1 in 100

IBM created a history of sorts when it named Virginia “Ginni” Rometty the first female chief executive officer in IBM’s 100-year history. She succeeded Sam Palmisano. While many might look at Rometty much deserved rise as history, many are also wondering why it took 100 years to find the first female CEO!


Recently at the Women Managers' Convention, organized by the Madras Management Association, Ms Aruna Jayanthi, CEO, Capgemini India, said that “Working women must think and act like professionals and not enter the workplace feeling special. While recruiting, organizations should look for women. But as they go along the career path, there should not be preferential treatment or reservation for promotions. That is demeaning and no woman wants that.”

Ms. Jayanti may be right about non-preferential treatment of everyone including women when it comes to promotions or career advancement. With all due regards to Ms. Jayanti, such statements hold little relevance in Indian scenario because forget about preferential treatment, many a times even a fair and equitable treatment may be a far call! This is not to discount that there are certain organizations and companies that are empathetic and equitable towards women. The larger scene however seems to far from perfect.

Am I being too critical? Well! In that case what would say about this recent finding?

A study by MasterCard ranks India at the bottom of 14 Asia Pacific countries when it comes to socio-economic development of women in relation to men. India ranked lowest on women's workforce participation, with only 35.9 women employed for every 100 men.

Methodology

It comprises of five indicators: business ownership, business and government leadership, workforce participation, regular employment opportunities and tertiary education. Each indicator measures the ratio of women to men in each of the 14 markets — scores are indexed to 100 (men). So a score under 100 indicates gender inequality in favour of males while a score above 100 indicates inequality in favour of females.

India beats China!

A small silver lining is that the same survey also found out that though India was ranked the last with an overall score of 48.4 after taking into account all the five parameters, its scores have been moving upward since 2010, according to MasterCard. On the other hand, China, which currently has a score of 73.7, has been experiencing consistent small declines since 2007.

A lot still needs to be done...and Ms. Jayanti far from asking organizations to dole-out preferential treatment to women; the expectation is merely of a fair opportunity! Research has time and again showed that the one who have one so, not only had better engagement, but also better performance.