I was asked by Archives of IT to look at the formative years of 20 high achievers in the Tech industries from their archive of oral history, and to draw conclusions as to the factors which contributed towards their success. Analysing the data led me to the conclusion that achieving success in the UK IT and STEM industry is down to drive and ambition, with the background and social class of their parents being irrelevant. Their own education, along with the support and encouragement of their parents seems to be a substantial factor in achieving success. The vast majority of the sample implied that their family was encouraging of their education, thus adding to the idea that a supportive and happy family makes for a successful job and life. Many of the sample faced difficulties in their childhood such as extreme poverty or death of a parent, however this did not preclude them from achieving greatness. It could be argued that the challenged they suffered in early life were to become motivators in encouraging them to achieve. Negatives can be turned into positives, and obstacles are there to learn from and overcome. Archives of IT are doing valuable work in encouraging future STEM and IT talents to pursue their dreams, irrespective of where they come from.
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A historian’s perspective of post war Britain
The information technology revolution in Britain is one of the most important, but understudied, aspects of post-Second World War history. It has fundamentally altered the way we live, the way we work, how we behave, and how we socialise with one another. Studying the people who were at the forefront of driving this revolution is itself enormously revealing about the last eight decades of British life.
Those behind the development of IT were drawn from a range of backgrounds: gender, class, family occupation, and ethnicity. It is a gateway into understanding the fabric of the country’s social and cultural history. Unlike so many aspects of public life, the business world, law, politics and academia in this period, which remained stubbornly connected to an established group of more middle-class individuals, IT was very different. Its newness, and the fresh-thinking and talent it required, meant it drew in people whose fundamental qualities were intelligence and innovation – something not related to social class.
This article will concentrate on individuals from the archive, mostly between the mid-1930s and early 1950s, focusing on their backgrounds, upbringings, family lives and schooling. We will ask what the collection can tell both historians, and the public more broadly, about the family unit in this period, about occupation and class, and about the role schooling and an education system that has now changed out of all recognition. It will discuss the broader nature of wartime and post-war Britain that was part of shaping this group of men. And they were almost exclusively men, which will also be the subject of comment.
