In an inspiring conversation with Tech Achieve Media, Aditi Nair, Chief People Officer at Practus, shares her perspective on Women’s Day and its significance in fostering gender equality in the workplace. Highlighting the unique strengths women bring to both personal and professional spaces, Aditi emphasizes the importance of using this occasion not just for celebration but for reflection and action. From breaking biases to ensuring equitable opportunities, Aditi shares actionable strategies to support women in leadership, address workplace challenges, and leverage technology for inclusive transformation.
Her powerful mantra? “Invest and Advocate”
TAM: What does Women’s Day mean to you personally, and how do you believe it contributes to advancing the conversation on gender equality in the workplace?
Aditi Nair: Women’s Day is a time to celebrate! Celebrate women and all that they bring to our lives – both on the personal and professional aspects. A time to appreciate and recognise the resilience, empathy, achievements and contributions that women bring to our workplace. As we celebrate this day, it’s also a time to reflect on how gender equality is still a work-in-progress initiative for all of us. While we may be focussed on achieving mandated gender-hiring KPIs, we also need to reflect on a few important aspects like addressing their access to leadership roles, ensuring competitive pay, creating an inclusive & nurturing work environment. As leaders, on Women’s Day, we should take a pause and reset our gender equality agenda to encompass these aspects.
TAM: Honing women in leadership roles requires a mindset Change. What specific actions or initiatives do you think organizations can take to better support women in leadership roles?
Aditi Nair: Women in leadership are likely to face additional challenges compared to their counterparts! These usually include gender biases in decision making, continuous need to build credibility and balancing career growth with personal goals & responsibilities. I feel there are 3 key areas that we need to work on to enhance support to women in leadership roles:
Elevating mentorship to sponsorship: We need to take a step-up in our mentoring journey with women leaders. Women need advocates – individuals who can push them upwards, provide necessary support and open doors for them when opportunities arise. It is important to identify and align women to projects that have high visibility, roles that have strategic importance and sponsorship for women will provide exactly that!
Upskilling women for future ready roles: It is imperative to ensure women are trained on emerging skills – functional or technical. With automation, AI, and digital transformation reshaping industries, it’s essential that women are given the tools to thrive in these areas.
Making diversity a leadership KPI: It is important to move diversity KPIs from the HR function to leadership to make it happen in the true sense. Accountability and inclusion matrices need to be percolated to leadership and their one down and should be reviewed alongwith other business KPIs for better implementation.
TAM: What role do you think technology can play in addressing conscious and subconscious biases, and how can leaders like you influence this change?
Aditi Nair: Technology is only as good as people responsible for implementation. In this data driven technology era, if the underlying data reflects societal biases, AI can reinforce them instead of eliminating them. This is where leadership plays a crucial role—we must ensure that digital transformation is inclusive from the ground up.
AI-Powered Recruitment and Promotions: Organizations can use AI-driven hiring tools that evaluate candidates purely on skills and performance, eliminating bias from the screening process.
Data-Driven Pay Equity Audits: Compensation decisions should be backed by analytics, ensuring that pay gaps are identified and corrected proactively.
Bias Detection in Performance Reviews: AI can help analyze performance feedback to detect language patterns that indicate bias.
TAM: As a woman leader, what challenges have you faced in your journey, and how have they shaped your leadership style?
Aditi Nair: I have been fortunate to be surrounded by colleagues, managers and mentors who have been invested in my growth. I have learned that embracing my individuality has helped me in my leadership journey. By not fitting into a pre-defined mould, I have been able to build my identity which is empathetic, strategic & impact focussed. I thrive on the relationships, partnerships I have built over the years.
Also read: From Awareness to Action – How AI is Driving a Health Revolution for Women
In this journey, there have been challenges on the way – both professional and personal. Being part of the corporate world, the biggest challenge has been in dealing with office politics stemming from weak value & cultural anchors. In such scenarios, you have to double down and persevere on the path you have set for yourself. Learning from these experiences, I ensure that my team and the organization at large has a “safe workplace” – a place where they can be themselves without fear, feel safe while expressing themselves and have the necessary support if they have any concerns. Another challenge that I have faced is in managing conflicting priorities and the roles that you are required to play daily, not just at work but also with family. A little flexibility and some empathy go a long way in making it easy for people to deal with balancing priorities when faced with such situations.
TAM: If you could share one message with women around the world on this Women’s Day, what would it be?
Aditi Nair: I have 1 simple thought that I feel will make a difference to women – Invest & Advocate! Invest in yourself and advocate deserving women. Invest in learning, growing, taking up challenges and networking. Pass on the good deed by advocating deserving women for new roles, interesting projects, learning opportunities. Lift yourself and pull others up alongwith you. Women’s Day (just like any other day) cannot be a 1 day celebration, but just a start point or a moment of reflection to move forward! Upwards & Onwards, friends.
