49ers Coach Katie Sowers Reveals a Team Said It Wasn't Ready for Female Coach

One unnamed NFL executive told San Francisco 49ers assistant coach Katie Sowers his team wasn't prepared to hire a woman on its coaching staff.

In an interview on FS1's Fair Game with Kristine Leahy (h/t USA Today's Scott Gleeson), Sowers explained what happened during the interview with the executive: 

"They felt the 49ers, because they knew how it was to have a woman on staff, that it'd be a better fit for me — that their organization was not yet ready to have a woman on staff. 

"(The unnamed team executive) went on to say that one of the coaches came up to him and said, 'Where are we going to put her desk? He said, 'Where we put everyone else's desk.' But that was another indicator to him that this organization is far from being ready."

She also said she "hated hearing that, but I loved the honesty" because it showed the executive "understood the [foundation of ignorance]" within the organization. 

Sowers became the second woman, after Kathryn Smith of the Buffalo Bills, to be hired to a full-time coaching position with an NFL team when she joined head coach Kyle Shanahan's staff in San Francisco in 2017. 

Prior to joining San Francisco, Sowers worked as a scouting intern for the Atlanta Falcons in 2016. 

The 49ers promoted Sowers to an offensive assistant for the 2019 season.