Inclusion of Women a Must to Ramp up Startup Ecosystem: Experts

KOCHI:
Entrepreneurs of women startups must be given better opportunities and mentorship so as to promote inclusivity in the country’s startup ecosystem, a landmark meet said today.

“Inclusivity is a critical element in the corporate world. It is all about value creation and profitability as well. If we are not including women in the workforce, where do you get workforce from?” queried Anupam Nidhi, Head, Corporate Citizenship and Sustainability, Siemens, at a panel discussion on “Inclusivity in the Workplace.”

“We need a platform for creating equal opportunities, grooming and mentoring for women at the workplace,” she added while speaking at the ‘Women Startup Summit’ organised at the Integrated Startup Complex at Kalamassery here by the Kerala Startup Mission (KSUM) in association with the Indian Women Network under the Confederation of Indian Industries. Aspiring women entrepreneurs from across the country converged for the one-day event.

Deepti Dutt, Head, Strategic Initiatives Public Sector, Amazon, said a gender bias exists at the subconscious level while promoting an entrepreneur. “Promotion means guiding to the right path with a positive note, while prevention means discouraging,” she noted. “When a women founder presents her case to investors, the question will be in prevention style.” Dutt noted that society needed to move the conversation from prevention to promotion.

Shrayana Bhattacharya, Senior Economist, World Bank, said India, unlike a lot of other emerging markets such as Brazil, China and Indonesia, has clocked a negative growth in the number of women in the workforce. The periodic Labour Survey released in May this year showed urban female labour force participation in 2018 at 16 per cent and 18.2 per cent in rural areas, she added.

“There is a decline in employed women in rural areas. It dropped from 33 per cent in 2004 to 18 per cent now,” she said, citing longer stages of education of girls and better financial situation as the reasons. Bhattacharya said lack of access to mentorship, inflexible timing, low pay and personal affairs prevent women from being involved in workforce. Commenting on #MeToo, she said research shows the voice of any community is key in pushing for flexibility in inclusion; be LGBT rights or women. “If you want to move from prevention to promotion, you have to mobilize that voice. In that case #MeToo was a great example.”

Seema Kumar, Country Leader, Cloud Technical Sales and Architecture India/SA, IBM, said gender is one dimension that garners the most attention when it comes to inclusivity. “Inclusivity goes much beyond gender. In large organizations across the world, diversity is a strategy as well as an advantage.”

“Women are dropping out of the job industry, citing personal reasons. For them, there are a lot of avenues in tech industry to make a comeback,” she added. “We have launched a programme, ‘Tech Reentry Internship’, with this aspect in mind. For experienced women, who have taken a breaks for the sake of their family issues, will get six-month training and they can go back to the mainstream.”

“As far as women are concerned, you need to ensure that you are investing in yourself, and you are putting yourself out there. Otherwise, just a programme won’t help you,” she said.

Naandika Tripathi, Sub Editor, Forbes India, was the moderator. A subsequent session on ‘Women in Business’ was addressed by IAN co-founder Padmaja Ruparel and Federal Bank COO Shalini Warrier. Brand Circle founder-CEO Malavika R Haritha was the moderator.