Let It Go by Dame Stephanie Shirley After leaving school Shirley decided not to go to university but instead to go straight into the world of work. In the 195

Let It Go by Dame Stephanie Shirley After leaving school Shirley decided not to go to university but instead to go straight into the world of work. In the 1950s she worked at the Post Office Research Station at Dollis Hill building computers from scratch and writing code. She studied at evening classes for six years to obtain a Mathematics degree. In 1959 she moved to CDL Ltd, manufacturers of the ICT 1301 computer. In 1962, Shirley founded, with a capital of £6, the software company F.I. Group (Freelance Programmers), (later Xansa, since acquired by Steria and now part of the Sogat Group). She was concerned with creating work opportunities for women with dependants, and predominantly employed women, with only 3 out of 300-odd programmers being male, until the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 made that practice illegal. She adopted the name "Steve" to help her in the male-dominated business world. Her team's projects included programming Concorde's black box flight recorder