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Business News/ News / Business Of Life/  Driving diversity: Maria Angelica Pérez
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Driving diversity: Maria Angelica Pérez

Why inclusion policies make business sense, and how these can be implemented

The focus is on gender.Premium
The focus is on gender.

NEW DELHI :

Gender diversity is often talked about these days. Yet companies don’t always find it easy to ensure this.

Earlier this year, a study released by the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a Washington, US, based non-profit, and audit firm Ernst and Young found that 60% of the 21,980 firms surveyed in 91 countries, including India, had no female board members, more than 50% had no female executives, and less than 5% had a female chief executive.

The gap may seem surprising, given that there is ample research to show that diversity makes sense in every aspect of business—whether it’s a better talent pool or profits. “Diversity Matters", a 2015 report by management consulting firm McKinsey & Co., says companies in the top quartile for gender diversity are 15% more likely to have financial returns above their respective national industry medians.

Telecommunications company Ericsson, which operates in 180 countries, now plans to increase the number of women in its workforce in the next four years, up from the present 22% to 30%, says London-based Maria Angelica Pérez, the firm’s global head of diversity and inclusion, who was recently in New Delhi. In an interview, she explains the diversity drive and the need for it. Edited excerpts:

How can a company ensure effective, continuous implementation of diversity policies?

To implement and drive diversity and inclusion effectively, it needs to be part of the DNA of an organization. Diversity goes beyond gender, race, religion, nationality, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation, age and other established parameters to include diverse experiences, family situations, functional backgrounds and more.

We believe diverse teams are the best teams—they are high-performing and innovative, with a variety of perspectives/experiences/references, becoming the most creative.

Although our definition of diversity is broad, we have decided to have a special focus on gender diversity, for that is the area where we have identified the greatest need for improvement.

Gender-diverse teams are known to perform better than single-gender teams since they bring different viewpoints, ideas and market insights. Then why is there a lack of diversity, particularly when it comes to board composition?

In our industry, the number of women holding degrees in ICT (information and communications technology) needs to be worked on, and this is one of the reasons why today we do not see as many female leaders working in our industries as we would like. This means the ICT industry will need to work harder at educating young girls about career prospects in the industry at an early stage to ensure that we have a future pipeline that is gender-balanced and reflective of the networked society.

Technology firms—be they Facebook, Twitter, Google or Pinterest—continue to struggle with diversity. Why?

According to a 2013 report of the European Commission, “out of 1,000 women with a bachelor’s degree in Europe, only 29 hold a degree in ICT (compared to 95 men), while only four eventually work in the ICT sector". To compound the problem, women leave the sector mid-career to a greater extent than men. So we need to increase efforts to recruit females preferably in the early stages of their lives.

How is your company planning to promote diversity in India?

Ericsson has a multidimensional approach to diversity and inclusion. (We are) not only focusing on gender diversity by attracting more females and young girls to STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) careers, but also advocating the importance of leadership support for the change process, focusing on development and succession, and cultivating an inclusive environment.

In India, we have the Blue River Project, which is our diversity and inclusion (D&I) initiative. As part of this, we have an open dialogue within the company on D&I, wherein we invite thought leaders from corporates, industry leaders and eminent sportspersons to have an open discussion on their experiences of diversity and inclusion.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pooja Singh
A journalist with over 15 years of experience. A Chevening fellow and graduate of Columbia University, New York
Catch all the Business News, Market News, Breaking News Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.
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Published: 24 Jul 2016, 04:01 PM IST
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