The challenge in diversity hiring

We feel concerned when companies reach out to us to help them with their diversity Hiring. The concept of introducing and encouraging diversity hiring is to give equal opportunity to all individuals, regardless of their gender, race, age, physical ability, ethnicity, or religious beliefs. But this is largely practiced as hiring more female employees to maintain the gender ratio in the organization. This helps them to attract more female employees and to maintain a healthy, diverse atmosphere.

It is now almost a decade that I have been managing large recruitment teams, comprising freshers, experienced professionals, some returning after a sabbatical etc etc. Recruitment fortunately has more female employees, but I have now realized that in these 10 years, I do not see more than 14% of my ex-colleagues continuing to work in full-time or part-time assignments. And this genuinely makes me feel concerned and scared. If the ratio is better elsewhere, I am sure organizations have helped these employees stabilize their work-life balance better. When I go back and spend some time on the reasons behind 86% of my female colleagues not being in the industry, it is disturbing.

It is easy to generalize why many females drop out from a promising career: getting married, being on the family way, husband in a different city, or maybe a new family does not want them to work (the usual suspects). I am not sure if this helps any of us in the society. While I understand that as a woman, we need to manage and fulfill multiple roles of a caring wife, good mother, responsible daughter, or daughter-in-law, we have been taught from the very beginning that each of the roles has to be performed to the fullest. In these roles, a career aspiration doesn’t exist, and if somehow any woman decides to take up this option, then she naturally feels she has compromised on her other roles. Many women quickly end up dropping out of their careers.

Is this a situation we have to accept? Do we have to choose between office demands and pressure and household workload? While the family can be a challenge or a support for a long-term career plan but it is the same family that has taught us from the very beginning that whatever situation one has to face, we are never allowed to drop out of our schooling. Then why drop out of your career today? Why not figure a solution for every situation? Do some of us see this as an easier option—taking our partners for granted to manage our expenses and our lives at the cost of us managing their household work? We need to take a stand for a better individual, a better family member, a better mother, and a better Indian.

I have known families where the daughter-in-law is the only earning member in the family. There is one exceptional manager I have seen in my team; she manages her drunkard father-in-law, she is abused daily at her home, and she manages her preschool-going son, an experimenting husband, and a retired mother-in-law. The courage to face all this and continue working with the best of productivity is not easy. You need to have your mind and goals in place. Obviously giving up on the job and accepting the family situation could have been the easiest option, but I feel so proud seeing her in the office every day. She just lights up my day. She has made a decision and worked on her ambition day in and day out without letting her family life get in the way.

I remember, females started opting for HR as this was an easier office job. There was a time when males would pick up sales and marketing and females would opt for HR in their final programs, but I feel sad to see many of these potential women HR leaders disappear. I sincerely request my female graduates and postgraduate students to give some shape to their ambition after putting in 16-19 years of their lives in academics. Life is not about compromising every time. Life is about creating solutions and working things out for everybody around, which includes you to begin with. I understand we need some support from our families, friends, and colleagues, but our confidence behind our decision will help them to see a better future.

This article was published in World HR diary