Ben Strack

<div id="highlights-block_62f3e6182c57a" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>The fastest growing blockchain roles are quality assurance analysts, cryptologic technicians and compliance specialists</li>
 <li>CEO of The Crypto Recruiters said developers are constantly in high demand, though many have “gone incognito”</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



The supply of engineering and information technology talent within the blockchain industry is not meeting demand.



Maturing digital asset markets have shifted company needs to technical roles — especially when it comes to security — according to a new study by <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/latest-in-crypto-hiring-okx-bitget-among-companies-boosting-headcount/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">crypto exchange OKX</a> and LinkedIn.



Finance talent accounts for 19% of blockchain-oriented employees, the report found. Engineers, meanwhile, make up 16%. And business development, information technology and sales staffers make up about 6% each.



<a href="https://www.okx.com/academy/en/global-blockchain-industry-talent-insights-okx-linkedin-report" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The analysis</a> includes research data samples from LinkedIn covering 180 countries from January 2019 to January 2022.  



The most sought-after jobs are crypto traders, software engineers, analysts, support analysts and account managers — which tend to come with relatively higher compensation.&nbsp;&nbsp;



But the finance category ranked sixth in terms of hiring demand, as of June, according to LinkedIn job postings. Instead, people in the engineering and informational technology fields are most coveted as companies are building out blockchain capabilities, followed by professionals in product management, marketing and human resources.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The study examined both crypto-native companies and traditional entities vying to establish a foothold in digital assets.



The fastest-growing title was for a “quality assurance analyst,” which had a growth rate of 713% from June 2021 to June 2022. Cryptologic technician and compliance specialists ranked second and third, growing by 350% and 253%, respectively, over that span.



“The blockchain industry is transitioning from being highly financial to being highly technical in nature,” the report said. “It will fully utilize the combination of technical and financial attributes of blockchain to gradually develop into an important part of the digital economy.”



Emily Landon, ​​CEO of <a href="https://www.thecryptorecruiters.io/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Crypto Recruiters</a>, told Blockworks her firm is seeing a lot of requests for marketing, investor relations and developer roles — including front-end developers, as well as those well-versed in programming languages Rust and Solidity.



But finding technical talent has become increasingly difficult as candidates aren’t always marketing themselves well on LinkedIn, she added. Others have deleted their LinkedIn accounts due to spam from recruiters, Landon said, flocking to Twitter and Discord instead.&nbsp;&nbsp;



“It makes it challenging to find them on those platforms,” Landon said. “Basically, these developers have gone incognito.”



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Other numbers at a glance</h3>



LinkedIn data show the total number of the platform’s members working in the blockchain industry grew by 76% year over year through June. The US has the most people working in the space, followed by India and China.&nbsp;



In terms of job postings, blockchain-related talent demand is most concentrated in the United States, China, France, India and Germany.



The average tenure of global blockchain talent is 1.2 years, according to the report. Aside from the influx of people from financial and technology companies into the space, the industry’s flow of talent is primarily from within the segment.



Despite the year-over-year growth, overall, <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/meet-the-women-looking-to-make-the-metaverse-more-inclusive/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">female talent remains scarce</a>. The segment has about four times more men than women, according to the report.



“[We’ve had] an incredibly hard time especially finding women in the space,” Landon said. “We want to help more women get into technical roles.”



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There’s a Shortage of Tech (And Female) Crypto Talent: Report

Bessie Liu

<div id="highlights-block_62b0c8257d8e6" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Amanda Archer is the co-founder of Women of the Metaverse, a creative studio that focuses on establishing projects by women artists</li>
 <li>Archer recently launched her first NFT collection, First Ape Wives Club, and hopes to bring the entertainment industry to the doorstep of her crypto community</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



In the same way the dot.com boom changed the tech landscape, public relations pro Amanda Archer saw an in for a Web3-focused startup that she hopes will change the entertainment game.



The tech-savvy Archer told Blockworks the goal of her <a href="https://womenofthemetaverse.io" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Women of the Metaverse</a> (WOTM) — an agency founded in October 2021 working to highlight women-led projects, such as the recently launched <a href="https://firstapewivesclub.io" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">First Ape Wives Club</a> NFT collection — is to “break down doors” for women in crypto. Though digital assets were supposed to upend the male-dominated paradigm of traditional finance, industry participants say there’s still a great deal of work to do. 



Archer is tapping so-called ambassadors, who are active members within the community and act as spokespeople for WOTM. Some of these people include Oscar-nominated producer Cindy Cowan, actress Natasha Bassett and jewelry designer Phia Broadus.



“The entertainment business can be quite hard to crack into, so part of the utility that we have is to give our members access,” Archer said.&nbsp;



Archer moved to the United States from Australia eight years ago and worked as a publicist for Michal Jackson’s family after the singer passed away. The gig, she said, opened up her world to scores of Hollywood actors — the same people she now wants her NFT holders to be able to network with and have access to.&nbsp;



“I want to try and make Web3 more commercial to the general public,” Archer said.



