Research Shows More Women Willing To Work: Here’s What Organizations Can Do

Take a look at the women in your family. Chances are you will find women in a variety of roles – homemakers, entrepreneurs, salaried employees, students, and maybe even women on career breaks. You will notice that their employment status varies but do you know what remains common?

Their aim of establishing their identities! 

Regardless of their employment status, the aspirations of Indian women have been, and are, rooted in growth. With a female literacy rate of 70% in India and the opportunities brought in by digitization, Indian markets can do more to support women professionally. 

At Women’s Web, we researched what women want from the Indian market. Our respondents varied in employment profiles and included students, homemakers, self-employed women, salaried women, and women on a career break. We delved into their broad goals, challenges, and needs, to analyze how the Indian market can help them climb the career ladder. 

What women want

We surveyed 201 respondents to gain insight into an integral question- what are women’s professional priorities? Here’s what we found. 

84% of women have ‘making more income’ as their first goal. 54% looked forward to collaborating with others to exchange ideas or promote their products and services. 35% of women (of which 13% were homemakers) were ready to take on new job opportunities. All women across employment categories want their talent to gain wider recognition. 

Women today want to leverage their personalities through their brands. How can organizations and communities like Women’s Web help contributors grow professionally? Here’s an insight. 

As the country’s largest user-generated content platform, Women’s Web has encouraged women across social and employment categories (including homemakers, students, and women on career breaks) to share their experiences, opinions, and learnings on the platform. For instance, tell our community how a career break helped you or how your field of work witnessed a boost in the space of Diversity and Inclusion. You can also showcase your entrepreneurial journey and services on our site. Our corporate content, created in collaboration with senior leaders and mentors, lets you explore learning and growth opportunities to upskill yourself or seek new opportunities in the 9-5 world. We also offer paid freelance and internship opportunities. Have you joined the tribe yet?

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Time to face the challenges

As we narrowed on the Indian market, we identified the sizable challenges to women’s professional growth. Of the multiple responses obtained:

• 29% of women found it difficult to make their work more visible, denoting a lack of efficient platforms where they can sell their ideas    
• 26% located ‘earning a larger income’ as a challenge, indicating the lack of financial growth opportunities for women  
• 45% of homemakers and 30% of women on career breaks had difficulty identifying job opportunities after a gap, reflecting on the gap in women’s skill sets and the lack of available resources to train them

The writing on the wall is clear – women seek opportunities that fulfill them creatively and financially. With numerous women looking forward to working, third-party collaborators and organizations can penetrate the employment market in various ways to establish a win-win situation for themselves and their potential labor force. Here is what they can do:

• Organizations can conduct leadership training for women at work that helps them build their confidence. Companies can also conduct workshops or individual sessions by assigning mentors or building women-led networks that help them grow in their careers. 
• With policies such as return-to-work and second-inning programs, organizations can motivate women to join the workforce after a career break. 
• Collaborations with a diverse supplier base in the form of freelance work can help organizations understand a variety of social standpoints. 
• Upskilling opportunities by third-party collaborators can go a long way. They can help potential candidates work on their portfolios by identifying their strengths and working on their weaknesses. Such opportunities can also help homemakers. 
• Provision of short-term courses, workshops, and seminars for women who want to grow their businesses. 

As we encourage women to join the workforce for financial and personal independence, such practices can help organizations hire candidates from a diverse base. 

Connecting the dots between women’s aspirations and the Indian job market is not an easy task but also not an impossible one. Our research has shown that women are eager to earn and learn but have their fair share of doubts and challenges – there is a lot organizations can do about enabling the journey ahead!

Photo from Pexel.com by RODNAE Productions and Pavel Danilyuk

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