Induction And Growth Of Women In Tech

At DBS Tech India (DTI), we pride ourselves on building an environment where women can be the best version of themselves every day. We have steadily made progress in creating a balanced workforce. Women employees make up 32% of DTI’s talent pool and 49% of our workforce globally. As a technology organization, which was established less than a decade ago, a steady rise in our diversity numbers is an achievement and a testimony of the effectiveness of our talent strategy.

DBS Tech India embodies the DBS Group’s values wherein Gender Equality is one of our Sustainable Development Goals. DBS Group’s efforts in diversity have constantly been recognized globally, along with recognition under the Bloomberg Gender-Equality Index for 5 consecutive years.

Since its inception, DTI has been proactively building pipelines for female talent in technology – an area where women have conventionally been under-represented – through targeted hiring initiatives, including hackathons, coding challenges and campus outreach programs.

The talent induction process at DTI is robust and transparent. It is important for us to define the people processes objectively to ensure biases don’t creep in. While hiring, we use gender-neutral language in our JDs and have a diverse panel with an objective interview approach based on STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result based approach behavioural interview method) and PRIDE! (Our Values - Purpose-driven, Relationship Led, Innovation, Decisive & Everything Fun!).

All our development processes like learning, promotions, salary increments, etc. have a gender-neutral lens applied to ensure biases don’t percolate. We educate managers constantly through programs like ‘Building Great Managers’ which cover unconscious biases and how to tackle them.

The Diversity Council defines the diversity strategy to drive business outcomes. Our efforts on inculcating a diverse charter are largely guided by this three-pronged approach:

Conscious Acquisition: We have instituted several measures such as expanding candidate slates, creating parallel frameworks to explore alternative talent pools (returning mothers, second careers etc), a woman centric referral program, to acquire a diverse workforce as acquisition is a key lever of our diversity philosophy. Through our campus and internship programs, we have made a conscious effort to induct more young women technologists into our workforce.

Customized Development: Our integrated EEE (Education, Exposure, and Experience) talent development approach, creates an impactful learning environment. HiPo process integrates an exhaustive high-potential talent identification, development, and mentorship program. The structured platform of HerDBS offers women-specific developmental initiatives. My Persona program focuses on training women employees to be the leaders of tomorrow. Internal mobility and personal development programs accelerate career growth. A salary benchmarking study is conducted every year to check and reconfirm parity in salaries offered across genders and grades.

Continuous Engagement: A yearly engagement survey called “My Voice” is conducted to check the engagement levels of employees. The engagement of women employees is particularly tracked with action plans created at a department level. We have witnessed a steady increase in the engagement scores. We have also conducted several independent surveys and FGDs with female employees and expecting and new mothers to identify their pain points and design solutions accordingly.

Our structured Flexible Work Arrangement plan allows women to build their careers while pursuing their individual goals. It includes staggered hours, part-time work arrangement and sabbatical options.

Apart from the above, a focus on well-being & safety is manifested through support for physical and mental health, fitness, and medical expenditures. Employee Assistance Program offers a host of services to address issues concerning mental health in a confidential and safe space. Coffee with Counsellor sessions train managers to support their teams’ emotional health. A health management app drives awareness around an active, healthy lifestyle. Additionally, sessions are conducted regularly on topics like parenting, financial wellness for women, nutrition etc. Grievance Redressal Policy provides a channel for employees to communicate directly with senior management and 24 Response App which is an emergency safety service for immediate assistance even while commuting alone at late hours.

We have also extended our ethos to develop more women towards in the way we support our communities. We sponsor STEM education for young girls under our CSR program among other initiatives focused on holistic women development.

We believe that our success is bolstered by our diversity of experiences. As the technology arm of the bank, DBS Tech India is poised to play a critical role in building an equitable, accessible, and inclusive digital future for DBS.

(The above-authored article has been penned down by Mamata Vegunta, Exec. Dir & Head HR, DBS Tech India especially for BW People publication only.)