Elevating Humanity

Gender inequality is a critical challenge in the world today. For many centuries 50% of the population did not achieve their full potential! I am now halfway into my career / professional life. It saddens me to see that it is still taking an exuberant amount of time to achieve gender equality. There are still discriminatory laws and gaps in legal protection for women's rights around the world. If we all play our role, I think we can expedite the transformation and it will be a big win for humanity.

International Women's Day is a day to remind all of us that we still need to work towards equity of humanity and break Gender based biases and stereotypes. Achieving equality of opportunity, recognition, and respect for all genders is the essential aspect of our species evaluation and next giant leap in innovation. It is surprising that mankind was able to break an atom but unable to break prejudice over gender, despite decades of awareness.

According to IWD March 8 is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating women's equality.

International Women's Day is the collective effort of all.?Collective action and shared ownership for driving gender parity is what makes International Women's Day impactful. Make International Women's Day our day and do what you can to truly make a positive difference for women.

Gloria Steinem, world-renowned feminist, journalist, and activist once explained "The story of women's struggle for equality belongs to no single feminist nor to any one organization but to the collective efforts of all who care about human rights."

The SaaS Engineering team at Nutanix celebrated Woman’s day by making it a week long celebration. The objectives of the celebration were:

?? ? ? ? Celebrate Women's achievements and influence in our life

?? ? ? ? Challenge Biases by Raising awareness

?? ? ? ? Reinforcing commitment by encouraging inclusive behavior

Kathy Chou SVP SaaS Engineering was very receptive to the idea and she immediately provided full support amid her extremely busy schedule. She kicked off the celebration by sending the beautiful and inspirational note to the team.

The team decided to celebrate the event by creating fewer but more engaging activities at a global as well as regional level. The team wanted to be more inclusive hence they planned activities which are flexible? to be done at an individual's availability, convenience and commitment. It included simple actions like sending “Thank You” notes recognizing Women for their contributions, strengths? and inspiration. Sharing IWD’s Virtual Background which can be used throughout the week in all the meetings. Employees can also write a blog or thoughts supporting IWD.?

At the regional level most of the activities were more collaborative and engaging activities. Keeping inclusion in mind, events were hybrid. We enjoyed the game “Name The Dame”. It challenged players to identify the influential woman who performed the feat. The team was split into groups and then given the categories like “Adventure & Sports”, “Activities”, “Art and Literature”, “Political”, “Science and Tech”, “Professional” and “Warriors and Military” and selected the question. The points were based on difficulty (just like the Jeopardy Game with the Jeopardy audio effects as well).?

The following day we invited some of the Inspiring women from SaaS Engineering to share their stories. 'If she can't see it, she can't be it'. Premise was that there is someone out there who is living your future dream of professional life TODAY. Lets connect with those individuals and listen to their stories. The selected women and allies were influencers. They have been instrumental in shaping SaaS Engineering team culture by their strengths, knowledge, creativity, determination and emotional Intelligence. Listening to fellow women and allies who have already traveled the path is the one of the best ways to motivate someone to take action

This time International Women’s Day was special for me. Stories of struggles and challenges faced by women colleagues and what they have fought for, which for men like me was just granted or privileged, was eye opening. It gave me exposure to women’s struggles in their lives even before their birth.? One of the women shared that her parents were advised to end the pregnancy when she was conceived. This was just because the fetus was a girl and her parents already had one girl child.. Really!!. It is time that we all see gender as a spectrum instead of two sets of opposing ideals.?

In another case the parents of a woman kept encouraging her that she was their “son” (why not be happy with a “daughter”?). We raise our daughters to be more like sons but we have to raise our sons to be more like our daughters. This requires courage.

These things look small but make a lasting impact on people experiencing such biases and inequality. Today we are fortunate that we can share such stories. Ignoring or staying silent doesn’t solve any problem. We need to raise our voice not so we can shout, but so that those without a voice can be heard. Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently. It is the courage to continue that counts.

David Sangster , COO of Nutanix once mentioned a quote: “Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it. Being challenged in life is inevitable but being defeated is optional so you decide”.?

I strongly believe it is a leader’s responsibility to create an environment in a team where each and every employee not only feels welcomed but also feels safe to speak up and share their stories. I am honored to be part of Nutanix and very thankful to its founder Dheeraj Pandey current CEO Rajiv Ramaswami and his executive leadership for building and encouraging an open, transparent and diverse culture. Employees can only give their best when they experience a work culture filled with inclusivity and belonging. Nutanix from day one has embraced such a wonderful culture.

I want to finish with a inspirational quote I heard from my colleague Divya Venkatachalam the other day at the IWD celebration.

“Women are half the population of the world’s population and are supporting or raising the other half of the population”.

Thank you to my mother, wife, daughter, sisters, aunts, and all amazing women colleagues and friend for your inspiration, support and help you extend everyday. I could not be what I am without you.?

#iwd2023 ?#embraceequity #nutanix