Diversity & Inclusion : Striking the Right Chord

The need for human resource as well as social responsibility will see

organizations reaching out to the larger, yet untapped communities; Dataquests

roundtable, on the sidelines of Nasscoms Diversity & Inclusion Summit, had

industry experts deliberating on the issue

D Q: Is the corporate focus on under privileged more of a CSR,

nice-to-do or are hard metrics and goals attached to this as well?

SC: When you start off its best not to put a number behind it. Its

basically do the right things, make the meter move and then probably put

metrics, audits, etc, around it. We are first trying to figure out which are the

places which are economically, socially, educationally backward, and how we can

ensure employability there. The focus is not hence employment in the

organization; if there is, great.

PS: For every organization that is looking at diversity as something

that is critical, it is a journey. You look at different talent segments and you

invest in them for different reasons and for different goals. And at the end of

the day every organization has a responsibility to ensure that the community is

a better place, people in that community are getting the chance to be

employable, but I dont think the journey starts at the same pace for every

segment. With women it is easier because they are already educated, they already

have the skills that you are looking for; for other segments which dont have as

many advantages it will take time to evolve. The trick is for organizations to

stay committed through every stage of that journey. As organizations if we only

look at employability into our companies or our communities we wont accomplish

the goal of making the whole community a better place so we have to invest early

on, and maybe approach the segments that are more mature with a different

proposition as to what value they can add to our organization.

HR: One area where these companies are really working well is the area

of community initiatives or corporate social initiative. They are identifying

young talent and saying heres the opportunity to take off time, ie, in the form

of sabbatical or reduced salaries and then work with organizations of their

choice, which are working with the underprivileged. If corporates can do that

not just from an employability perspective but also to develop their leaders

because if you do that you show the community that you are committed to it and

get role models within the organization.

KM: When they join, the focus is on how you enable them to really

become equal because some people might be excellent technical people but might

lack in communications, which is key as you grow higher. Thus equalizing becomes

very important, otherwise this diversity can become a disadvantage.

We bring in little kids and let them hang around he campus. Then theres K12

which is more focused on women, where we talk to young girls. We talk about how

it is to work, and develop their interest in science and technology. Then at a

higher level we run the iexcite camps. We select schools which dont have all

the benefits of technology and we get them together for a week at the campus. We

have role models going and conducting experiments with them. Even where there

are differences when they start off, when they get off you can see the

equalizer.

RK: I have the other perspective. I have moved out of IT proper and

set up a company only for this. Laksh works on employability. The kids that I

am training, I want them to get jobs in various industries. We are focused on

tier-2, -3 cities. We work with unemployed youth and also with college youth.

The aspirations are high. If you ask them they all want to work in IT or similar

segments. The challenge is that theyve all studied in vernacular medium. Their

exposure is very limited. It is not just the skill, it is also what they want to

dowhich kind of job they want, where will they fit in, are they willing to

migrate and come to cities. I know there are 100 positions in Wipro BPO so Im

trying to excite the Mangalore kids to take up those jobs but they tell me,

"Madam you tell us if it is in Mangalore" So I have a skew: where the jobs are

available versus where the population is. Then there is the challenge of under

employmenta person who can easily get a 8k job is earning some 2k or 3k

somewhere, and is not investing in the skill upgradation that is required for

the next level. Exposure is very very important. This is where I would like to

work with the corporates.

PS: I think in organizations you need to have managers, who understand

and appreciate what that segment brings to the table. I think the best way to do

that is through programs that Hema was mentioning. We have something called the

Accenture development partnerships where we have relationships with other

non-government organizations. We encourage our employees to go on assignments,

what it does is expose these disadvantaged communities to what corporates are

looking forand the dialog starts. Also, people who are disadvantaged start

seeing what is expected of them, they start stepping up. You need to invest in

these interventions, you need to make those connects happen, to actually to

reach a tipping point where you impact large scale.

