Women on Top: Diversity, Inclusion, Pipeline Leak & More (Podcast)

“It’s that month of the year when we reserve a day to celebrate women.At UpsideLMS we are taking it a step ahead and celebrating all of March asWomen’s Month. No surprises then that this podcast is dedicated to women power.We will be talking about Diversity, Inclusion, Pipeline Leak, GenderSensitization, Returnship & more. So there it is – a podcast by women, forwomen and of women.”

I say this with a wide smileacross my face. We are recording our all-women podcast with four women thatrepresent UpsideLMS in their roles of ProductSpecialist, Technical Support Manager, Sales Manager and PreSales Manager.

It’s a day I have been waitingfor. To be honest, it’s an opportunity I have been dying to carve out for ourwomen talent.

The gender bender

Being born a girl was special – whatwith the cuddles, kisses and other open displays of affection from loved ones.But the ‘special’ gave way to ‘different’ when I entered my teens. Rules changed,curfews surfaced. My rebellious mind could make no sense of the differentialtreatment and expectations attached to genders. No respite was offered at theworkplace too as gender-oriented rules played in even more. Years later, Ibecame a mom to a beautiful boy and what should have been my privilege soonbecame my prison. As the primary caregiver to my child, I experienced howcrippled the society (and culture) made a woman as it “expected” her to behave ina certain way. The pattern repeated and story in my headsoon changed to ‘being born a girl is being treated different’.

That I had great family support,mentors, bosses, friends and loved ones who refused to see my gender butappreciated my talent empowered me to unsee myself from the gender-lens. But asa woman who has been a workplace minority, the only girl in an all-boys MBAclass, had to avail, extend and return after a maternity leave with a chippedself-confidence, had to explain to “seeming” well-wishers why I chose work overmy baby (yes, have done this a million times!), had to work in an environmentthat celebrated men by belittling women through gender-colored jokes at thewatercooler or the lunch table, have been the only woman with a seat at thetable, I am well aware of the work cut out for me and other women – on both,the home and the professional front. We owe it to the next generation.

While there is a lot we, parents and society as a whole, can do in termsof sensitizing our boys and raising them with a humane aspect, and raising ourgirls to voice their opinions and raise their hands, businesses to play a keyrole in making the workplace a level playing field for all genders. We focus onthe latter’s Learning & Development piece in our Women’s Month specialpodcast ‘Womenon Top: Diversity, Inclusion, Pipeline Leak & More’.

Listen to the full episode tolearn:

• What can businesses, L&D in particular, doto crack the code for Diversity and Inclusion through training interventions
• How can L&D address returnship
• Importance of soft skills and hard skills forthe workplace of today and tomorrow
• Importance of holistic, broad-based traininginterventions that sensitizes and encourages men to have a better buy-in toD&I

‘Let’s Talk Learn-Tech’ isavailable on https://www.upsidelms.com/podcastand can be accessed on mobile phone via Podbean’s iOS and Android App. Follow‘Let’s Talk Learn-Tech’ on https://upsidelms.podbean.com/to ensure you get the latest podcast – on the day of the release!