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G Naga Sridhar
For women leaders who want to make their presence felt in boardrooms, help is on the way.
The Indian School of Business (ISB) is gearing up to launch a specially designed programme for women independent directors to coach them in both business and non-business related matters.
“We want to contribute to diversity in business management and workplace by encouraging women leaders. A core group of experts will work on designing a special programme for women directors so that they can be independent and empowered,’’ Rajendra Srivastava, Dean, ISB told BusinessLine.
Asked how women directors are different from their male counterparts in boardrooms, Srivastava said that there are certain gender-related issues and constraints for women directors such as higher stress in voicing opposition.
In addition to financial analytics and business concepts, ISB will teach them how to cope with stress and how to ignore the glass ceiling, according to Srivastava.
While he still holds cards close to its chest about the specifics of the programme, there are many issues that women face.
As per the recent estimates of the Women on Corporate Boards (WCB) Mentorship programme and the Institutional Investor Advisory Services, the average tenure on company boards for women is 4.6 years against 9 years for men among the Nifty 500 companies.
The findings of a November study, Corporate governance and risk transfer: A survey on perceptions of women leaders in the National Capital Region, by the BIMTECH and Raheja QBE General Insurance Company Ltd are also worth noting.
The survey of 650 corporate leaders finds that most of the women leaders faced ‘Trust Deficit’ from colleagues. Gender stereotypes, stress related to pregnancy and other biological functions also figured prominently.
Srivastava said that “The proposed course is also a part of initiatives to step up focus on women in various ways. We will also increase intake of women candidates progressively in our programmes.’’
As of now, ISB has 35 per cent women candidates in its post-graduate programme.
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