SI: According to Nasscom if we continue doing the kind of business

that we are doing, by the year 2020 we will see business of $220 bn. And to

service that kind of business the kind of human talent we need is mind-boggling,

and extremely challenging. Every corporate today realizes that it has to go

beyond the top tier universities and colleges to recruit and continue to grow.

Very clearly there is recognition that we need to move out into the larger

communities. And we have the advantage of the human dividend. There is

recognition that we need to build an ecosystem which the market will prosper,

which is very important also for a company to survive. The provision for finding

ways to engage in this has been created.

HR: From a purely pragmatic and practical perspective, the demographic

dividend that Sucharita talked about, if we dont address, this very issue of

bringing in the disenfranchised, into the mainstream, this demographic dividend

will become a demographic disaster. We are talking about two Indias here, while

there is dualism which is inherent in our culture, like tectonic plates these

two Indias easily spark off. So there is no way that we can afford to ignore

this.

SI: Twenty years ago there was this discourse that population is

Indias biggest problem, today we are seeing it as a demographic dividend.

Clearly if that dividend is not invested in, twenty years on well again be

talking about carrying that burden.

DQ: Vishal, youre sitting on the demographic dividend. How do you see the

corporates reaching out to your programs?

VT: Coming from the other side, while we see a lot of corporates

engage in the concept of CSR, as Prithvi pointed out, the concept is still very

nascent. We are reaching out to about 2,000 odd urban slum kids, with the

average age group of sixteen years. One big challenge is to get them to come to

you. There is an entire ecosystem working against usthere is family pressure,

peer pressure to get to work and start earning the Rs 2k immediately, not really

looking long term. The industry has also not reached the stage of a dialog,

saying that if I have a tenth, twelfth grade pass, what kind of skills do I

build in them. We are not talking about technical skills, but skills to actually

stay in a job: life-coping skills. Inspite of what technical skills you have,

for a person coming from an underprivileged background, coming into the

mainstream is actually very disempowering. So you see them working in places

like pizza huts, CCDs but in 6-8 months they are back on the streets. So we want

to build in them life-skills while they are studying. Between the 16-18 age

group is when we start loosing most of our kids. Weve just started to get them

engaged in life-skill modulescommunication skills, money management, exposure

to higher education programs. First give them that knowledge then tie up with

industries, especially industries which can give them career growth.

RK: Taking it from Vishal, we also saw that building unemployed youth

is very difficult, they are already very demotivated, its much better to start

training when they are still studying.

PS: It all depends on how inclusion and diversity is accepted as the

way for the future of the organization. Unfortunately, historically,

organizations tend to believe that when you come in you need to be a certain

way. And we have to unlearn this. You dont want to have a cookie-cutter

attitude. If you want to grow you need to address both marketsthe urban

educated middle-class as well as people at the bottom of the pyramid.

Organizations need to bring these people in, work with them, learn from them as

to what they need as consumers as well. The business case is very positive for

organizations to create that diversity. But it is very dangerous to try and

accelerate that too fast because that will put sustainability at risk.

SI: Corporates have pretty much accepted that gender inclusivity is a

business imperative, they have some pretty good practices and policies in place,

and we are going to see the results of that in a few years from now. They are

just about beginning the jouney of looking at other kinds of diversitycultural

diversity, inclusivity of the diffenrently-abled, generational diversityas the

industry matures.

DQ: Gender Diversity is way ahead in the journey then?

SI: One critical factor in gender diversity was the executive

sponsorship from the top leadership. When that happened that really created

attraction, and going forward that is what we need to create when we look at

other forms of inclusivity.

HR: Any diversity plan has to be aligned to business benefit. That is

why ethnic and nationality diversity will succeed. Gender will become critical,

especially in times when you are recruiting heavily. Age will also happen

because while it is a young industry, it has been here a very long time and you

are seeing two clearly different bands, you can no longer go by average age. But

there is a worry. In times of downturn will initiatives like this suffer? Will

diversity suffer? Can diversity sustain through troubled times? Thats a big

issue that organizations will have to address. Unless senior leadership comes in

and unless that person is ready to put his or her head on the block, ensure that

it happens, its very difficult for gender diversity to gain root. But where

that has happened, we have tremendous success stories. I have a mantraline led,

HR managed.

