FWM: What led you to launch Power Women of India?
When I started out my professional life, I did not think about the ceiling, the pay gap, or topics such as diversity and inclusion. I came into the workforce believing that the playing field was level. I became mindful of many of these topics as my career progressed. As many other women of color, I experienced being excluded, or felt the “imaginary ceiling”, and had my own struggles when I became a working mother. These experiences made me realize that my journey had hurdles which as a young ambitious girl I had never imagined I would encounter. Over time I realized I needed to find the right networks and build a support system around myself to overcome these challenges, get stronger and keep on rising.
I started looking for a network of women leaders like myself, especially women of color so that we could support each other, talk about such experiences and be stronger together. Strangely enough, when I searched, I couldn’t find such a space and ended up founding it. My search for a network such as this and my passion for gender parity and women in leadership led to the birth of Power Women Of India. Due to the #BlackLivesMatter campaign now there is even more rigor and commitment around inclusion and colorism. I am glad that organizations are now finally taking notice and talking about these topics.
I feel there are so many powerful women of color doing amazing work and their stories need to be told. We want to not only bring these women leaders into the C-Suites, Boardrooms and make them have multi-billion dollar exits but we also want to inspire the next 500 million Indian women.
FWM: Share your background.
I grew up in a middle-class family in Calcutta. I am fortunate that my parents put a lot of emphasis on academics. My parents have been a big influence in my life. They came from a small town in Northern India and moved to Calcutta in the 70s to start a life from nothing. My parents pushed us to excel in academics. I did very at school and went onto study engineering. I was among the first children in the extended family who studied aboard on a scholarship.
If India is my birth home, then Germany is my work home. The country made it possible to get world-class education at almost no cost. I pursued my master’s in software systems engineering at RWTH and worked on the side to fund my education. I did my research at the European Microsoft Innovation Centre and then found my first job with the German engineering giant Siemens. During those days there were very few women and very few people of color at the organization. I started out as a software engineer developing medical applications at a healthcare production facility and went onto lead product development. I was also lucky to be inducted into the talent development program and also founded the Diversity Initiative together with the Chief Diversity Officer’s office. I remain grateful to the opportunities I received and the incredible men and women who mentored me and influenced my personal and professional life.
After my MBA at INSEAD, I moved to Singapore working at an early stage startup and then to the middle east where I led Marketing for another MNC and later worked on my own venture. I have also led the INSEAD Alumni Association in the UAE as President. I am a bit of a polyglot, I speak English, German, Hindi, Punjabi, and Bengali and basic Italian. I am married and have two children. I hope that by the time our children grow up and join the workforce, we have indeed achieved a world which is more equal and fairer.
FWM: You have spent your career working in product development, innovation, and marketing. How do you bring your experience to Power Women of India?
Building Power Women Of India from the ground up has been like launching my own startup. I started it as a passion project last year but the response from women around the globe made me realize that many women shared my passion. I have been working very hands-on from day one, whether it’s building our website, running social media campaigns, launching and hosting a podcast. I feel my technical and marketing skills and my own professional networks have helped in building and growing the collective, positioning our brand, attracting the right members and developing meaningful partnerships.
Having said that, the problem we are looking to solve is a very big one, and clearly this cannot be done alone. Hence I keep on looking for partners, volunteers, interns all of whom bring in the perspectives and keep on helping us grow. We are always looking to expand our network further with more talented women leaders.
FWM: What are the perks for joining?
We are building a community of stellar Indian women leaders from across the globe. We have members from the best of academic institutions world over, worked for the best of brands and at incredible power positions. We believe that many of these leaders with a support system and strong network can become the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, enter boardrooms, build multibillion-dollar businesses. Overall this pool of talent can make a huge difference and impact not only India but also the overall society as well.
