Catalyst Blog

By Ilene H. Lang, Deborah Gillis and Deepali Bagati

Earlier this month, we met with CEOs of Indian companies to discuss the importance of expanding opportunities for women and business in India Inc. Women currently make up 36 percent of the Indian labor force, yet 67 percent of Indian employers are struggling to fill jobs. One solution to this talent crunch: educated and ambitious Indian women.

CEOs across Mumbai, Delhi, and Bangalore shared with us inspiring, and effective, ways in which they’re shifting their organizations’ cultures to ensure that all talent is valued. One CEO talked about “leading by example.” He has taken action and asked each member of his leadership team to mentor three women, while he personally mentors five!

Another CEO talked about consciously changing the way he viewed women—namely, by thinking of them as natural leaders. Once he started from the assumption that women were born to lead, it helped him to confront and shatter biases and stereotypes about women that he grew up with.

Finally, a CEO talked about changing the default question at his company, so that when women are considering a new role with bigger responsibility, they are not asked, “why would you want to do this job,” but instead, “why wouldn’t you want to do this job?”

Actions like these are clearing a path for the success of talented, and ambitious, Indian women. Gender gaps exist in India, but we’ve discovered on this trip that many companies understand how women can fuel India Inc. And they are acting on it—an inspiring model for senior leaders in India, and around the world.

What is India Inc.? For me, it’s not just India’s booming business sector. It’s also a phrase suggesting tremendous opportunity for Indian women and business.

India is undergoing explosive GDP growth—and a skilled labor shortage to match. Yet amid this tremendous thirst for talent, deep gender gaps persist. Women represent only 36% of the labor force—less than half that of men—and only 3% to 6% of senior management.

To mark the launch of our new report, Leadership Gap in India Inc., I’ve asked our Senior Advisor in India, Deepali Bagati, to write about what’s at stake in this emerging market. Women, she says, are core to India Inc.’s sustainable growth.

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Deepali Bagati writes:

India Inc.—the land of opportunities, relationships and contradictions—is a place where organizations find themselves thriving on growth and innovation, but also challenged by the talent crunch: finding and keeping top talent. Organizations are hiring aggressively, and employees are jumping ship even more aggressively especially at the skilled/managerial level. Culturally, the importance of relationships cannot be emphasized enough, and “who you know” continues to be critical in getting close to the ladder, let alone moving up the ladder.

Although women continue to be bogged down with familial and societal stereotypes about their roles and abilities, the burgeoning middle class, intense consumerism and a thirst for upward mobility in urban India is opening doors for women. In rural India, a million plus women are functioning as grassroots leaders in the Panchayati Raj Institutions, and rural India has already been anointed as the unexplored and untapped market with unprecedented opportunities.  

The India story is no longer about whether this is a growth play, but more about maximizing and accelerating this growth by leveraging female talent. A unique window of opportunity beckons the key stakeholders and decision-makers—the majority of who are still male—to set in motion processes and programs that bring more women into the workforce and create an agile and inclusive workplace.   (more…)