Enframed

Women in Business at ISB

Saloni Singh and Anu Kohli are presidents of the Women in Business (WIB) club in Hyderabad and Mohali respectively. This is an excerpt of an interview with them.   

What prompted you to lead WIB?

Saloni Singh: My biggest motivation was the statistic – only 3.6% of CEOs of the Fortune 500 companies are women. I didn’t understand it. It confused and worried me until I realised that there were three main reasons:

First, there are not too many women at the top, which means that a woman aspiring to reach the top in the corporate world usually lacks support, inspiration and resources. We needed to create a strong network of women that we can learn from and work together to reach the top.  

Second, the reason that most women don’t reach the top is simply because they choose not to! At some point in their professional career they become the victims of myths such as “You have to choose between work and family” or “the glass ceiling is too strong to crack.” There is an urgent need to bust these myths. Women worldwide need to be inspired, they need to believe that they are meant to be leaders and that they too can reach the top.

Finally, I felt that the corporate world is still a man’s world. Firms need to actively create an environment that is conducive to women’s needs.

This analysis led to my broad objectives for the year – Create a strong network for WIB members, break the myths, inspire women and create opportunities for corporate leadership.

Anu Kohli:  I see the club as a support network for women, to encourage them to pursue their professional careers, without giving up their personal and family lives. The WIB club serves as a platform that supports women to pursue business careers by providing inspiration through not only thought leaders, but also fellow women leaders, and by providing them with a forum, where they can discuss these work-life balance issues and other such workplace problems.
My motivation to spearhead the WIB club lies in this fundamental basis for the club. Besides that, founding the club at the Mohali campus presented its own challenges, but was also very exciting.

Students have always felt that their year at ISB transforms them. Do you feel that the time here has also helped break some gender stereotypes?

Saloni Singh: Absolutely! When I became president I was surprised by the bias that I faced –both from the men and women in class! There was ambiguity on who the club was for – young women felt that this was a place where married women complained about work-life balance, married women in the class did not see how this club could benefit them, and finally most men viewed this club with some suspicion and amusement.  I realised that while I was the president of a club - I did not have any members!   

As soon as I became president I made three changes: First, I created and announced a position for a male vice president, this proved that we were serious about diversity. Second, by inviting the unconventional Aditi Mittal, India’s first female stand-up comedian, to inaugurate the club, we established that we celebrate all women achievers irrespective of their backgrounds. Finally, with fellow student Karthik Parthasarthy’s help, we redesigned the WIB logo and gave it a new image. We caught everybody’s attention, gained their respect, and have never looked back since!

Anu Kohli: Yes, absolutely! Gender stereotypes exist in every culture and they can be very deep-rooted as well. However, given the diversity of our class, the ISB experience introduced us to people from different work environments.
But you also see people working together in every field – whether for classwork and projects, or in sports fields and tennis courts. Moreover, having a high percentage of women in the student body is very motivating for other women to continue to pursue their ambitions and professional careers. 

Do you have any lessons for the incoming class?

Saloni Singh: Life at ISB will not allow you to do everything. You will have to choose. So choose wisely. If you blindly follow someone else’s, dissatisfaction is bound to follow. Also, If you are good at something then I’m sure you’ll find someone here who is at least 50% better. It is a humbling experience but sometimes it can be intimidating. Remember not to lose yourself. Find your niche and work at it. Finally, chase the subjects you hate the most. You will learn the most there. Learn to enjoy feeling dumb. I was a non-engineer-graduate-in-psychology with a phobia of numbers when I started the year, I felt dumb quite often. Yet I can definitely look back and say that I learnt a lot!

Anu Kohli: Start early and pursue anything that you set your mind to. Only you have the power to make it happen. Everyone else will come together to provide the resources you need. Take the initiative and engage people. However, be focused and don’t spread yourself too thin.

For more information on WIB and their activities, please read