DRIVE FOR GENDER DIVERSITY

Indian firms are striving for more diversity, equity and inclusion at the workplace, both to expand the talent pool as well as to plug the leaky pipeline

- M.G. ARUN & SONAL KHETARPAL

HCL TECHNOLOGIES Women staff at the company are trained on an AI-driven, structured mentoring platform under a senior mentor to prepare them for leadership roles

A diverse workplace is not just a better workplace but also an attractive one. It is this wisdom, as enunciated by their chief sustainability officer, Anjalli Ravi Kumar, that has become a guiding principle at food aggregator major Zomato. "Diverse companies are also more innovative," she adds. And at Zomato, that change begins at the very top, with the board of directors. Four out of its seven directors are women-Namita Gupta, founder, Airveda Technologies; Gunjan Tilak Raj Soni, CEO, Zalora Group; Aparna Popat Ved, a badminton player who has represented India at international forums; and Sutapa Banerjee, a banking veteran.

Zomato exemplifies an encouraging trend in India Inc. According to data by primeinfobase.com, from a mere 5 per cent a decade ago, women now occupy 20 per cent of all board positions in companies listed on the National Stock Exchange. This significant shift could be attributed partly to market regulator SEBI mandating that all listed firms have at least one woman on their boards as an independent director, and partly to fulfil the DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) objectives of companies. "When the SEBI mandate was introduced in 2013," says Pranav Haldea, MD, Prime Database Group, "it was treated more as a need for compliance and, usually, close female relatives were given board positions. However, over time, while most companies still continue to view it as such, several companies have realised the benefits of diversity." As of December 15, a substantial 45 per cent, or 997 of 2,217 NSE-listed companies, have more than one woman director on their boards.