Meenakshi Vashisht is the Founder & CEO at TekUncorked based in India. She believes that while successful women may have beaten odds to get there, they should be forthcoming to accelerate change.
What according to you are the successes of gender equality movement which gathered momentum towards the end of the last decade?
There are definitely few stereotypes which have been broken successfully. Women stepping out of their homes to work. Women entering in spheres primarily dominated by men like sports.
At the start of this decade, what would be your three priorities for gender equal workplaces?
- Women Entrepreneurship
- Opportunity for Women in all spheres
- Support for women to ease access to resources (eg work for home support for a new mother)
How important is the role of men in this movement and what according to you should organisations do to involve them?
Extremely important. Men need to be seen as an ally, a strong support and facilitator in helping create gender equal workplace.
How important is the concept of “Sisterhood” in accelerating change?
Successful women generally do not align with other women at workplace. They often do not step up to mentor, guide and handhold other women. Probably, because they reached where they did beating all odds during a painstaking and a very tough journey and they often feel that it’s unfair to give others the advantage that they never got. A spirit of sisterhood will help newer generations to learn from others who had traversed a similar path before them and definitely accelerate change.
Do you think we need a young champion like Greta Thunberg for this cause as well?
Why Not? It’s important to create a global movement of sorts to accelerate change.