Women Leadership: New Age Imperatives

We are in the era of Radical Shifts. The corporate dynamics is flipping at a fast rate and fostering gender equality remains a high visibility agenda across companies. While we may have seen a surge in the number of women entrepreneurs, the number of women CEOs and executive team members is stagnating. It stands at a meagre 4.6% of Fortune 500 CEO positions. Where is it emanating from?

According to the Women in Workplace study 2016 - Promotion rates for women lag behind those of men, for every 100 women promoted, 130 men are promoted. Secondly, at senior levels, women shift from line to staff roles. 90% of CEOs were promoted from line roles and 100% of those were men.

So why are women leaders important and how will we benefit from women leadership?

• Women have circular vision, one moment they could be talking about the latest pub in town and next moment giving you perspectives on the stock exchange. They can switch gears real quick, making them exceptional motivators and problem solvers.
• Women are multi-taskers and highly collaborative and process oriented.
• Women are skeptic by nature and look for legitimacy in the prospective solution to a problem. Thereby, building an authentic yet practical model for work.
• Improved staff retention, innovation and access to talent.
• Lead to higher employee engagement since the diverse strength of all employees can be leveraged.
• Role Model effect will lead to a better socio-economic quo,

Companies can enforce gender equality in the following ways:

• Stop relegating women contributions as supporting and not central/leading role.
• Develop women’s skills and capabilities by trainings.
•  Do not brush off critical feedback from women as non-competent.
• Commitment to gender diversity should be percolated from CEO to every employee.
• Put better systems in place to ensure the policies are working towards fair hiring, promotions and role alignments.
• Encourage and ensure direct interaction of women employees with senior management.

Finally, the women must follow the 3L Strategy to achieve leadership roles – Learn, Lead and Legacy:

•  It is not only what you know, but also who you know that defines success. So connect with people, transformational leaders and exchange knowledge and learn.
• Be fearless and be a good negotiator. Be aggressive wherever needed.
• Overcome traditional gender expectations with élan and grace to leave behind a positive legacy.

Women in the Changing dynamics of the Corporate world

International Women's day is fast approaching.March 8th, every year is marked as the IWD. Being an employee of an equal rights employer, the stress on IWD, gender equality at work, fair policies for woman and enforcement of a work culture free from gender-bias is a very important KRA for the policymakers of the organization.

We have certainly come a long way. From the confines of the four walls of the house, where women were being denied basic education to becoming literate, educated, skilled and highly skilled workforce of the Nation;women have surely come a long way.

Something that remains intact is the mindset of the average Indian Man or may be Men across the world. Therefore, we see fewer women at the top management positions than we see the men. There are a handful of such fiercely forceful ladies as Rekha Menon or Vanitha Narayanan in the IT industry and Arundhati Bhattacharya or Shanti Ekambaram in the Banking industry.

A Woman has always been epitomized as a caregiver, a fulfiller and a nurturer. Whereas, man has been exemplified as the bread earner, the hard worker and financially responsible.A female employee is still considered as a temporary asset to the team at least in the heads if not on papers.She will join, get married in due course, go on maternity leaves and that shall mark the end or slowdown of her career.Yes, it may mark a temporary slowdown, but she is not temporary. She is here to stay. The sooner we understand and realize this, the sooner we acknowledge that getting Ahead is a womanly trait too and that she should not be suppressed is when we will take the first step towards a balanced economical growth.

Disparities in financial remunerations due to gender bias is a commonly faced and discussed about topic. So many women face this challenge often. For an equal rights employer, it becomes obligatory to eradicate such unhealthy practises.

Let us give our women their due, unclog our mindsets and support them in their journey. Yes support - for they were, they are and will always remain to be the life givers on this planet and need a little handholding at stages, which in o way should impact their aspiration or desires.

There is an excellent video on Gender Equality at work(an advertisement by Tanishq). Go catch a glimpse of it here.

With Love,
Megha S.

Soul Mates Vs Twin Flame

We are all nothing more than a flame of light, for we are the soul and not the body. Each flame or soul as we most commonly call it, has transcended over hundreds of years and reached here - to this moment - 'The Now' that we are all into. Each one has its own journey, individual lessons to learn and then be absorbed back into the larger flame.

Have you ever met someone whom you felt an instant connect with? Like, you know this person for a long time, like you have felt this touch before whereas in reality you would have never even crossed paths in this life, in this physical plane.Well, I have. To be honest, I have met many such people. Some, that I am still in touch with. Others that came, taught valuable lessons, are still around me but we don't interact as often as we once did. May be their role in my life was limited to the phase where I met them. When they were needed the most, they were sent and now they are busy learning their own life lessons. These people are your soulmates. A soul mate may be anyone - not necessarily your life partner. You can actually have many soulmates. They are basically souls that are on the same wavelength as yours and come to the physical plane to help you in this journey. You may feel strongly for them. Having said that, let us understand it well, that it need not be romantic love for that soul. You may be able to comprehend words they don't speak, actions that they do not explain about. Yet, we believe in them. Why? Because, we have met before. We have known each other and our souls can look within us. The souls can connect.

There are other set of people, whom we do not connect with at all. Yet, life takes such turns and twists that we end up getting intertwined with them, into relationships that both the head and the heart isn't convinced about.We pause at multitude Red signals, know that the road ahead is bumpy, are most often not even willing to take risk, Yet, we plunge into it. Why? Because, there is this soul, you owe some debts. There is a karmic account that needs to be settled. It is best to settle it now and free yourself of it. So that you can crossover to the next life with lesser burden. I have had such encounters in my life too. Trust me, these are your energy drainers. They will suck out the positivity from your life and leave you devastated. But may be that is the reason they were sent to us. To help us learn patience, perseverance, feeling of loss and deceit. God help you if you have learnt it all. If not be prepared for some real fun, when you crossover too. (pun intended).

The third kind of souls are the most precious. They are your Twin Flames . Just when it was decided that a soul had to go on a physical plane to learn life's lessons (because it is believed that it is only when the soul takes the form of a body that it can experience hurt, anxiety, fear, jealousy and all that we keep close to the bosom with pride), the flame gets divided into two. It is more like a monozygotic twin where a fertilized egg splits into two separate embryos. The only difference lies in the fact that a monozygotic twin is born at the same time, but the Twin Flames may be sent over at different times.When the time is right, they meet. If the former or latter are doing a good job at learning their lessons is when they may not even meet in this life. That is the power of Free-Will. Destiny may have had some plan for you, but the outcome of the plan would have been left just in the Draft state with a note that Free will shall decide the course of events. It is then that you may or may not meet your Twin Flame.  But what a loss! If we don't. I am sure that feeling of being able to see, touch and feel your twin flame can transport you to another world. It can fill your life with a light so bright and divine that you would feel satiated and eternally blissful.

Many of us would like to accept and acknowledge that we may have met our Soulmates but not the Twin Flames or may be met your Twin Flame but they couldn't become your Life Mates. Possible, Isn't it?


With Love,
Megha S