Wooing Women Talent, Companies trying hard to build leadership pipeline

Shalini (name changed), an extremely talented woman, had joined an MNC after completion of engineering from a premier institute in India. She was happy with her job and growth. The company recognized her talent on several occasions. Everything was going fine until her parents finalised her marriage. She had to leave her job because of new responsibilities that included taking care of her husband and in-laws.

Shalini isn't alone. Many other girls exit workforce as they have to choose between family and career, and in the majority of cases, family takes precedence. 

‘Forty-eight per cent of Indian working women under the age of 30 take a break, 60 per cent in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) jobs take a break in the first 10 years of their career. These women often struggle to restart their career. When it comes to labour force participation of women, other Asian countries, for example Sri Lanka, do better than India,’ as per Dr. Saundarya Rajesh, Founder, AVTAR I-WIN, a leading Indian women professionals interface network.

According to PWC report, ‘Women are under-represented at every level in the corporate pipeline, with the gap becoming more pronounced at each level of seniority as just 19 per cent of woman is in C-suite positions. The maximum representation of women is at the entry-level position, where it stands at 46 per cent. In the manager level women constitute just 37 per cent of workforce, while for Senior Manager/Director level it reduces further to 33 per cent. For senior vice president it stood at 24 per cent and for C-suite it was at just 19 per cent.’

Different surveys essentially come up with the same story, only the ratios and the percentages differ slightly.

Sumita Datta, Head of PG-MPW and Women Leadership programme at SPJIMR designed to support women coming after the sabbatical said that in the most cases, the reasons are personal constraints and major life events like marriage and child birth. As per our societal norms, more responsibility is on the shoulder of women hence, they decide to take the break. 

Another angle of the story says,'Rising income levels and stability in families are disincentivising women from joining the labour force, according to Reassessing Patterns of Female Labour Force Participation in India, a March 2017 report by the World Bank, which analysed government data from 2004-05 to 2011-12.'

After they exit the workplace, women often face several challenges to make a comeback in their career. Getting a job at the same level and desired income becomes difficult, said experts.

This is an important issue for India’s economic development as India is now in the phase of “demographic dividend”, where the share of working-age people is particularly high, which can propel per capita growth rates through labour force participation, savings, and investment effects. But if women largely stay out of the labour force, this effect will be much weaker and India could run up labour shortages in key sectors of the economy. (Engendering Development Through Gender Equality in Rights, Resources, And Voice, World Bank).

According to the PWC report, ‘Winning the fight for female talent’, 71 per cent of employers who said they had adopted diversity practices said these were having a positive impact. Thirty-nine per cent said the practices had led to increased levels of female applicants, 32 per cent to increased levels of female graduate hires, 27 per cent to increased levels of female experienced hires, and 24 per cent to increased levels of external female leadership appointments.’

Some companies are helping women employees dip their toes into the workplace again. Campaigns such as IBM India's Bring her back, SAP India’s stay in touch Initiative, Genpact’s career2.0 launched in 2015 was one such successful campaigns where they attracted women candidates with sponsorship programmes, childcare facilities, stork parking, networking forum and flexible timings. Corporate majors such as IBM, SAP, Mahindra Satyam, Hindustan Unilever, Virtusa Corporation and many Tata companies have dedicated programmes to woo back these ‘second career’ women.

Shirin Salis, Vice-President – Human Resources , Ingersoll Rand in India said, 'From a development perspective, we have a Women’s Leadership Program run by our global enterprise which is a multi-month and a multi-format (online and classroom learning, coaching and mentoring, and action learning) learning journey that includes a wide range of resources and tools designed specifically to address the leadership needs of women. The program is designed to enhance the visibility of women leaders with senior management, deepen their leadership skills, clarify their ambitions and support them to realize their full potential.'

Rajkamal Vempati, HR Head, Axis Bank said,'Pipeline is leaking from middle school and high school, talent drain of women is persistent, only the numbers vary. We at bank motivates the fathers to take paternity leave to share the burden, there is a lactation room, on request transfer after marriage or transfer of husband. Our pipeline isn’t getting developed as in other countries leakage starts at middle level but in India, it starts at mid level only. We at Axis Bank motivate the fathers to take paternity leave to share burden, In addition to that, there is a lactation room and on request transfer policy after marriage. 

Niharika Bhardwaj, HR Head - Indiabulls Housing Finance said that, ‘Except the maternity leave, we are offering Mandatory Leave Policy where one has to take leave to spend time with the family and recharge herself. Women have the option to avail zero-interest two-wheeler loans so that they can be financially independent. 

A commitment to inclusive talent processes – underpinned and enabled by an inclusive talent culture, policies and programmes – will enable organisations to create a business model where all talent can prosper, including women. Because when the best talent rises to the top, everyone wins.Inclusive recruitment is not only the right thing to do: it’s the smart thing to do. But it will also be just the beginning of this journey for employers.