A wise person once said, “The only time you should ever look back is to see how far you’ve come.” While true, great value can also be gained in taking a moment to stop and look around, to not only celebrate how far you’ve come, but to see how much further you have to go.

As an engineer at the Port of Los Angeles (Port) Construction Division and as president of the WTS-Los Angeles chapter, I am afforded great opportunity to see how far women have advanced in the traditionally male-bastion of transportation. More women lead, create, analyze, operate, and transform transportation projects than ever before. And as a woman and a woman of color, I know firsthand what it is like. When I first started out, many times I was the only woman in a conference room or set of cubicles. But in terms of gender parity, the transportation industry has greatly improved. However, I have noticed something of late, a change that’s adjacent to transportation that I find most interesting and heartening.

At the Port, I have had the great fortune of working in an environment that truly prizes excellence without regard to gender. Several women have led the Port throughout the years and women and minorities continue to hold positions at every level from top to bottom. But I have still had occasion to meet glass-ceiling breakers. And it got me to thinking about women in construction. While we’ve made great strides from the transportation boardroom to the bus driver’s seat, what about construction? Personally, I met the first woman superintendent of my 20-year career. She led an LAX project tour that we hosted through WTS-LA last year. In addition, my Port team also worked on a project with a woman contractor project manager and we’ve worked on projects with majority women engineering design teams.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, women now represent approximately 12% of the construction workforce. That means that more than one million women hold various roles in construction. Nearly half of them (44%) work in professional and management roles and 37% in defined leadership roles. That’s no accident, as studies show that diverse groups that include gender diversity make better decisions more than 87% of the time and deliver 60% better results, as compared to more homogenous groups. For context, look back to 1965, when the number of women in construction topped out at 200,000. Of course, there are still some areas that need work.

A significant number of construction jobs women hold still focus on office or administrative work. Though that is changing as well. In fact, the greatest uptick women earned in construction jobs centered on construction managers and frontline supervisors. Close behind those roles were carpenters and electricians.

According to a report by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, “Women of all racial and ethnic backgrounds are underrepresented in these occupations. Too many women, particularly women of color, face discrimination in hiring and employment and experience sexual harassment and gender or racial bias on the job. Women are less likely to be retained on core crews, promoted to field leadership positions, or to receive the same on-the-job technical training as men. Such adverse conditions mean that women are less likely to complete their apprenticeships than men and are more likely to leave the industry.”

On that note, what advice do I have for other women in transportation and construction fields, or those looking to enter? Recently, a colleague considering career advancement felt hesitant to take on a new role very different than her current one. She didn’t trust that she was ready. So, I shared with her what I learned from my experience as a transportation construction professional. By doing the day-to-day work and solving problems on large complex multi-million dollar projects, we prepare ourselves for our next promotional opportunities. We may not always know we are ready for the next step, but once we are in the role, we will learn and grow into the position. Trust yourself that you are qualified and ready for that next step and look to those around you that are cheering you on and ready to support you in your new role.

Clearly, work remains to be done. But we also find much to celebrate. Progress continues to be made and the number of women in construction continues to grow. So, even in professions as entrenched and difficult to diversify as construction, women continue to make great strides. But there really is only one way to know that. In addition to looking back to see how far we’ve come, it’s vitally important to look around and see where we are, so that we know how far we’ve come and how much further we must go.