On Teacher’s Day, we look at Special Education, an inviting career choice for those keen on making a difference.

Collated by Aparna V. Singh

With a rising awareness of Disability, at least in urban India, teachers keen on working with innovative teaching methodologies have great opportunity in this field.

On the occasion of Teacher’s Day, we asked a number of teachers who work with special children, especially those with developmental disabilities, to talk about their work. What drives them? What is their work day like? How do they deal with the challenges their work throws at them? Read on to find out!  Continue reading →

Work from home jobs offering returns for little work are tempting. In reality, many women fall victim to work from home scams.

By Kiran Manral

With many women opting out of the traditional workplace and looking for alternative work options, infinite work from home scams have sprung up over the past few years which have conned women out of time, effort and even money. According to the cyber crimes cell, at any given point there are around 300 work from home scams making the rounds of the internet, most of them targeting mothers who want to work from home or retired people.

How do you distinguish between legitimate work at home jobs and work at home scams? Here are five work from home scams you should avoid, and some tips to launch your work from home career.

Filling Online Surveys: The most recent example of online survey scams is the Speak Asia scam . A friend with a three month old had enrolled in the Speak Asia scheme despite niggling doubts, simply because she saw others in her family join. She says, “It did seem too good. Pay Rs 11,000 up front and get paid Rs 1000 for two short online surveys per week. And the ads were all over, which convinced me that maybe all was well with the company.”
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With more Indian women taking up jobs outside the country, negotiating new cultures at work becomes essential.

By Aparna V. Singh

Traditionally, most Indian women moving abroad did so as trailing spouses, following the husband. The major challenges in settling abroad were usually to do with raising children and running the household in a new country. With more working women going out of the country either alone or with family, navigating a new workplace culture and focusing on one’s own career growth in a different environment has also become imperative.

Here are some learnings shared by Indian women who’ve gone out to work in different parts of the globe.
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Although more Indian women are now employed in formal work environments, how women friendly are our office spaces?

By Dipika Singh

There has been a steady rise in the number of Indian women in the workforce over the last few decades. While this has resulted in added opportunities for women , more families with a double income and has helped the economy with literally an extra pair of working hands, have our work spaces been able to keep pace with the needs and expectations of women? More importantly, is there are even an acknowledgement of the fact that our work spaces may not be women friendly?

“The washroom is common and so dirty. There have been times when I’ve walked across to a mall to use the loo.”

Praneeta Deshpande* works with a travel company based out of Mumbai. The company is facing a space crunch and has placed employees across satellite offices 2-3 kilometers from the main building. Praneeta is based out of one such building. There are 2 departments working out of this office and the majority of the employees are men. The trouble is that there is a common washroom for both men and women at this place.

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How To Make Your Office Space Greener

Saving our planet is the key phrase on everybody’s lips these days. Can you contribute your bit to sustainable development?

By Melanie Lobo

Green power or green technologies are now a trend fast catching on worldwide. You may have even replaced household cleaners with organic ones in your bid to help the environment, but what about at work? Whether you have a home office, or work in a big company, consider making your office more environmentally friendly. Doing this can actually save you and your company money (and win you brownie points!

Here are some ideas to make your office space greener:

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Work-from-home may seem like a panacea for working mothers, but evaluate whether it is right for your situation.

By Aparna V. Singh

Once upon a time, you either commuted to your workplace and worked 9 to 5, or you stayed a homemaker. There was no possibility of dipping into both worlds. Today, technology allows for many jobs to be performed from remote locations and ‘work from home’ is one of the flexible work formats becoming popular. Whether as an arrangement with your employer, or as a self-employed person working from home, it makes sense especially for people with young children or the elderly to care for.

And let’s face it – most of this care-giving is usually done by women, which is why working from home is especially attractive to women. But, is a work-from-home arrangement suitable for everyone? Here are a few things to think about before you furnish your home office!

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“Flex” careers are becoming popular world over, but the responsibility for creating them does not lie just with employers.

By Sairee Chahal

Whether it is taking care of babies, pets, homes or the elderly – worldwide, the majority of that responsibility lies with women, and more so in India. However, women also need to work, more than ever before – for various reasons – fulfillment, money, career, independence etc. Women are making more work-life choices and picking those that suit their individual needs.

A flexible career or a workflex role is one of the many choices that women make, one that allows them to find a match between their professional and personal roles. However, making flexible work – work for you – is an opportunity and a challenge. Opportunity because it allows one to find a good fit, challenge, because it needs one to consistently learn and unlearn.

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Given the unique challenges women at work face, having the example and support of female colleagues can definitely help their careers.

By Aparna V. Singh

While the mistakes that female bosses make take on a life of their own, rarely do the praises of women who help each other in the workplace get sung. As in other spheres, phrases like “women are women’s worst enemies” are often repeated. However, if one refuses to buy into the stereotype of ambitious women as cats waiting to pounce on each other, it is worth exploring whether women can support each other in what is often still, a ‘man’s workplace’.

The linear workplace, based on the assumption that workers (by default, male) will place work at the center of their lives and advance steadily up the ladder rarely works for women who have their own biological and social challenges. There are other issues too – top management in most companies still tends to be male-dominated, and women often get left out of the old boys’ network that gives access to those in power. As Cherie Blair recently said, “Fifty percent of the people are appointed on a board because they know the chairman…and it’s a chair-MAN.”

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While physical contact is easy to categorise as harassment, other forms are laughed away or ignored. It’s time to start talking!

By Kiran Manral

At different kinds of workplaces, including the so-called ‘elite’ or corporate ones, many women experience uncomfortable episodes which they’re not sure really “qualify” as harassment. With workplace harassment laws in their infancy in India, almost every woman has some such story to tell, but one that is rarely told openly – for various reasons. In some cases, it is sexual harassment but there is no direct physical contact or explicit demand for sexual favours; instead – the woman faces a stream of suggestive innuendo, inappropriate jokes and talk. Other forms of harassment might be non-sexual but sexist nevertheless – such as keeping a woman out of a project, making derogatory remarks or decrying her capability to handle tasks based on her gender.

If the woman tries to take this to the boss or make a formal complaint to the HR Department, few companies in India take this seriously enough to act on them, though according to the HR professionals we spoke with, this is definitely changing. To help us all acknowledge that harassment exists in many forms, not just the physical, we spoke to a few women in the workforce for their stories.

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While the benefits of flexibility at work, for both employers and employees, are accepted in theory, why do employers hesitate to implement?

By Sairee Chahal

(Sairee Chahal is Co-Founder, Fleximoms. Fleximoms works towards creating, enhancing and co-creating workflex opportunities for women professionals. It also helps organizations harness flexibility as a value driver. Co-founder, SAITA Consulting Pvt. Ltd, a management consulting firm focussed on SMBs, member of the CII Committee on MSMEs, a visiting faculty at IIFT, New Delhi and mother of a 3-year-old, Sairee is your regular Fleximom.)

Our lives are complicated and our work not getting simpler. Any clued in business leader agrees that Flexibility at Work is an imperative – something that needs to stay on the business radar. Businesses and employees realize that money is important but creativity, freedom and innovation are critical to bringing in that money.

US President Obama recently said in an address that workplace flexibility is an issue that impacts the success of our businesses and the well-being of our families.

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