How AnitaB.org is trying to bat for women in tech in India

Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Sundar Pichai, Mark Zuckerberg...the tech world has several well-known names of male founders and CEOs. Now try and think of a successful woman techie. Hardly any name comes to mind, especially when it comes to India.

How do you bridge this gender gap in the technology sector? That’s the question the US-based pro-women non-profit organisation Anita Borg Institute (now called AnitaB.org) is trying to answer.

A nonprofit organisation was founded by the late computer scientist Anita Borg, known for starting Systers, an emailing list for technical women in computing.

During her lifetime, she continued to advocate for women in tech.

A well-respected name globally, the organisation recently severed ties with Uber to highlight its stance against the work culture of the US-based cab hailing company.

In India, the organisation under its India MD Geetha Kannan has been working with women, tech companies, and engineering colleges to create a business case for women to be given an inclusive role in the sector.

Kannan who in the past has helmed HR departments of companies such as Infosys and ANZ, spoke to Moneycontrol on the organisations’ efforts to increase gender diversity in the sector and the challenges ahead.

What was the organisation’s rationale behind severing ties with Uber?

We support women technologists and we work with corporates to create that opportunity for women. If that’s not happening then we need to take a stand.

It’s not like we severed ties with them right after the news (of harassment of a woman employee) broke out. We have been trying to talk to them and work with them. But they have been a lukewarm partner since the beginning. They were not interested in our efforts to shake hands with them.

Then in the end when this happened, we, of course, stood behind the women technologists. What happened there really hit hard on our philosophy. It went against our grain. We still reached out to them and said if you need any help we are ready to give our senior-most people.

Uber’s case is out in the open, but there are other companies that have similar issues. But until and unless it comes out in the open it’s very difficult to take action.

What is the organisations’ business case for promoting women in tech?

Today’s world is largely tech-driven, especially with the advent of the Internet of Things (IoT). If technology has to appeal to a wider audience, you have to have women in your team because then you’re doing better from a business perspective while also catering to your market.

To that end, we say that if India’s population consists of about 49 percent women, a similar ratio should reflect in its corporate culture. If the workforce is not diverse, the relevance of a product is lost on half the population.

We have had cases where a few FMCG companies developed products for women with an all-male research team! How can they create an effective product for women without women? The moment that changed, we started to see thoughtful products in the market. Tech is omnipresent, and if you don’t appeal to half of the population, the product reach will be limited.

The second business case is regarding talent.

IT companies are always on the lookout for good talent, especially because IT industry is the harbinger of tech advancement. If you cut down half of the talent pool because they are women then you are limiting your chance to get good talent.

If we talk about successes for AnitaB.org, which companies would you talk about?

Intel is one of the companies that has done a commendable job in creating opportunities for women techies. They have seen a percentage increase in their diversity ratio due to those efforts. They dedicated funds for it, created a diversity division, and worked towards it with concentrated effort.

ThoughtWorks is another company that has successfully created an inclusive culture. The company’s top management is very serious about it, and that trickles down to the whole organisation.

From our experience with US companies, we have learned that the effort to create gender diversity has to come from the top. There almost all top companies have chief diversity officers, their recruitment process is more refined now, and they also take efforts in retaining the recruited talent, so there are women in higher management. The companies also come out with diversity reports to track progress.

In India, however, we are still trying to convince the companies to share data. After four years of operation, they have finally started to share some.

What are the basic challenges in India that arrest growth of women in tech?

India historically has always had a science and maths driven education system, especially basic education. We have a higher concentration of women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) than in the US.

The workforce strength in entry level consists of nearly 35 percent women. But we start seeing a leak further up in the pipeline, mostly due to personal reasons.

Many companies today have Back-To-Work programs to bring back employees who left or are on a sabbatical. But they struggle with a lack of applications. There’s hardly any traction. We have our own back-to-work program, where companies give spot offers to women techies. There have been times when they had 2-3 offers in hand but didn’t join.

The bigger challenge, however, is the pressure from society. There was a girl who worked night shifts. It suited her and her parents were supportive too. But the pressure came from neighbours and relatives who raised objections to her coming home late, warning parents that no one will marry her! She was ultimately forced to resign. That (societal) pressure is the hardest to tackle. That’s one of the biggest reasons we haven’t been able to achieve a healthy diversity ratio.

How do you tackle these challenges?

There is enough research to prove that you hire whom you relate to. We talk to companies and tell them why it is important to have a diverse interview panel; because it will lead to a balanced recruitment decision. The idea is not to put down

The idea is not to put down men, but to bring up women to enjoy the same kind of preference, which is based on talent, not gender. We don’t say go and hire all women. Then there are internal policies that we try and influence to include family friendly, employee sensitive clauses. We circulate white papers with companies to initiate knowledge sharing. Then there is a CXO breakfast event series to influence and create an inclusive work culture.

We also work with students once they have taken a decision to get into tech. We conduct Code-a-thons across the country. We conduct these in small towns also, such as Coimbatore, Jaipur, Madurai, Bhilai, and so on. These small towns don’t have much networking opportunities. We realised they don’t understand a few tech terms also that we use. Their practical training is not that much. But in a workforce, they will be required to have same skillsets. So the quality of engineers, be it from metros or small towns, has to be standardised. This is where these programs help.

Durba.Ghosh@nw18.com