Males
put on hold as India Inc chases women workers
Mumbai: It’s the flip side to the
gender diversity policy being followed by top corporations. With the latter
going into overdrive to hire more female employees—in order to achieve a better
gender balance at the workplace—applications from male candidates have begun
piling up. Not only that, with companies extending deadlines in their quest for
good women candidates, job openings are remaining vacant for longer durations.
A section of hiring agencies told TOI that they were being pushed to such an extent that they were neither able to meet the gender diversity objective of companies nor were they being able to do justice to the applications from good male candidates. Meanwhile, job openings which have to be closed within 30- 45 days have been getting extended to 90 days.
A section of hiring agencies told TOI that they were being pushed to such an extent that they were neither able to meet the gender diversity objective of companies nor were they being able to do justice to the applications from good male candidates. Meanwhile, job openings which have to be closed within 30- 45 days have been getting extended to 90 days.
WORK LIFE
Mumbai: The focus on gender
diversity has delayed filling of job openings in India by up to 90 days. A few
companies admitted to waiting as long as three to four months. So much so that
in some sectors, almost a quarter of all available positions have been lying
vacant for the last three quarters.
According to the internal data of the last three quarters shared by Elixir Consulting, a recruitment process outsourcing firm, in sectors such as consumer durables, retail and FMCG, there are 27% positions lying vacant in finance, 22% in marketing and 16% in brand management. The data, which reflects the general trend in the search industry, reveals that during this period, almost 100 to 50 good applications from men have remained pending.
The firm said in functions like HR and corporate affairs, where the demand was only for female candidates, 100% of the open positions were closed successfully with women hires. However, a deviation was seen in functions like sales and legal, where 75% to 80% of positions were closed with men. The reason: these positions could not attract the right women candidates even after a wait beyond the stipulated period.
“In cases where the position is not closed within 30 to 45 days, we have seen it getting extended even till 90 days in a wait for the right female candidate. The agony of the hiring manager, whose project is in the pipeline waiting for the resource to come onboard, can be seen in such cases. It is when the 90-day period is over and a white flag is raised, signalling that the wait is over, that the search for a male candidate begins,” said Harish Madan, manager (FMCG, consumer durables and retail practices), Elixir Consulting.
Sumit Mitra, executive VP (corporate HR), Godrej Industries, “If we feel there is potential to find the right candidate and we may not have done enough searching, then we wait. But if we feel that it will impact business, we will not wait for a long period of time.”
In MNCs, these delays are often because of clearances from headquarters. “MNCs have stringent gender policies and whenever they deviate from the proportionate mix… they are required to get a global clearance. This causes some delays in the hiring process,” said Surabhi Mathur-Gandhi, senior VP, TeamLease Services, a staffing solutions company.
According to Elixir Consulting, for every resume shortlisted, a ratio of 1:4 (male: female) is imposed with open positions. However, the general trend in India is that they find only 1 female candidate per 10 male candidates.
Some companies follow this strictly across functions while in others, the trend is restricted to domains such as HR and communications. However, despite the policy, there are areas where HR managers reach a stage of compromise and roll out an offer to a male candidate. Thus, the total number of male hires (about 70%) still far exceeds female hires.
Egon Zehnder International partner Namrita Jhangiani, said, “Multinational companies, particularly American and European ones, to meet their global gender diversity ratio, ask to see women candidates on the slate. But they do not compromise on quality and will not sacrifice quality and hire a woman just to meet a quota.” However, Jhangiani added that given a choice between a good male candidate and an equally good woman candidate, companies would prefer to hire the woman.
Not all companies agree. “Talent acquisition priorities are closely interlinked with our business strategy, and thus to find the right talent for the right role at the right time is critical,” said an HUL spokesman.
According to the internal data of the last three quarters shared by Elixir Consulting, a recruitment process outsourcing firm, in sectors such as consumer durables, retail and FMCG, there are 27% positions lying vacant in finance, 22% in marketing and 16% in brand management. The data, which reflects the general trend in the search industry, reveals that during this period, almost 100 to 50 good applications from men have remained pending.
The firm said in functions like HR and corporate affairs, where the demand was only for female candidates, 100% of the open positions were closed successfully with women hires. However, a deviation was seen in functions like sales and legal, where 75% to 80% of positions were closed with men. The reason: these positions could not attract the right women candidates even after a wait beyond the stipulated period.
“In cases where the position is not closed within 30 to 45 days, we have seen it getting extended even till 90 days in a wait for the right female candidate. The agony of the hiring manager, whose project is in the pipeline waiting for the resource to come onboard, can be seen in such cases. It is when the 90-day period is over and a white flag is raised, signalling that the wait is over, that the search for a male candidate begins,” said Harish Madan, manager (FMCG, consumer durables and retail practices), Elixir Consulting.
Sumit Mitra, executive VP (corporate HR), Godrej Industries, “If we feel there is potential to find the right candidate and we may not have done enough searching, then we wait. But if we feel that it will impact business, we will not wait for a long period of time.”
In MNCs, these delays are often because of clearances from headquarters. “MNCs have stringent gender policies and whenever they deviate from the proportionate mix… they are required to get a global clearance. This causes some delays in the hiring process,” said Surabhi Mathur-Gandhi, senior VP, TeamLease Services, a staffing solutions company.
According to Elixir Consulting, for every resume shortlisted, a ratio of 1:4 (male: female) is imposed with open positions. However, the general trend in India is that they find only 1 female candidate per 10 male candidates.
Some companies follow this strictly across functions while in others, the trend is restricted to domains such as HR and communications. However, despite the policy, there are areas where HR managers reach a stage of compromise and roll out an offer to a male candidate. Thus, the total number of male hires (about 70%) still far exceeds female hires.
Egon Zehnder International partner Namrita Jhangiani, said, “Multinational companies, particularly American and European ones, to meet their global gender diversity ratio, ask to see women candidates on the slate. But they do not compromise on quality and will not sacrifice quality and hire a woman just to meet a quota.” However, Jhangiani added that given a choice between a good male candidate and an equally good woman candidate, companies would prefer to hire the woman.
Not all companies agree. “Talent acquisition priorities are closely interlinked with our business strategy, and thus to find the right talent for the right role at the right time is critical,” said an HUL spokesman.
Namrata
Singh TOI120808
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