Missing Women

size="3">Over
the last five years the number of women employees have increased
significantly in the IT industry which has been quite active on its
gender inclusivity agenda. However, when it comes to leadership
positions among the channel community, the partners are yet to catch
up pace, the number of female employees to that of their male
counterparts being extremely poor. In fact, the ratio is not just
poor, the fairer sex is virtually non-existent in the reseller and
channel ecosystem. Although
the Indian socio-economic scenario is changing fast giving scope for
increasing women empowerment, there's a huge gap that seems to be
existing in the channel. On a broader perspective, there's still a
huge gap which needs to be addressed when it comes to creating a
conducive support system that will allow women to deal with two most
competitive priorities of their lives—family and career. Like every
other industry, this impacts the channel too. But the reason for even
abysmal numbers amongst channel is not difficult to fathom. The
pitiable working conditions in most IT hubs-notwithstanding face="Times New Roman, serif">The
DQ Week size="3">campaigns
like Nehru
Place
ko chamkao size="3">-the
situation is most cities still beggars description. Unhygienic and
unsafe working conditions-many companies do not even have separate
female lavatories, and presence of dubious elements in many of these
IT hubs-discourages more females from entering the channel fray.
Speaking
to several channel partners what comes out is that they are not
averse to hiring more women in their workforce. So you cannot accuse
them of being chauvinists, but in many cases they have been lethargic
to improve some of the conditions that are dissuading women from
joining their fraternity. A real tragedy since most men now
appreciate (and that includes our channel partner brethren) that the
world should have been a much worse place (and infinitely much
duller) without women. And most men in the corporate world at least I
am sure would readily acknowledge that their workplaces are now much
enlivened by the presence of their female colleagues. So why are our
partners missing out the pleasure of increasing intermingling of the
sexes in the workplace? If
not the channel partners themselves, then at least face="Times New Roman, serif">The
DQ Week size="3">,
the champion of channel causes for a generation, has been proactive
on this front. size="3">The
DQ Week size="3">
team has always been strong on the femme fatale front and the
tradition continues. Currently more than half our workforce is women
and I will be the first to admit they are doing a damn good job. So
if The
DQ
Week
has been successful in aligning Mars and Venus, we can expect our
partners will also do so in the near future.