Found her home in the technology industry – "There is a need for diversity"

Olivia Harlin shows us around the office in the large building from the turn of the last century, located right in the heart of central Umeå. She has worked as a UX designer here since she graduated from the Master of Science Programme in Interaction Technology and Design in the spring semester of 2024. A bank manager once lived in the building; perhaps that is why it feels more like someone’s home than a workplace. Or is it just that Olivia has found her home, after a very long and bumpy journey.

Olivia learnt to read, write and count early. She barely needed to listen to the lessons to complete her schoolwork. But problems eventually arose when the curriculum and her classmates caught up with her. Suddenly she realised that she lacked the necessary study skills to learn new things. So school became difficult – especially math, a lot of which is based on knowing formulas and methods.

“That’s when it became difficult, I fell behind on my studies and often lagged behind my classmates. I thought math was really boring and said it was the thing I was worst at in school.”

Thanks to her father and many long hours at the kitchen table at home in Luleå, she finally managed to grasp the pattern that made math understandable. She actually became good at counting.

“I think it was a lot about changing my image of myself in relation to mathematics and not that I was actually bad.”

A new world opened up

At the same time, she started publishing a blog that she coded and designed herself and a whole new world opened up. So when it was time to choose an upper-secondary school, she chose a programme focused on technology.

“I never thought that would be something for me, because I thought only guys and nerds studied technology. But technology is about finding creative solutions to complex problems, and it is so broad – technology is in everything we do, see and encounter in our everyday lives. It had become clear to me that I was going to work with this.”

When I read about the programme, I immediately felt that this is where I should go.

But she ended up in a very homogeneous group. Throughout high school, she had this sense of being underrepresented and school was not at all as fun a time as many had said it would be. But Olivia had found her path and was determined to continue on it even through higher studies. Before university, she went through all of the country’s civil engineering programmes and picked out the programme names that she thought sounded interesting. This included the “Master of Science Programme in Interaction Technology and Design”, which is only available at Umeå University.

“When I read about the programme, I immediately felt that this is where I should go. Right then, I made up my mind.”

Diversity among students on the programme

While her high school years were a bit of a disappointment in some respects, her university years were all the better. At Umeå University, the narrow view of who works and deals with technology was also challenged.

“It was so nice, we were a very mixed class in terms of all aspects of diversity. It was great to see that it can be like that, even though it was a data-heavy IT programme. For me, my time at university turned out to be what people had said about high school, that it would be so much fun, and I will always look back fondly on that aspect. It is such a unique time in life.”

How was the education?

“It was excellent. It had a good mix of theoretical and practical studies. We were able to do a lot of projects that felt realistic, and sometimes we worked with real companies. I still use many of the projects from that time in my portfolio today as part of my work as a consultant.”

Despite the recession and a tough job market, Olivia was hired for a permanent position soon after graduating. Today she works at the IT consultancy Consid, where she has had clients in both the private and public sectors – trade unions, municipalities and even Umeå University, where she has been involved in developing the upcoming Education Website.

What has Umeå University meant for you?

“I had such a great time during my studies, and I feel like I got so much in return, both socially and in terms of skills, but also a love for Umeå as a city. I have always had a fondness for northern Sweden, and it has been sad to me that in many cases you have to choose between a career and wanting to live here in the north. I feel that Umeå University does a lot for Norrland as a whole. You can receive a quality education here, and the university helps bring in new people and that companies can start up and thrive and allow individuals to make a living here, which I think is very important.”

Involved in gender equality and diversity issues

The experience of being underrepresented in the tech community sparked Olivia’s commitment to expanding the IT industry to attract more girls and women. During her studies, she became involved in the non-profit organisations DataTjej and Pepp, both of which are active both in Umeå and nationally and aim to support more women and non-binary people in choosing a future in the tech industry.

Why is that important?

“There is so much concrete evidence for how badly things have gone when you only have a very homogeneous group that involved in developing technology. The lack of diversity among those developing technology will always be reflected in the final product, something that can have devastating consequences.”

She mentions airbags as an example, where women have a higher risk of serious injury in a car accident since airbags are only tested on crash test dummies based on male anatomy.

“This is an example of forgetting an important perspective. Once I became aware of this, I understood the importance of this on another level, not only that studying or working with IT should be enjoyable, but that what we do actually affects everyone in society at large.”

Tech Woman of the Year

The commitment to better equality in the IT industry led Microsoft to name Olivia Harlin Tech Woman of the Year in 2022.

“That was really cool, a bit unreal but also very affirming. I have worked a lot with these questions: Do I belong here? How can I be considered an equal? How do I get away from the good-girl syndrome or the feeling that I always have to prove something or overachieve? As a woman in this industry, I have felt like I always have to be good – or even the best – to get by, while many men can get away with being mediocre.”

The award opened up many opportunities, contexts and platforms to continue raising these issues and raising them more broadly. But working so hard also led to overload and she became exhausted and went on sick leave.

“I never thought you could get burned out while studying since that is not something you see that often. At first I was also ashamed because I thought maybe I was the one who was weak and could not handle the pressure, but I quickly realised that is not the reason.”

My advice is to dare to set the bar lower sometimes and practice prioritising when it is worth making an extra effort and when it is not.

In her quest to create a better environment for women in a male-dominated industry, she had lost her own balance and was giving more than she had on every level, which is typical of the good-girl syndrome, something she wants more women to get away from. In this way, her own journey became an example of how important it is to work on these issues.

“I think it would help if more women were aware that women are overrepresented in stress-related sick leave and that they understood the importance of slaying their inner demons and reducing how much they demand of themselves. My advice is to dare to set the bar lower sometimes and practice prioritising when it is worth making an extra effort and when it is not.”

But this requires diversity in the IT industry.

When she went on sick leave, she was also diagnosed with ADHD, which has helped explain why she did not always fit in. Today she is doing well and still advocates for equality issues but wants to break even more glass ceilings. Her dream is to open up and broaden the tech industry so that a greater diversity of people understand that it can be a place for them as well.

“The way we talk about IT has always been quite narrow; I would like to talk more about its breadth and what this actually means – that you can work with, for example, design, colour and form while it still being IT. But this requires diversity in the IT industry.”