She'z the world...she'z the beginning

Amidst the dispute for the women reservation bill and the argument about safety of women employees in night shifts, there is a new breed of women who are not looking up to the government to provide them with space. They are the women in the Information Technology industry. The doors of IT are wide open for them and they are all geared up to become the major employees in almost all the IT firms.

According to National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM), by 2010, women will constitute half the workforce in the IT industry, which is already the case in the BPO sector. There are many reasons behind this demand for women employees. “Women employees are more competitive and competent than their male counterparts,” says Ravi Shankar, VP-Resource Management Group, HCL Technologies, which has 25 per cent of its employees as women.

“The women workforce, especially for ‘nontraditional’ jobs like IT, was, until recently, remained unexplored. It is a huge talent pool and I think all sectors have realised this. We believe that diversity is a key competence to create a culture of innovation. This diversity extends beyond gender to caste, creed and religion amongst others,” says Joji Gill, HR Director, Microsoft India.

Rekha Menon, Lead Executive, India Geographic Services and Human Capital and Diversity, Accenture India, also agrees on the importance of diversity. She mentions, “Today, the IT industry realises that diversity is no longer “nice to have” , but “necessary to have” as it has implications for business success and high performance.”

As an icing on top comes various studies, which prove that greater the diversity of a team in an organisation, greater are the possibilities for innovation and problem solving.

The capability to adapt to situations both in personal and professional life, ability to balance careers and personal lives with panache and grace, flexibility in adapting to multiple roles/tasks, accepting challenges, adapting to situations is what makes women different from their male counterparts and favourite employees of the IT industry.

The IT industry boasts of being an equal opportunity employer looking at attracting and retaining diverse talent without any clear preference for any gender but there is a slight difference of opinion when it comes to recruitment. The industry finds women to be more productive, more committed and less prone to job-hopping, contributing to reduced attrition rates.

“The edge that women employees have is that they are dedicated and committed to their task; the caring nature, which a woman brings to a work place, is what makes a difference. Also, women can balance emotions well and that is what brings in additional stability in times of crisis and high pressure,” says Shankar.

To attract more women employees, companies are taking good care of the facilities that they provide to their employees. “The challenge organisations need to focus on are to attract more women into this profession and their companies and then extend their career tenure by helping them meet the issues they address with each life stage such as marriage and motherhood,” says Menon.

Many IT majors offer various facilities to the employees like flexible work arrangements, which include flexi-timings , tele-work , compressed workweek as well as maternity leave; extended leave and child care benefit with other facilities like laptop, cell phones, remote access to systems, broadband connectivity at home, etc to make work and life easier.

“The work-life balance is valued highly at Microsoft and for this, we provide employees flexibility to be able to work out of home; our leave policies allow no encashment and nominal carry forward to ensure that all leave is availed of; and we have had a few need-based cases of extended maternity leave and working out of home as well which helps to make life easier for the mothers at Microsoft,” says Gill.

“Some of our businesses have facilities like nursing rooms for lactating mothers and we have security guard escorting women employees to their homes, if they are working beyond 9 pm. We have in place extremely stringent guidelines around sexual harassment to ensure that it is a viable environment for women to work,” he further adds.

To move a step further, Cisco provides not only flexible working hours but also a choice of working location too. “An employee can work from any of our eight offices across Bangalore or even from the employee’s own home,” says Tracy Ann, Senior Manager - Diversity & Inclusion - Asia Pacific, Cisco Systems.

“We have a culture of openness and trust for employees to avail of these as needed without bureaucracy and fear of being perceived as ‘not working hard enough’. The facilities provided at working place pay off in the form of higher employee satisfaction, lower attrition, higher levels of commitment and greater enthusiasm,” adds Ann.

Vaahini, which is Accenture women’s support network, guide efforts and initiatives related to networking, mentoring, communication and counseling; Another Accenture initiative is ‘Kids-at-Work’ day where employees bring in their families with their children and enjoy organised events.

Many organisations also encourage employee referral for women employees with extra incentives. “Retaining top talent, having diversity in teams and bringing a rich set of diverse experiences to the table are the benefits that come out of a focused approach to creating a more balanced gender equation,” says Menon.

Women in IT field have whole-heartedly accepted these measures, as these help them to put in the extra effort needed to make their careers move with an accelerated speed. These initiatives are breaking the stereotypes about what women can and cannot do and are providing more opportunities and space for today’s women.

Courtesy: Times Ascent