Speaking with people from other cultures can be difficult, but working in engineering as a woman can be even more overwhelming. Women are still a minority in STEM, and we can find it difficult to communicate our needs and find a job that respects and elevates us.
My friend Andrea is an engineer and communication nerd who's helped countless people improve their careers through effective communication. As a woman in STEM herself, she's experienced the hurdles many women face in the industry.
Whether you're starting out in STEM or you've been in the field for years, the advice below is the career side of this. But there's a second layer, and in my lessons it's hard to miss. Engineers want to be right before they speak. Women are raised to be liked before they speak. Put those two together in a second language and you get very capable engineers who know exactly what they want to say and say about a third of it. Perfectionism is trouble on its own. Perfectionism plus conditioning is double the trouble.
Find Your Cheerleader
If you're just starting your career, creating a strong support network is important. Find a mentor who can help you navigate the challenges of working in a technical field. Join professional organisations and attend events where you can meet other women in STEM. Many women feel isolated in technical fields (I know I did when I started out as a young engineer). Women might not have gotten support from friends and family and have never met a woman who does the same thing. Just the general stress of being a minority in your field can weigh you down.
Find peers who understand what it's like to work in a male-dominated environment and people who truly lift you up. It's so much easier to succeed when you have someone in your corner cheering you on.
Make "No" Your Favourite Word
Setting boundaries and saying no is essential for women engineers working in international male-dominated environments.
Women often find it more difficult than men to set boundaries and say no, because we are conditioned from a young age to put others first. We are taught that it is our responsibility to take care of others and that saying no is selfish. This mindset can be difficult to break free from, but it is essential if you want to have a successful career and maintain a healthy lifestyle.
This ties into creating boundaries. When you establish boundaries and learn how to say no, you are taking control of your life. You are telling the world that you will not let them dictate how you live your life. You are also telling yourself that you are worth taking care of. When you have a healthy work-life balance, you can focus better at work and come up with innovative ideas. You are also less likely to experience burnout, which can lead to decreased productivity.
Remember, clear is kind. Let me repeat this: Clear is Kind!
Chances are that your male peers say "no" more often than you, or have boundaries that others don't question. Become clear with yourself about what you want from your career and employer. Then live in accordance with those principles, saying no when necessary.
Saying No in English Is a Different Job
Saying no is one thing. Saying it in English is another.
This is where my lessons split. My male students usually want to know how to say something faster. My female students usually want to know how to say it without being read as "bitchy"*. Same sentence, different worry.
The fix isn't softer language. Softer language is what got you here: the extra "just", the "sorry to bother you", the question mark stuck on the end of a statement that wasn't a question.
The fix is grammar that carries its own weight, so you don't have to pad it.
- "I won't be able to take that on this week." Not "I'm so sorry, I don't think I can maybe...?"
- "We need the revised drawings by Thursday." Not "Would it be possible to get the drawings at some point?"
- "That doesn't work for me. This would."
Modal verbs, conditionals, and whether you choose a statement or a question. Those three do more for how you come across than any amount of vocabulary. That's the grammar worth your time.
Prioritise Your Well-Being
Similarly, don't let your work come at the expense of your health: physical, mental, or spiritual. When starting out in your career, it's easy to work for a company that takes advantage of you. You shouldn't ignore your feelings and health. Look for a job where you can use all your skills and feel good, says Andrea.
In engineering, it can be difficult to maintain a healthy work-life balance. It is important to be aware of the signals your body and mind are sending you and to act on them. Ignoring your physical or mental health for the sake of your job can lead to serious consequences.
Also, if you don't create boundaries, you'll hurt your body in the next 10-15 years. When you're older, you'll be happy that you prioritised your well-being over the company's, and you'll have more job options that you actually enjoy.
Use Your Skills
Every engineer has a special toolbox of interests. Use this toolbox! One of the great things about working in STEM is that there are many options and paths you can take. Follow your interests, and don't be afraid to change direction if something isn't working out. Andrea says if you can't find a job that suits your interests, create the right job.
Remember that your zone of genius is not making coffee or doing the laundry. As women in engineering, it's easy to forget about following our passions and settling, but that's not good. Find a job that respects your boundaries, ignites your passions, and makes you feel good.
Give Up On Perfect
A common theme that Andrea sees with women engineers is the desire to be perfect. Many women are held back. Women make mistakes too, but we want to be perfect. Which is simply not possible. It's the same with learning to communicate in Business English. If you wait till you're perfect, you'll never speak.
You won't excel in your career until you give up on perfectionism. If you don't know something, learn about it. But don't wait to speak up or move forward till you're perfect. According to Andrea, giving up perfectionism is the biggest thing women in engineering have to learn. Make mistakes and move on. It's something that very few men in engineering struggle with.
So, learn and improve and accept the mistakes as they come. With this mentality, you can achieve everything you want.
You Need Somewhere to Say It Out Loud
I teach men and women. The lessons are not the same.
With my male students we usually go straight to the language problem. With my female students, something often has to come out first. The meeting where she was talked over*. The site visit where someone assumed she'd take the notes. The contractor who answered every one of her questions to her younger male colleague. Ten minutes of that, and then we can work.
I used to think I was losing lesson time. I wasn't. You can't practise sounding confident in a language while you're still angry about the reason you don't sound confident. And in a second language that anger doesn't come out as heat. It comes out as hesitation.
So find the room where you can say it out loud. A coach, a peer group, a friend in the same industry, the cheerleader from the first section of this article. Somewhere the answer is "yes, that happens" and not "are you sure you're not reading too much into it".
Then go back and take the space. Not perfectly. Just take it.
Where To Start
Keep these tips in mind as you start or continue your career in STEM. By networking with other professionals, setting boundaries, and following your interests, you can succeed in any technical field.
Perfectionism is an engineering problem. Wanting to be liked is a conditioning problem. In English they stack, and the result is an engineer who's excellent at her job and quiet in the room where it gets decided. You don't fix that by waiting until your English is perfect. You fix it by finding out which part of the language is actually in your way.
If you want help working that out, book a free 15-minute call. No pitch, just a conversation about where your English is costing you room in the meeting.
Andrea's full conversation is episode 9 of the English for Engineers podcast, Vienna Waits for You.
Frequently Asked Questions
Because you're solving two problems at once. You're choosing what to say and building the sentence to say it in, while the meeting moves on without you. Most engineers I teach aren't short of opinions. They're short of the half-second it takes to get the opinion into English before the moment closes.
The perfectionism is the same. What sits on top of it isn't. Engineers are trained to be right before they open their mouths, and women are usually raised to be liked as well. In your native language you can manage both at once. In English, one of them gives way, and it's almost never the wanting to be liked.
Cut the padding and let the grammar do the work. Statements instead of questions when you mean a statement. A clear modal verb instead of three hedges stacked on top of each other. No apology in front of a reasonable request. Directness in English reads as professional far more often than non-native speakers expect.
No. Nobody is deciding your competence on your vowels. See also the article "your accent isn't the problem."
Confidence tends to arrive after the sentence, not before it. Start with the situations where the cost of a clumsy sentence is low, and build from there. And find somewhere to talk about the days that were genuinely bad, because carrying those into a meeting will do more damage to your English than any grammar gap.
See also the article "why engineers sound less confident in English than they are."
Language Notes
*"Bitchy": an insulting English word used about women who are direct, critical or unfriendly. There's no common male equivalent, which is more or less the point. It's here because it's the word my students hear, not because it's a word I'd recommend.
*"To be talked over": when someone begins speaking while you're still speaking, so your point disappears.
Original Post from 9 January 2023; latest update: 25 August 2026.
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