KM: To get a sponsor is very critical, and it has to be an action-led

council and not just an advisory council. Its like any other business proposal,

if you go with a value proposition, senior management will support it. And

implementation is easy because its coming from the business leaders.

SC: Weve taken it to our CEO. And we are getting a lot of stuff done

because hes the CEO. Moving on from gender to other diversity has also come

from the business, that will sustain it through the ups and downs. Otherwise it

is very difficult to keep it at the top of the agenda.

DQ: Isnt there a fear that the pressure of maintaining a certain minimum

number of women in every band will force organizations to lower the bar? Where

are these numbers going to come from?

HR: You cannot compromise on merit but if you have the organizational

culture, backbone and ethos, you will succeed in getting your numbers.

KR: One of our business units had to do it. This senior leader, a

women, said in her direct reporting she needed to have an equal representation,

and told the head of the staffing team that unless they get the women these

positions will not be filled. When you see the commitment and the results, you

buy in; and this trickles down into all bands. Not just recruitment, when you

are doing your performance management you look into how men and women fare. Do

women continue in the lower rung or do they get equal representation at higher

levels.

PS: If you approach it only from an outcome perspective and the key

metric you are looking at is just how many women you have, you may get diluted.

Most organizations today look at metrics at the attraction stage, the growth

stage and the retention stage. You have to look at it through the talent

management pipelineare we bringing in the right number of women, are we growing

them appropriately, giving them the right role and experience so they are ready

for the senior positions?. And are we retaining them? For many senior women, and

men today, we have to make sure that they have the flexibility.

HR: But you have to segment the population, to see what is the hot

button that works for different groups. Now there is a 10-15% increase in the

number of womenabout 30% in the junior management levelthat is a big number.

There is no one size fits all, so you have to constantly keep segmenting, and

approach the different diversities differently. And you have to have the lag

indicators which is finally the metric but you also have to look at the lead

indicatorsin the pipeline what are the efforts, are the processes robust.

Because if the lead is not tracked and you are only tracking the lag it is too

late. And the worst thing you can do is to make a diversity program exclusive.

That is why an event like this has to have men and women.

SI: Last year mens participation was 4%, this time it is 20%.

DQ: Which brings us to the much talked about Second Innings...

KM: Its again not one size fits all. We offer the women flexible

options and they choose what they want.

PS: Large organizations can put these enablers into play. In areas

where the organizations want to put more progressive policies into play but

dont have the economic wherewithal, thats where the government can incentivize,

make sure that it spreads. Not just to large organizations which are doing it

voluntarily but also the smaller ones as well. This will create a stronger pool

of women. We may be losing a large number of people today because these

practices are not in play in the industry.

HR: When you reenter corporate life, with the growth pace that this

industry is in, you need enablers. Either the government through its initiatives

or organizations, training bodies need to provide hand holding.

RK: Itll be great if we could have an executive forum for women who

want to reenter the workforce. You are always feeling negativefeeling youve

lost out on technology, skills...but if you go back with say an executive MBA

you feel empowered. Then, of course, there has to be a good method of placement.

KM: They come with a lot of experience, and it will take them hardly a

couple of months to get into the thick of things, while grooming a fresh person

can be a time consuming process.

PS: Whether its men or women, reentry can be a very difficult

process. You have to prepare the individual as well as the organization to take

the person in at the same pace and not believe that the person cant fit in.

Those are the investments that larger organizations make over a period of time.

And over five years or so most organizations will have to do this for resources.

Decisions will have to be madeshould I put up an executive committee for

returning women or should I invest in newer technologiesand those will be hard

decisions to make.

HR: Reverse mentoring will really help here. Taking leaders from the

minority groups and making them mentors for the other stakeholders in the

organizationthe influencers, the decision makers. In this case, take a

successful returned employee and make him or her the mentor for that senior

managementto sensitize them on issues relating to returning employees.

Atreyee Ganguly



atreyeeg@cybermedia.co.in