Rise of women entrepreneurs: A definitive step towards gender equality
Women are confidently taking on leadership roles in all sectors of the economy, here’s a look at the factors that are responsible for the success of women.
By India Today Web Desk: Women across the world are stepping out of the obscurity of hearth and home and taking on leadership roles in the positions previously considered an exclusively male domain. The times are changing for the better. The feminist wave that began a century ago at the suffrage parades for women’s right to vote in the west has turned into a roaring tide of women empowerment in the 21st century. Women are increasingly making their presence felt in every field of social, economic, and political activity. They are sportspersons, astronauts, political leaders, artists, scientists, educators, innovators, and entrepreneurs.
Age-old stereotypes are now being broken in the echelons of power and boardrooms of the corporate world. The likes of Indira Nooyi, Kiran Mazumdar Shah, Priya Kaul, Falguni Nayar, Ritu Kumar and many others have blazed the trail for women entrepreneurs in India.
The 6th Economic Census by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation reveals that out of the total entrepreneurs in India, 14% are women. Though it’s not a staggering figure, if you look at the dismal numbers of the past decades, you realize that women in India have come a long way, but they still have far to go.
What’s behind a successful woman?
Behind every successful man, there is..We all know the cliché. But let’s flip it and ask: what’s behind a successful woman?
Education
Education has been a great leveller in gender equality. The democratization of education has empowered women with knowledge and skills to take up roles and responsibilities that were long regarded beyond their ken.
Loosening stranglehold of patriarchy
In a globalized modern world, local cultures are perpetually exposed to values and viewpoints that are contrastingly different yet unavoidable. This has loosened the stranglehold of patriarchy in the cultures where the male was held superior in all respects.
Rise of Feminism
Women feel empowered and emboldened to assert themselves and call out the injustices against them, as reflected so well in the ‘Me Too’ movement that has caused a tectonic shift towards more gender equality in the last decade.
Merit over gender
There’s been a change in the criterion of professional performance evaluation. Merit is now being put over gender and women are now considered better equipped to manage and drive organizations with human and ethical touch.
Family Support
Support of kin both male and female helps women to switch smoothly from her role as a homemaker to a thoroughbred professional.
No cause for complacency
Women are doubtlessly doing better than before, but there’s still a lot of ground for them to cover. Worldwide trends during the coronavirus lockdown reveal that women workers and entrepreneurs were more susceptible to losing their jobs or businesses than their male counterparts.
In India, women contribute towards only 17% of GDP despite constituting nearly half of the population. As per the Sixth Economic Census, 90% of women entrepreneurs run microenterprises and about 79% have to self-finance their businesses. Lack of income parity with men still remains a big issue for women at workplaces. In a nutshell, the picture is not as rosy as one would expect.
Building an equitable future
An equal role for women is not just good for society, but for the economy as well. A global analysis by McKinsey reveals that employment of women in roles identical to that of men could add up to 28 trillion dollars to the global economy by 2025. While that may still be wishful thinking, real changes can be initiated right now to ensure greater women presence in entrepreneurship. Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) by NITI Aayog is a commendable initiative in this direction. If not a giant leap, it will help women take a definitive step towards an equitable society and future.
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