Women’s Day 2020: Knockdown Gender Stereotypes and Strive for Equality

As we all know, 8 March, is celebrated as International Women’s Day every year, to celebrate and recognize women from different backgrounds who are making a mark across diverse fields. While a lot has changed for women in India, there is still an imperative need to strive for gender equality and eliminate discrimination that women face just because they have added responsibilities at their households. Along the same lines, on the occasion of Women’s Day 2020, here is what women leaders have to say about the measures that need to be taken to improve the scenario for women:

Rose Tsou, Head of International and eCommerce, Verizon Media

Organizations have to support women when they really need help and in a way that is meaningful for them. It’s essential to create a work environment where women feel safe, trusted and empowered. It is not just about the skills and training that women in tech require professionally -- though that is important -- but about the critical support they may need at points in their career to balance work and family. It means trusting women and mentoring or empowering them to take on greater leadership responsibilities. Ultimately, it is about creating a work environment where women can bring their ‘whole self’ to work, not just their ‘work self,’ which maximizes their potential and contribution to an enterprise. Nurture an inclusive workplace, where differences are celebrated. Technology today touches every part of our lives. When you think of how to apply technology to solve existing problems or tap new opportunities, you need different perspectives, skills and viewpoints at the table. This can only come from a more diverse workforce, where employees are celebrated in the work environment for how different they are.

Neha Bagaria, founder and CEO, JobsForHer

This is a call for equality that has been brought to light over the past couple of decades. The magnitude of the problem in corporate India has opened the doors to a dialogue on processes to increase the participation of women in the workplace across levels and verticals. Working women and men deserve to be treated equally and with dignity. Diversity and inclusion will be the call to action for India Inc. for the next decade and increase the number of women in leadership roles.

Regardless of the size of the company, the importance of diversity and inclusion in the workplace has been recognised and accepted by corporate India. This has led to greater investments in increasing the percentage of women with buy-in from top management — an important step towards achieving gender parity at all levels of an organisation.

Training and sensitisation are important measures that companies should invest in to enable their employees — both men and women — to understand biases and the importance of having more women in the workplace.

Bindu Surendran, Senior Principal, Delivery Management, Sabre GDC, Bengaluru

From resisting social expectations to adopting a new culture, women today are faced with many challenges. Great work is not enough for women, just need to focus on the work you do and believe in yourself and on the way to your success help others, investing in learning and development for yourself and for others. Be open to criticism and make the effort to get better and stronger.

Puja Punj, Co-Founder, GyFTR -Vouchagram

My entrepreneurial journey has been really overwhelming with a family and a kid to care for back at home. When it comes to women entrepreneurs, there is always a question of priority in their life and it is always assumed that it’s difficult to manage both. The Mantra I follow to keep up the work-life balance is to unplug myself from the certain things that can be managed without my attention be it at home or office. It always gives a sense of responsibility and accountability to the other person. I always make sure to keep some time of the day for myself to plan and analyze the work in the direction of my goals. I believe in excelling at work through delegating the tasks to people as per their strengths which would not lead to good results but also done with all positive energies on time. To work with the team of XX people, the key to motivating them is the self - motivation and letting go of perfection to a certain extent to keep up the spirits high.

Meenal Arora, Founder Director, Shemford Group of Futuristic Schools

In my opinion, besides being a human right, gender equality is imperative for women to realise their self-worth, take control of their decisions and fill the gap to access equal opportunities and resources as men. The impacts of this parity are far beyond a particular section of the society, it sways the nation as a whole. Empowering women and giving them equal standing is the need of the hour to pull off sustainable development and economic upswing. Despite these facts, no nation in the world has been able to attain 100 percent gender-equality. We constitute half of the total world’s population but our contribution to the overall wealth of the world is negligible. Our battle against gender-bias is not for letting us read and write, neither it is for the equal pay and opportunities, it is for what we deserve - the equal respect, rights and stature in the society. It’s high time, we overcame the major roadblocks – the fallacies and the attitudes people hold against gender equality. The seeds of gender awareness need to be sown right from the young age of children that will make them responsible citizens with a mindset to create a nation free from discrimination. I, being an educator am committed to giving my students a childhood devoid of gender-bias and a meaningful start in that direction. As a woman, I stand strong with the empowerment of women and hence offer equal opportunities to women employees in my organisation.

Shikha Pillai, Head of Strategy, Siemens Healthineers

Women bring a unique energy and perspective to leadership and therefore it's imperative to focus on inclusion and balance in organizations. The playing field needs to be leveled to enable Each For Equal. That said, it is heartening to see that there are many more opportunities for us today and women role models are spearheading change in various fields. Each woman who carves a path for other women is transforming our world for the better.

Neha Kaul, Marketing and Brand Head, Shine.com

With organizations becoming more serious about cultivating diversity, the trend of building women-friendly policies and programs is becoming more mainstream. With the shortage of skills in the tech sector, tech firms are leading the way in incentivizing women to re-join the workforce. This includes programs to support women with young children, flexible work options, and technology-enabled systems to help women navigate their careers while balancing their role as the primary caregiver for children. The need for skilled talent may just be the opportunity we need to finally usher in a meaningful change in the long struggle for gender equality. It will drive companies to move more women into good jobs, keep them in the workforce and bring back those who have left as it will make more business sense than recruiting new talent and training them from scratch.

Dipali Mathur, CEO and CO-Founder, Super Smelly

I am raising a GenZ daughter and as I step out of the house each day to go to work, I do that with a dream in my eyes that my little girl and many more little girls are watching me march to work knowing that working Women are normal. They watch me being ambitious, they watch me voicing my opinion, they watch me looking after myself by exercising every day and eating nutritious food, they watch me questioning traditional patriarchal conventions, they watch my quest for equality in more ways than one and would know that it is not an aberration to do all this, but it is normal. I grew up watching my mom sacrificing her career, only looking after her children and in-laws and often ignoring her own health and nutrition, never resting. I knew I had to be a part of the change called I am Generation equality to ensure the generation after me inherits an equal world.

Aarti Saxena, Associate Director- Innovation and Strategy, Xebia Technologies

My understanding of equality is that everyone regardless of their gender should have access to the same opportunities. There shouldn’t be predefined roles that men are supposed to do one thing and women are supposed to do the other. In spite of the developments that we’ve gone through over the years, our country still remains largely patriarchal. Boys and girls aren’t exposed to the same opportunities. They are treated differently, ever since they are little children. In fact, it is much different in almost all countries of the world. Even in developing as well as developed countries, gender disparity in the workforce is a big concern. Moreover, in many working spaces, women often are paid less for the same work that men are paid handsomely for. Due to certain societal norms, girls are often deprived of education. This handicaps their ability to earn for themselves and forces them to stay dependent on men for their livelihood.

Even the expected age of marriage in our society isn’t the same for men and women. While men continue to pursue their career goals up to their mid-thirties without being bothered about marriage, girls, as soon as they enter their twenties, are treated as a burden and coerced into getting married. The problem might not be as visible in the metro cities, but it is quite prominent in the rural parts of the country.

By marginalizing the rights of women, we deny ourselves the opportunity to lift millions of men, women and children out of poverty, not to mention the chance of a just and fair world. These kinds of social norms that prefer one gender over the other need to be examined and then changed to establish a prosperous society.