On the occasion of International Women’s Day 2022, Rashna Seli ZAROO, Senior Group Manager, Technology R&D, India, STMicroelectronics spoke with Vaishali Umredkar of Electronics Maker about women leadership, gender diversity and key challenges for women in India.
Tell us about yourself and your journey in the industry.
I joined STMicroelectronics almost 22 years ago as a fresh engineering graduate in Electronics and Communication.
During my two decades in ST India, I have grown through various leadership positions in R&D and got numerous opportunities to collaborate across multiple domains in engineering.
I have partnered with people across multiple sites to work on innovative technology projects that can make a positive difference to people’s life. I have also been a site-level facilitator for various technical and leadership programs and a leadership development coach.
ST strongly believes that a diverse workforce and an inclusive work environment increases performance and bring value to business through effective innovation, engagement, attractiveness, and agility. The global strategy focuses on three pillars that will drive numerous programs at both company and local levels: striving for a diverse workforce, supporting career development, and developing an inclusive culture. As a part of this culture, I have held different roles in ST – R&D engineer , people leader, Transformation Specialist, Coach, Mentor and trainer.
How do you achieve work life balance?
To me, this concept is not a challenge. I see my work as an integral part of my life that has enriched me as a person. My family has always been understanding of my career aspirations and supported me in it. There also have been situations when my personal life needed more attention and I have been fortunate to have a supportive workplace that gave me the freedom to prioritize my personal commitments. I see my work & personal life as complementing each other and hence able to achieve this balance and recommend ST as a best places to work, learn and grow.
Working with ST, I learnt to balance and progress in the workplace and received opportunities to succeed through challenging projects and other forms of amazing work experiences. Gender diversity has been one of ST’s key priority and many policies and constructive actions have been undertaken in that direction. Most of the practices have evolved over a period based on research and feedback from the employees. This helps employees to keep a work life balance
What would you say are the main challenges facing women at present in India?
In Indian context, we still see a low percentage of women active in leadership roles. As per data, just 21% adult Indian women are engaged in full/part time work as compared to Western workplaces who have three times higher female workforce. India is a young nation with 65% population below the age of 35 years. There is so much unfulfilled potential out there and a lot of work can be done on how women can participate in workforce.
We need to systematically address roadblocks and make them feel comfortable. Also, entrepreneurship is an area that we should promote and encourage women to become role models.
To increase women participation in workforce we also need to create platforms at workplace that support them in this journey. Once such recent initiative at ST India is the S.H.E. Platform (Share.Help.Empower). Under this program. senior women leaders are volunteering mentoring time for multiple proteges, and this is already giving us a Diversity choice for our future leadership at ST India. I am a part of this initiative and feel a sense of confidence and belief that such initiatives will help women undertake the many challenges that are inherently part of strong technical organization like ST.
Where do you want to see yourself in next 5 years?
As a constant endeavor to progress, I hope to gather new experiences and handle complex situations and significantly contribute to the technology industry- locally and globally. I also hope to be able to spend some time on mastering my coaching skills and use it as a tool to support ST colleagues.
What would you change about the world for women if you could?
As a woman, we need to be more confident about ourselves and take informed decisions while facing a challenge. Women needs should be addressed by the organizations by creating an innovative and high-growth environment. As a society, we need to support women around us and encourage them to take more ownership of their decisions. Gender diversity and equality need to be brought into daily conversations in our society – whether in workplace or homes. What gives me hope today, is the realization that, more and more leaders, managers, and people in society and in the workplaces are starting to move the needle beyond where we are and it’s very inspiring and humbling.
