I am always interested in learning new things.

Early in my career, women on computer staffs went through similar things. Don’t know about now. We hired a young lady. I did all of the training. I assumed that anybody could do anything until proved wrong. That happened only twice.

A week after she started, she said to me: “You a lot different than I expected, than you were during the interview.” I went down my question list, looking at her over my reading glasses. Nothing social.

I asked her why she left her prior company after only one month. She said, “I was hired because I was an expert in a certain computer language. They put me in a room to read manuals. I asked about the project and they said ‘that project was cancelled months ago.’ I was hired to increase the black and female percentages in their work force.”

I said, “That’s not why I recommended you. You are smart, can learn on your own, and I don’t have to send you to a bunch of classes.” Later, I thought my reply sounded kind of gruff.

She did great, along with all of my other women trainees over 8 years — better than most men since they already knew everything. I had one guy fired for arrogance (he upset the customers) and another because he could not understand IF-THEN-ELSE concept.

Sadly, I have seen many such things in your article.