The Non-Negotiable Strengths Women Leaders Bring To The Table

Shweta Mohanty, the Vice President and Head of HR at SAP in India, was recently recognised as the Woman Leader of the Year at the BW People HR Excellence Awards 2024. In an exclusive interview, she shares her journey, challenges and the strategies that have shaped her illustrious career in human resources. Her insights reflect her commitment to fostering an inclusive workplace, driving impactful HR initiatives and empowering the next generation of women leaders.

As a woman in a leadership position, what challenges have you faced in your career, and how have you navigated them?

I think the path to leadership is strewn with career defining inflection points. How one responds to them, ultimately defines the leadership journey. I have always been someone who ‘wanted it all and believed that I ’can have it all'. Being a young mother navigating the early career without caregiving support was very difficult. Later in my career, building my brand, upskilling on key leadership competencies like business acumen, strategic insights, raising hands for difficult projects, gaining the trust of leaders, leaning on mentors, finding sponsors who would bet on me, each stage presented its unique challenges & opportunities. I have made a conscious decision to slow down and accelerate at different times during my career. Keeping a learner’s mindset has always helped me to stay grounded and approach every situation with a problem-solving mindset. Giving up was never an option for me.

What key factors do you believe led to this recognition?

It is a great validation of the work that we have been able to spearhead and the leadership ethos that I stand for. This recognition belongs to the 15K+ employees of SAP in India and is testament to the people focused culture that we have succeeded in creating in SAP in India. I have always believed in keeping the interests & welfare of people front & center to the business strategy, in challenging status-quo and bringing a solution-oriented in approach to everything that touches our workforce. I am glad that our initiatives have been a market-leading, creating industry benchmarks and makes our employer brand even stronger.

Can you highlight some of the impactful HR initiatives you have spearheaded that contributed to your organisation's success?

I am a big believer that organisations and HR function always have an opportunity to evolve and improve. This could be a natural change based on the changes in the technology, industry, economic situations and employee needs, or could be a strategic change based on the organisation’s directions and goals.  Some of the work that I would like to highlight are:

Yellow Circle: The importance of mental well-being at work has taken center stage in the post-COVID era, as the pandemic drastically altered how we work and live. There has been an increased cases of stress, burnout and isolation among employees. Prioritising mental health was essential for maintaining productivity, engagement and overall job satisfaction. We launched a programme called Yellow Circle to destigmatise mental well-being at work through community conversations, daily check-ins on how one feels during the day through an app and set up mental health allies to support employees who need to talk to someone.

Leadership Learning: Leaders need to be role models and coaches. As organisations are going through heavy tech transformations, we need leaders who can talk Tech, be Thought Leaders and showcase resilience to changes. The ELIXIR programme was designed to upskills our people leaders to be on a continuous learning journey on latest technologies and develop thought leadership on product, market and customer strategies.

I’m also proud of the Tech HR approach taken by my People & Culture (P&C) team in India in the past 2 years. Some of the examples are Metaverse onboarding, Employee Navigator app to see all employee benefits in one app and GenAI and chatbot implementation in payroll processes, to name a few.

People initiatives fall short if we do not have leadership collaboration. Each of the programmes that we have designed are co-created by the P&C team and business. This helps HR to be relevant and innovative.

How do you promote diversity and inclusion within your organisation, and what strategies have proven most effective?

An inclusion strategy needs be multi-pronged and multi-directional. Some of the strategies that have proven effective are:

Leadership accountability - ensuring that diversity and inclusion are priorities committed from the top down is crucial. Being visible and vocal about our commitment to D&I plays a huge part in nurturing an inclusive culture and results in more actions and allyship to meet the commitment.

Representation matters– Visible representation from minority groups in key positions fosters inclusion in teams. Some of the practices that we follow for Inclusive hiring practices are bias-free candidate screening, diverse candidate pools and interview panels, and fair interview processes to ensure that we provide the tools to the managers to hire the best candidates.

Trainings and workshops– Ongoing trainings and workshops on inclusions are a reminder for us to pause and reflect on our biases and inculcate practices to be inclusive in our daily work. These workshops also help leaders and employees understand the importance of diversity and how to foster an inclusive environment.

Employee resource groups– Grassroot level involvement of employees creates a sense of belongingness in the organisation. ERGs bring together people with similar interests and experiences to share their perspectives through community meet ups, listening circles and identifying opportunities for betterment of policies and programmes in the organisation.

Diversity dashboards– Having KPIs and regular reviews in D&I can help us to monitor progress and inch towards the goals set for the year. In addition, including questions on feeling of equal opportunity and inclusion at a team level through annual people surveys strengthens the focus on D&I at team and managerial level.

I have personally stepped into conversations when I see equity and ethical practices are deviated. I encourage everyone to beat the bystander effect and be a vocal ally, even if someone is being non-inclusive to others and not directly at you. We can continue our progress in inclusion only when we mindfully practice identifying unconscious biases and respect each other as a human irrespective of our cultural, religious, racial or gender identities.

What advice would you give to other women aspiring to reach leadership roles in HR or other fields?

I want to remind every woman aspiring for a leadership role to be courageous. The strengths that women bring to the leadership like effective communication, power of empathy and collaborative teamwork are unique and non-negotiables in the current business environment. Being aware of own strengths and areas of improvement are crucial. Sustaining a long enriching career takes hard work, having a growth mindset, being comfortable with change and being open to experiences are fundamental.

My advice to women seeking leadership roles is to seek a mentor, seek experiences outside their domain and break mental barriers. I would also like to highlight the importance of ‘self-care’ and ‘discipline’ even in small things such as what time you eat, bedtime and engaging in some form of exercises etc. If you have to take care of your team and your organisation, you need to start with self.