Mentoring and empowering the Next Generation of women leaders

These are transformative times. If 2023 was about embracing emerging tech like Generative AI, AR, ML, 2024 is turning out to be about consolidating the gains as digital technology permeates all spheres of business operations in a fresh push.

In its fifth edition, Adgully’s WOMEN DISRUPTORS 2024 strived to straddle this changing world and unleashed the true potential that India’s women workforce drive.

WOMEN DISRUPTORS 2024 endeavours to celebrate and turn the spotlight on women leaders at the forefront of steering India Inc through transformative times as well as influencing and encouraging a future generation of leaders.

Held on March 1, Women Disruptors 2024 saw a panel discussion on ‘Mentoring and Empowering The Next Generation of Women’. The discussion was chaired by Tufayl Merchant, Co-Founder & Business Director, Howl and the panel members included:

Samyukta Ganesh, Chief Experience Officer, VP & Head of Marketing, Sephora 

Nikita Agarwal, Chief Business Officer, Suta 

Nidhi Bisht, Actor 

Mansi Bhatia, Chief Business Officer, Shoogloo 

Tufayl Merchant started the session by asking the panel members, “How do you see yourselves being actively involved, working with a lot of women employees who become mentors in the future?”

Samyukta Ganesh answered, “As rightly said, change begins at home; you do not need to be 20-23 years old to start your corporate career, to experience or go through a lot of things. We will probably start grooming the next generation and people around us. There needs to be a lot of empathy as well, in terms of understanding the different stages in a woman’s life, and what happens at every stage. Then there comes a point in life when things change, life changes. The measure, the metric and the narrative does not remain the same.”

Nikita Agarwal, too, agreed to the fact that change has to start at home. She said, “It is not necessary that a woman’s career has to take a step back, for instance, when the husband needs to go for job in another location, and the wife is doing well in her home, so why is it essential for a wife to move along with her husband? It can be the other way round, with the husband making the move. I think times have to change and people also need to understand that it is not necessary for both the genders to move at equal paces; it’s not about one scoring above the other, and that grooming has to start very early. Men have to be conditioned like that from their early childhood. I think we are very far away from that conditioning. According to me, the change has started and needs to be more vocally spoken about in the way the children are brought up. Parents need to operate these changes early in their parenting.”

A lawyer by qualification, Nidhi Bisht said, “I studied law and then I practised at the Delhi High Court for almost two years, and then I transitioned into storytelling, acting and everything else. All along I observed that my brother had really cool mentors, who were seniors to me, guiding him by suggesting to do engineering course for four years, after that giving the suggestion to sit for placement where he will get a job with a good package. When I completed law, I had no idea of where I should be searching for a job, and what my future will be. Although I was lucky enough to start working with one of the best legal firms, and I had a female boss, besides my associates, colleagues, and my immediate bosses were all women. In that sense I felt very protected, always cherishing that layer of protection. I was very lucky to have seniors who guided me well and so early in my life and career. Now, I try to pass it on as much as possible.”

On the other hand, Mansi Bhatia’s experience was quite different. She recalled, “I had male bosses and initially when I was starting out, I used to constantly hear comments that ‘now she will get married and will go outside’. In the initial years, my bosses and my managers did not understand the thought process. As I progressed in my career and climbed the corporate ladder, I started hiring more women tech for me, ensuring to impart the mentorship that was required. I think that change needs to start with you first, of you ensuring that if somebody else is doing, you will not do the same. That is something that really got into my mind and I got a very good team with whom I was really connected with.”

Watch the entire Women Disruptors Summit here