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Want to get back to work after a break? Here are 12 companies with return-to-work programs that you should explore. Marriage, maternity, and mobility are three major factors that pull women out from their career track most of the time. Women then struggle to get back to their career. In return, the work force loses its diversity quotient. Women at work need to be nurtured more. Skills of professional women could be better utilised in a fast developing economy like India if they can return to work after the breaks they willingly take to support their families.
The last few years have seen companies introspect this scenario and examine the loss due to the untimely exit of capable women from work spaces. The Indian government has placed strong policies specifically for maternity and government organizations also take care of the transfers for spouses to accompany their family move.
Recently, proposals are raised to increase the period of maternity leave. It would be good if more emphasis is given on opening child care facilities in the office premises so that mothers don’t need to be home bound and continue to work. In the private sector, many companies are also coming up with programs to bring back the women who took breaks from their career. Here is a list of return to work programs from 12 companies in India.
This is a stage for women employees to return to work, after a break in their career. This internship provides necessary support and training for women who were on a break and who want to restart their careers. The applicants need to have at least 3 to 6 years of relevant experience in their specific domains.
This program began in January 2014 and offers a 6-month internship to women who have been out of the work force for a year or more and are interested in the digital advertising space.
Through this program, Godrej offers live business projects to women who have professional experience of at last 2 years in the fields of Manufacturing, Engineering, Sales and Marketing, Operations, Human Resources, Architecture and Interior Design, Legal and Audit, Finance and Accounting, and Strategy and General Management. The candidate should have taken a continuous break of more than 6 months. The projects are available in Mumbai and Pune.
This career transition program offers projects to women professionals who have taken a break of 6 months or more, and are willing to return to work with increased flexibility. The age limit for application is 50. SCIP adds new projects for its women throughout the year.
The Restart Program at GE’s John F Welch Technology Centre, located in Bangalore, focuses on hiring women scientists and engineers who are on career breaks. They also offer flexible timings and work from home opportunities to make it easy for women working at GE in the first place.
HLL supports a woman who was on a career break to return to full-time work by providing her flexible options in various capacities, including functions like Sales & Marketing, Human Resources, Supply Chain and Research and Development.
IBM’s Bring Her Back program aims to attract women from mid-career breaks. Women professionals with the required skill-sets and who have taken career breaks spanning 3 years or less can apply.
Axis Bank’s program offers return to career options specifically to its own former bank female employees who have left the system and who otherwise have restrictions in the terms of number of positions and locations that are available to them.
This is not specifically a return to work program but through this initiative launched in 2014, Microsoft wants to reach one million more Indian women to encourage them to take up IT as a career filed, or to learn new skills in IT to stay put in the domain.
Women with a minimum of 3 years of experience, currently on career breaks and looking for full-time jobs in technical fields, are invited to apply for this program. They have opportunities available in major metropolitan cities.
The Department of Science and Technology in India provides opportunities through scholarships to women scientists and technologists in the age group of 30-50 years, women who are willing to return to mainstream science and work as bench-level scientists. These women need to associate with an institute and a group to collaborate for the space and laboratory facilities.
As far as companies with return-to-work programs are concerned, this is one of the very popular ones. Career 2.0 aims at roping in qualified women who are on a break and who want to rejoin work. It will offer flexible and family-friendly schedules and work structures for women, under various mid-level and senior-level capacities.
Do you know of other back-to-work programs for women? Do let us know in the comments section below.
Image via Shutterstock.
A science researcher finding ways into broader science careers. A women enthusiast to the core
I agree with Garvita.Many times, the women are given roles very different from what they pursued an education in.There is no connection between work experience & education.In that case, what does one do ?
Hi VASRAO, It is great to see that this article is invoking these thoughts among us and that is very important for we women who want to go back to work after any break. Any break we take puts a risk on our career track and we still take that as that remains the only possible way for most of us in certain times of our lives. After a break often our CVs are nullified and we are asked to start from scratch in a different domain or are offered jobs with lower pay scales compared to our strengths. It is a catch 22 situation and we women need to find a way thorough it. I personally have kept my CV rolling while in a break by networking, volunteering, and getting trained in the areas where I wanted to be in future. Most of the time while in a break our career domain goes through many changes and we remain unaware of it and that gives the employers a chance to bargain. We need to research whether our existing skills are valid any more in the job market or not. For me it worked that I stayed close to the community and remained aware of whats going on in the field. So when I am offered a job I can take a call whether I would like to go with that or not. Often flexibility is what I asked for in lieu of low pay as that helped me to balance with my increased family responsibilities. We need to be practical while asking for a job after a break and think about the freshers in the job market who are technically often more savvy than us, ready to work longer hours and in less money, so what is the difference we are going to provide to the employer as a job seeker. A thoughtful plan on how you are going to work on the role if it is provided to you often helps the employer negate their concerns about you. Awareness about the existing challenges in the role we are applying for and discussion on how we can face those challenges are best way to enter back.
Is there any kind of program that can help lawyers come back after a break.
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