Python ecosystem and PyLadies are tackling underrepresentation. Rather than merely discussing parity, these communities are actively recruiting women into core roles and building more supportive opportunities for development and advancement.

Individual Paths, Shared Impact

Alongside the feature pieces, four profiles spotlight women making a mark within the open source world:

  • Marcy Sutton, an award-winning independent developer, is working to make accessibility the standard rather than an afterthought. She accepts that progress will take time but sees advocacy as the way to push people toward doing the right thing.
  • Jory Burson stepped in when she saw open source standards being decided by too few people. An active member of the W3C and TC39, she now works as a consultant and educator focused on improving how open source projects collaborate.
  • Lorena Mesa traded a role as a political analyst on the Obama campaign for a life in code after discovering Python. She now works to make Python a community that is global, diverse, and open to everyone.
  • Kath Korevec, leader of the documentation team at GitHub, recounts her own route into the field—complete with an unfortunate fall down the stairs at a pivotal moment.

The collection is meant to be shared. The hope is that these stories encourage conversation and help build a development culture where women are actively supported to thrive.