One of our current projects is called Project KNOCK KNOCK. BEING SHAMELESS. A lot has been said, researched and spoken about Women On Boards. But two facts remain, adding diversity to the boards increases value and representation of Women on Boards remains dismal. Power Women Of India launched this project with the simple philosophy, we knock (shamelessly) at doors and seize opportunities if they don’t come to us. Goal of the project has been to get 5 trailblazers onto advisory roles. After knocking at several doors, we have now a collaboration with Founders Institute UAE and have five of our women advising startups in their program starting September. We have also hosted several sessions to create awareness about getting into the boardroom, building your personal brand and hosted a podcast as well. We are also hosting another session in September on how to handle microaggression at the work place. This is a very relevant topic for brown women working globally or in the international context as most of us have received no formal training on how to handle such situations.
We have been building a pipeline of thought leaders who can bring new perspectives into expert discussions and panels. Manels is a big pain point which needs to be addressed. Only yesterday we highlighted a session where out of a jury of 30 thought leaders 29 were men! This is a big problem especially in India. This year we collaborated with Asia Berlin summit and supported them in bringing diverse thought leaders from our talent pool. I often hear this phrase, “where do you find these women?” Well, we exist, organizations just need to look harder and keep their minds open.
Going forward we are excited to launch more such projects including bringing more men into the discussion and giving back to other women.
FWM: How can we join?
We try to bring experienced women leaders so that we can build a platform where have relevant and impactful discussions and bring about change. For us it has never been about volumes and scale, but about adding members who are passionate about the topic of gender equality and feminism and can contribute and bring about change. We have been growing organically with members within the community recommending other leaders who they feel share the same values. Members can also join us via sharing their motivation and professional journey with us on our website https://www.powerwomenofindia.com/joinus
We also welcome partners and volunteers who share our vision and would like to collaborate or work with us. We are always looking to expand our network further with more talented women leaders.
FWM: How is your platform helping women on a global scale?
Power Women Of India is a global platform. Though we have women leaders from India or Indian origin, they live and work globally. Many of our members are based out of the valley, many are in Singapore, we also have members in Korea, Hong Kong and in Europe. Our partners so far have also been at a global level, e.g. we worked with Founders Institute in the UAE and now with the Asia Berlin Summit. Our women leaders work in a global context and bring global perspectives. We had also launched our Singapore chapter last year before the pandemic hit us and I hope once we are back to the old normal, we can relaunch in person events to strengthen our local networks. This year May, we were to host a leadership trek for our community members to Leh but that too unfortunately had to be called off due to COVID-19.
FWM: Do you have any upcoming virtual events?
We host monthly mixers where our inspirational members share their journeys. There’s never enough time to hear out everyone! https://bit.ly/3mfRX1z We will be hosting another mixer soon with our new cohort. We are also hosting a session on how to deal with microaggression and racism at work. This is something very close to my heart. I feel if I had received this kind of a training, I would have reacted very differently in certain scenarios. Three of our members are speaking on panels are Asia Berlin Summit and five of our members are advising startups at the Founders Institute. We are also working on our next podcast around women in politics.
FWM: You are an active member and supporter of several NGOs. Share your initiatives.
I grew up in Calcutta, and have witnessed enough misery and poverty around. I have always remained mindful of how fortunate I have been to receive a good education, to have a loving family and a roof over our heads. We can so easily take things for granted. When I was studying in Germany, I remember watching a documentary on female genital mutilation in Mali by Plan International, it really disturbed me. I was a student at that time, but I took up on sponsoring a girl child with Plan and shared a part of whatever little I earned with another less fortunate girl. My husband and I volunteered for Unicef for several years. Our daughter made us very proud last year, when she forgo all her birthday presents at her 6th birthday last year and donated the money to Nepal for eye correction surgeries of over 50 people with the Fred Hollows Foundation. I feel all of us, especially during these difficult times need to keep on doing whatever we can and helping those around us. My father once attended a talk by Mother Teresa where she said, not everyone can do great things. But we can do small things with great love. This has also stuck with me and has been a guiding principle for my own journey.
FWM: What is your best advice to young women?
I grew up thinking I was a super hero and then somewhere along the way, I lost this belief. I am happy I believe in myself again! My advice to young women is never ever stop believing in your self. Every girl, every woman should believe she is a super hero!
- www.powerwomenofindia.com
- www.linkedin.com/company/powerwomenofindia
- https://www.powerwomenofindia.com/podcast
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaursimran/
