Report Workshop on Engendering Leadership in Organisations
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
REPORT WORKSHOP ON ENGENDERING LEADERSHIP IN ORGANISATIONS PRIA & MARTHA FARRELL FOUNDATION March 10-11, 2016 42, Tughlakabad Institutional Area, New Delhi 110062 Phone: 91-11-29960931-33 Email: [email protected] | Page www.marthafarrellfoundation.org www.pria.org BACKGROUND While a large number of public policies and interventions focus on women’s empowerment by improving their Recent studies have demonstrated that India can access to education and employment, very little improve its GDP growth by more than 2 per cent per attention has been paid to the systemic nature of annum if gender equality in the country increases. How exclusion they face inside an organisation. Systems and is this going to be possible given the conditions outlined practices in organisations tend to make the assumption below? that women are primarily responsible for reproductive and care-giving roles in family; only a few organisations • Smaller and poorer countries have better gender offer women workers some flexibility to fulfil this role. equality score on UNDP Gender Index than Women’s productive, economic and professional India. contributions are overlooked. And male employees are • Women’s labour force participation, especially expected to ignore their own responsibilities of care- in urban India, is declining as per 2011 Census. giving in the hope their wives, mothers and sisters will • Talented and educated young women in India take care of the same. Such cultural practices, norms and are constrained to reduce (or drop out from) mores are prevalent in all types of organisations in India their workforce participation due to fear of – private business, NGOs, government departments, harassment in public spheres. police, judiciary, educational institutions, media, political • Hostile work environment which systematically parties, etc. demeans women’s contribution continues in most Indian organisations. Engendering organisations requires a new kind of leadership. Organisational leadership not only provides In the past two decades, national and state governments policies and procedures, but also defines its culture. in India have formulated a large number of public Stories and anecdotes of successful and effective policies, laws and institutions promoting women’s engendered leadership are occasionally heard from all empowerment and targeting gender discrimination and types of organisations. Yet, very little systematic harassment at the workplace. Yet, there is mounting understanding of how institutional culture and evidence about gender inequality which continues to leadership can enhance gender equality is largely absent affect a wide variety of socio- economic indicators – in India. There are hardly any efforts at collectively female foeticide, maternal and child malnutrition, school promoting ‘engendered leadership’ in organisations. drop-out rates, and declining labour force participation. How can leadership in organisations create a balanced approach that values and supports women’s Experiences around the world have begun to focus participation and contributions? How can we understand attention on the way women’s participation and and promote such ‘engendered leadership’ in all kinds of contributions are regularly discriminated against in organisations in the country? various organisations; such constraints and restrictions are caused by the way institutions are designed and In this backdrop Martha Farrell Foundation (MFF) and function. In India, gender discrimination and restrictions Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) in organisations is widespread – girl students and organised an engaging workshop on “Engendering teachers in schools and colleges; women artists and Leadership in Organisations” on 10-11 March 2016 at actors in cultural institutions (including Bollywood); PRIA. The workshop was attended by 58 participants nurses and women doctors in hospitals; women political drawn from a variety of organisations – civil society, leaders in political parties; lawyers and judges in courts; private business, public sector undertaking, Indian Navy, women sports-persons in sports associations; journalists police, educational institutions, and many more. This in media; women in the police, paramilitary and armed document captures the key points discussed in the forces. Various government and non-government workshop. organisations are no different. 1 | Page WELCOME, OVERVIEW AND SETTING THE Behaviour. The purpose of this dialogue is not to focus CONTEXT only on the problems but also to identify innovations in gender mainstreaming. Dr. Tandon reminded that the Ms. Rita Sarin, Founder Trustee, Martha Farrell participants in this workshop came from a variety of Foundation; and Global Vice President and Country organisations. Irrespective of organisations that the Director, The Hunger Project, New Delhi welcome the participants were associated with, he hoped that the participants. She remembered Dr. Martha Farrell in a sharing of innovations from various sectors would enrich personal note and described her as a wonderful person the dialogue. He hoped that the dialogue would result in and professional. Dr. Farrell was associated with the civil not only clarity of new ways addressing this issue but society sector and worked on the issues related to also possibilities to work with the Foundation in the gender mainstreaming systemically and systematically. coming period. Ms. Sarin invited the participants to keep a moment of silence in the honour of Dr. Farrell. Ms. Sarin invited Dr. Rajesh Tandon, Founder President, PRIA, New Delhi to provide a context of the workshop and to set the stage for discussion. Dr. Tandon shared that the Martha Farrell Foundation (MFF) has been created by the friends, relatives and well-wishers of Dr. Farrell with an objective to carry forward her passion and vision of a gender just society. Since its inception, the Foundation has been taking forward the youth-led campaign on violence against women and girls called Kadam Badhate Chalo (KBC) in 14 locations in India. The Dr. Rajesh Tandon setting the context Foundation has celebrated International Women’s Day (8 March) in several locations and many more events are being planned. A second area of the Foundation’s work SESSION I: MACRO PERSPECTIVE is on Preventing Sexual Harassment at Work Place. It has Moderator: Ms. Rita Sarin, Founder Trustee, Martha made efforts to raise awareness and train Third Party Farrell Foundation and Global Vice President & Country Facilitators for serving various Internal Complaint Director, The Hunger Project, New Delhi Committees which needed to be constituted according to the law. Such training workshops have been organised Speakers: in Lucknow, Bhopal, Ahmedabad, Gangtok, and Siliguri. Dr. U. D. Choubey, Director General, Standing In future, several such workshops will be organised by • Conference of Public Enterprises (SCOPE); and the Foundation in other cities as well. A third area of the Former Chairman and Managing Director, GAIL Foundation’s work relates to making the institutions (India) Ltd. gender sensitive. This workshop is an opening • Mr. Prithvi Haldea, Founder Chairman, PRIME conversation on how organisations are designed and Database, New Delhi function in ways to make them gender sensitive. It does not limit to making provision for maternity leaves, or Mr. Prithvi Haldea made a presentation on the “Myth leaves for attending parent-teacher meeting, but to and Reality of Women Directors”. As per the Indian critically examine that the gender stereotypes are not Companies Act 2013, the Indian companies are now perpetuated in the institutions. It’s also the way men and required as follows: every listed public company shall women relate to each other in the work places. have at least one-third of the total number of directors Currently, it’s not a popular area or work among the as Independent Directors and such class or classes of practitioners, academics and students of Organisational 2 | Page companies as may be prescribed, shall have at least one Drafting Committee had to finally give up which in his woman director (this, among others, includes all listed opinion was a mockery and constraint to introduce a companies and several other public limited companies). new paradigm in the corporate governance. He, He also shared the obligations on part of Indian however, emphatically argued that we should definitely companies listed under the Securities and Exchange encourage companies to include women on the Board. Board of India (SEBI) as follows: Prime Database maintains a database of directors with Where the chairperson of the board of directors is a non- profiles for each director. It also traces which director is executive director, at least one-third of the board of joining and leaving. He said, many male directors run the directors shall comprise of independent directors and companies like propriety at the expense of shareholders. where the listed entity does not have a regular non- If the promoters and management are to be given a fair executive chairperson, at least half of the board of deal, the companies need to make sure that the directors shall comprise of independent directors: directors are really independent. Provided that where the regular non-executive chairperson is a promoter of the listed entity or is related to any promoter or person occupying management positions at the level of board of director or at one level below the board of directors, at least half of the board of directors of the