‘The power equation shifts when men advocate for women's rights’

At the 5th edition of e4m PR & Corp Comm Women Achievers Summit 2024, women leaders came together and spoke their hearts out on the topic of ‘Empowering inclusion, driving positive social impact’. The panellists include Malvika Mudgal, Founder, Jagan Foundation, Dharini Mishra, Sr. Vice President & Head, Marketing and Corporate Communications, Suzlon Group, Tehseen Zaidi, Communications Lead, Syngenta India, Gayatri Das, Lead- Talent A&E, PepsiCo India, Moderator: Ritika Upmanyu, exchange4media.

When asked about what inclusion looks laike in action, Dharini defined, “We confuse inclusion with focusing on just one cohort or community that we are trying to include and thereby, in the process, we alienate others—who could be the majority. So, inclusion in action looks like a DIB Council (Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging). As per me, inclusion in Action looks like giving equal parental leave to men so that women can focus more at work, making inclusion holistic and not just a small segment of a panel discussion, not just focusing on a niche group with special skills, but increasing awareness and inclusion for the majority as well.

Malvika talked about inclusion in terms of gender inclusion. “When we go back to the basics, we talk about access to education, access to health, access to financial literacy, and—probably—if you are able to put a little peacock money in their pockets via integrity, that means access to livelihoods,” she adds.

Tehseen mentioned that inclusion was inherited in her DNA from her childhood, “My father introduced this concept to me at a very early stage in life. He has always taught me and my sister to have our own desires and identities. This is how I started with inclusivity. And this is what we call it—irrespective of gender, caste, or anything else. It's about how you accept a person as they are.”

Gayatri explained that Inclusion is a precursor to diversity and believes that if we have inclusive mindsets, I think diversity just becomes an outcome. “From my personal examples, I have had a similar upbringing. I come from a Fauji family, and as you know, rules and regulations are extremely important. Never in so many years of my life, when I was being raised in a family with rules, were they ever different for me and my brother. Okay, so if my father said that I had to be home at a certain time, my brother had to be home at the same time as well. So, I think it starts with a very different mindset personally. If your extended ecosystem is convinced and they believe in any corporate setup and organization, I think inclusion for that woman, and for that matter, anybody who is part of a larger ecosystem, comes in automatically,” she asserts. 

Moving forward, Mishra discussed how she incorporates inclusion in her organization, “I have a team of 20, and then an extended team of about 80 people. But the thing that we do a lot is we try to find stories of challenge. And those challenges are not just gender-based. We follow a very simple process of selling stories of challenge. Every week, in our team meeting, we have 30 minutes marked out only to talk about stories of challenge and how we can help you become better. And I think those are the real heroes and real stories of inclusion.”

Mudgal also shared some personal instances, “I come from a very conservative family. So when I went back, I had to start leading the business. My family was always questioning my choices and I didn’t find the string of support I expected. Surprisingly, the support I found actually came from my all-male staff. The day I went to the pump and started running the business, it was the male employees who stood by me. They were the ones who stepped forward and became my backbone. So, I think increasing awareness, breaking the gender divide, and standing strong is important. You don't need to do this alone—you need the best advocates. And, in fact, the best advocates are men. The power equation shifts when men advocate for women's rights. That’s why it’s very important to have them as active participants in your ecosystem.”

Das emphasized that inclusion is about an inclusive mindset—not just about gender, but also about generations. She also talked about an initiative they’re actively running at PepsiCo, RevolutioNaari, which is a nation-wide movement where they look at empowering almost 10 lakh women over a span of three years. She acknowledged the learnings of the initiative, “One of the biggest learnings for us from inclusion stand point is that probably there are n number of opportunities and many women are not aware that they can break barriers and come in and work in these few representative functions like supply chain, sales across FMCG industries.

Tehseen shared some actionable advice to the professionals on how they can integrate inclusion in their work environment, “It’s giving freedom. Give freedom to employees. Give freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and be an active listener. If you don’t put employees in a league and give them the space they desire, you will get the best out of them. Micro-managing is what increases stress for them.”

Lastly, Dharini guided, “The first thing we need to do is decriminalize motherhood at work. No woman who gets pregnant should be scared. No woman who is carrying another life in her body should be stressed about, oh my God, a critical project will be taken away from me. No woman should be told, 'You're pregnant, you’re not ill.' Instead, we should just provide a healthy, supportive environment for mothers.”

Malvika advised to look at health from an inclusivity and an economic standpoint and make sure there should be healthy women all around. 

“I think inclusion will happen automatically—the moment, whether it's a corporate setup, a home setup, a rural setup, or an urban setup—the moment all of us are aware and are consumers of the fact that everybody wants to feel psychologically safe, true inclusion will really happen,” Gayatri concluded.