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Navigating a bear market</h3>



To get Women of the Metaverse off the ground, Archer relied heavily on colleagues and consultants in Web3 to help her lay out a roadmap.&nbsp;



For those looking to move into the space now, Archer said she prizes free online resources, such as tuning in to and even participating in Twitter spaces and Discord communities to stay up to date with a market that changes by the second.



“What we want to do is educate people on how to navigate the Web3 space, because we’ve made these mistakes,” she said. “I suggest that they go and find people online, even if they don&#8217;t know them directly, and start following them and getting into the conversation with trusted people.”



Though Web3 remains nascent — and cryptocurrency has been especially volatile as of late, with bitcoin and ether <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/crashing-prices-expose-bitcoin-mining-industrys-addiction-to-leverage/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">plummeting</a> over the past few months — Archer deems the sector primed for explosive growth.  



“When we started in October last year — we had a roadmap, but the NFT space has moved so quickly and things don’t always go as planned,” Archer said. “It’s a tougher market right now, and a lot of projects have come and gone, so it’s important to stay very aware that the project is a utility rich environment for people to seek real value — that will differentiate it from other projects.”



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Woman-powered Web3 Startup Gives NFT Holders Hollywood Access

<div id="highlights-block_62a354b1c8f4d" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Companies with a woman in the founding team made up only 17.7% of venture-backed Blockchain startups</li>
 <li>Women make up only 26% of cryptoasset investors</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



There is a gender diversity problem in the crypto space. <a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5a7f13828a02c7e2df8e6c68/t/5e00f58ccf118b46b6fbd32c/1577121230490/The+State+of+Diversity+and+Inclusion+in+Blockchain.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Studies</a> have shown that between 2012 and 2018, teams with a woman among the founders made up only 17.7% of venture-backed crypto and Blockchain companies. This number dropped to 8.2% when looking at all-women founding teams.



Women are also less likely than men to invest in cryptocurrencies. Gemini’s <a href="https://www.gemini.com/gemini-2021-state-of-crypto-us.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">2021 State of US Crypto report</a> shows that women make up only 26% of the investors in the space.&nbsp;



“Women tend to be more cautious when it comes to investing,” Jaclyn Strul, the chief financial officer at Xchange Monster, told Blockworks. “I like to understand risk and the technology behind things and in such a volatile industry and market, that critical thinking ensures that I make the right decisions and investments at the right time.”



The crypto space was also born from two traditionally very male-dominated industries: finance and technology. A 2021 <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/financial-services/our-insights/closing-the-gender-and-race-gaps-in-north-american-financial-services" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">McKinsey study</a> showed that 64% of financial services C-suite executives are white men, and 23% of them are white women. The gap is significant also in the technology space, with data showing that only <a href="https://dataprot.net/statistics/women-in-tech-statistics/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">24%</a> of computing jobs are held by women.&nbsp;



This gap has been present for decades, Strul said. “PC usage in the ‘80s was definitely male-dominated for the first ten years before women became comfortable and again, the internet in the early ‘90s was also male-dominated until the 2000s before women began using the internet.”



<h3 class="wp-block-heading">Moving forward</h3>



Not long ago, women were <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/us-money-blog/2014/aug/11/women-rights-money-timeline-history" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">legally prevented</a> from managing their own finances; it wasn’t until the mid-1970s in the US that women first gained the right to open a bank account.&nbsp;



Although we are slowly making progress towards gender equality, that goal <a href="https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/compensation/pages/gender-pay-gap-improvement-slowed-during-the-pandemic.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">remains far off</a>.&nbsp;



“Crypto is a fairly new industry, and it is still highly technical,” Lily Hu, a lead engineer at 57Blocks, told Blockworks. “I think as the industry matures, we will see more women and minorities participating in the space.”



Hu echoed Strul’s opinion on women being more risk-averse than men, stating that “typically men are more exploratory in spirit while women are relatively conservative when it comes to taking big career risks. However, I see that changing as more and more women are becoming leaders in their field.”



She also believed that in addition to being in a space that is constantly changing and adapting, the crypto industry is full of new concepts and ideas different from traditional technology and finance.&nbsp;



“As someone whose background has been in traditional software development for many years, I had to endure a lot of cognitive changes to understand the new [blockchain] concepts,’ Hu said.&nbsp;



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“You also have to participate in crypto to fully understand it.”</blockquote>



Although the demographics in crypto still skew male today, it needn’t imply that women are not interested in the space. In fact, the same <a href="https://www.gemini.com/gemini-2021-state-of-crypto-us.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Gemini report</a> revealed that 53% of crypto-curious people are women.&nbsp;



For many women interested in learning more about crypto and looking for opportunities to work in the field, Strul suggests to “be confident in your craft.”



