INTERNATIONAL WOMENS DAY FOCUS
Bangalore, March 8 2019: Earlier this week, Infosys hosted  a panel discussion – Innovate for Change, on addressing challenges and opportunities in supporting the role of women as agents of change.
The panellists were: Priti Shetty, Director of HR, Applied Sciences and Technology at Flipkart,Yamini Koganti, Associate Vice President, HR at Swiggy and Aruna Newton, Global Head- Diversity and Inclusion at Infosys, who came together to discuss how women in today’s corporate world  are driving change, innovation, and business while accelerating profits and enhancing culture.
Key points made:
Developing an ecosystem that supports and guides women: Priti Shetty: Flipkart is India's largest e-commerce market place and we serve a very diverse set of customers from across the country. We have something called a ‘mom on board’ program, which is essentially bringing mothers together to talk about issues. But more importantly, it becomes a very important feedback channel so we can tweak our policies, make them more relevant and keep up with the times rather than somebody sitting in an ivory tower and crafting something out. We also make sure that our male colleagues are involved and are participating in the whole process.
Bringing women back into the workforce: Aruna Newton:  we championed the maternity amendment act and the extension of paid maternity leave to 24 weeks.  The implementation of the same involves a two pronged approach that includes childcare support as well as a sharp focus on the effective integration of women back to work.  Towards this, we’ve created infrastructure at all developmental centers that we call the Mom’s Net -  a comfortable ‘space’ for women coming back. Mom’s Net enables new and expecting mothers stay abreast of new technologies and equip them with skills.  It also offers regular sessions on career pathing and experience sharing with senior leaders and a great space to build a supportive buddy network. In addition to this, moms also have access to the Infosys IMother App that helps them stay connected, relevant and inspired through this important phase of their personal and professional life.
|Inspiring Workforce: Yamini Koganti: Being the largest and fastest growing food tech company, we have a sizeable population of young workforce with a lot of energy. We use this to fix problems which have never been solved before. They do it in their own way without getting boxed with the traditional rules and systems. We give them opportunities in new business spaces under a supervisor so that they naturally groom themselves. It is not structured but I think keeping it not structured and keeping it agile is helping right now. We also have an intensive program to get women on the ground as delivery executives. There is a lot of planning and co-ordination that has gone into it. From considering safezones from where women delivery executives can deliver to looking at the hours they work and their timing so that you are setting them up for success at the end of the day