Women in India lead globally at receiving workplace growth opportunities, says survey

Women in India are looking for growth opportunities and feel ready to take on more responsibility within the company, a global study by Hewlett-Packard Inc said. Accordingly, India also emerged as a country with the highest number of women who applied for promotions within the company, it said.

The HP Global IWD Pulse Survey was conducted among a sample of over 6,200 adults in the US, UK, Canada, Mexico, and India.

About 92 percent of women respondents in India confirmed receiving a promotion in 2021 as compared to 40 and 63 percent respondents from the US and UK, respectively, in the same period.

In fact, Indian women also surpassed their male counterparts (68 percent). Higher salaries and a greater influence within the company were primary factors behind wanting a promotion in India, the report revealed.

Nearly 40 percent of Indian employees stayed in their companies as they were optimistic about growth opportunities, it said, adding that it observed a similar trend among the respondents in Mexico.

In India, one out of three employees cited a better work-life balance, more autonomy, and higher salaries as the top reasons to leave a company.

While most global counterparts were willing to stay for higher salaries, 53 percent of Indian employees preferred greater work flexibility over higher salaries for retention.

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Interestingly, about 65 percent of Indian employees strongly felt companies have become more proactive in combatting gender discrimination than before.

Many employees expressed a hybrid model for women employees would be possibly better as it would allow for both in-person time and flexibility. The hybrid work model also appealed to Gen Z in India (41 percent), while Gen Z in the UK (46 percent) prefered an in-person model.

Ketan Patel, Managing Director, HP-India, said, “At HP, we believe in giving equal growth opportunities to all our employees. The company aims to achieve 50/50 gender equality in HP leadership by 2030. We are happy to see how more women are aspiring to take on leadership positions in India, coupled with the efforts made by corporations to create an inclusive environment that enables everyone to do their best work”.

In 2017, HP launched the ‘Disha’ initiative — a six-month blended learning programme — to build the leadership pipeline for HP and addresses the complex social challenge of ‘women leader’ representation in the corporate sector.