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“You don’t have to be a software engineer to be a woman in tech. There are many opportunities for accountants and even if you’re in marketing. It doesn’t matter what your role is. You just need your own craft, and you need to believe in your abilities.”</blockquote>



The first cryptocurrency, bitcoin, was designed to <a href="https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/training/annual-national-training-seminar/2018/Emerging_Tech_Bitcoin_Crypto.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">encourage financial equity</a>. It was created so that online payments could be directly sent from one party to another without relying on a financial institution. The modern Web3 movement is meritocratic, optimistic and forward-looking. But as an industry, we should remain vigilant about where we’re falling short.



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Crypto Has a Gender Diversity Problem, Let’s Talk About It

Morgan Chittum

<div id="highlights-block_62290d7f93f65" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>Metaverse startup The Sandbox will give $25 million to the World of Women Foundation over the next five years</li>
 <li>“It was [International Women’s Day] yesterday, and there were several panels and exhibitions for women, yes…But most of them featured exclusively white women,” Yinkore, a Nigerian-based NFT artist, told Blockworks</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



As Women’s History Month comes into full swing, women founders in cryptocurrency are extolling gains toward inclusion — but say the industry has a ways to go when it comes to women of color. 



The statistics are jarring. Just 69 of the 1,229 US-based crypto companies have one or more women founders, per <a href="https://www.rovva.com/en-us/blog/growing/the-crypto-world-in-numbers" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Rovva data</a>. Only 29% of NFT artists are women, <a href="https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/03/08/men-still-own-the-world-and-its-not-cute-nft-projects-and-daos-lead-the-way-during-womens-history-month" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according to</a> artificial intelligence firm Limna. Data from the Kapor Center and Digital Undivided show women of color founders make up 4% of tech startups.



There are outliers, including BlockFi and Bakkt, both founded in part by women. Each has raised over half a billion dollars.&nbsp;



“Web3 will flourish if it’s built with diversity in mind,” Maya Miller, chief people officer at Blockchain.com, said in a statement. “Industries that are represented with diversity of thought, experience, ethnicity and gender reflect their ecosystems and users most accurately.”



But the booming business of digital collectibles has not always been built with diversity in mind, industry participants say.



Yinkore, a Nigeria-based NFT (non-fungible token) artist, told Blockworks she could “count on [her] fingers the names of Black women that are spotlighted” in crypto.



“It was [International Women’s Day] yesterday, and there were several panels and exhibitions for women, yes,” Yinkore said. “But most of them featured exclusively white women.”



Though scores of Web3 startups claim to support women, it’s predominantly white ones, according to NFT artist Oghenetega Akpomedaye.



“The change this year was significant as lots of women were supported, but I’ll say Black women, queer women and non-binary people are still looked down on in the space,” Akpomedaye told Blockworks. “We [have] yet to see how much change has been made in the community. But based on what I saw yesterday, I’d say they still have a long way to go in supporting more Black women in [this] space. Hopefully, it’ll get better going forward.”



The number of all startups founded by Black women — not just crypto companies — increased 2.5 times from 2016 to 2018, according to the most recent data available. And funds collectively raised by Black women founders rose from $50 million to nearly $250 million from 2016 to 2017.



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>OpenSea hosted an NFT <a href="https://opensea.io/collection/unstoppable-wow3" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">auction</a> Tuesday. Funds will go to Girls in Tech, which bills itself as a “nonprofit focused on educating and training the next generation of women leaders.”</li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>The Sandbox, a metaverse game, will give $25 million to the World of Women Foundation over the next five years. The foundation was created in partnership with World of Women — creators of the NFT collection WoW.</li></ul>



The initiative “signals [the] intent to invest long term in shaping a diverse and inclusive space for women,” according to a statement from The Sandbox co-founder Sebastien Borget.



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>Worldwide Asset eXchange (WAX) celebrated the month by hosting a series of Twitter Spaces featuring women in Web3. The startup announced a women’s group focused on blockchain, which will hold virtual meetings throughout the year.</li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-list"><li>Unstoppable Domains, a blockchain domain provider, said it will donate $10 million of free domains to International Women’s Day event attendees throughout the year. The company is partnering with 65 organizations, including Google Cloud and Deloitte.</li></ul>



Jassy Jackson, vice president of operations at the NFT blockchain WAX, said many diversity initiatives can “lose steam or must pivot to adjust to the industry’s needs,” but “this in particular is not exclusive to the blockchain or crypto space.”



“This is an ongoing conversation that needs to be happening across all industries,” Jackson said. “It’s an initiative that gives women the opportunity to express, create and be authentic about how they are perceived, treated and more importantly integrated into male-dominated companies.”



Participation seems to be steadily increasing, however. CoinMarketCap <a href="https://files.coinmarketcap.com/static/marketing/according-to-coinmarketcap-2020-q1.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">data</a> indicated the number of female crypto investors increased by 43.24% from 2019 to 2020.



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