AMCHAM’s Tamil Nadu Chapter held a breakfast meeting on July 22nd in Chennai on creating a conducive ecosystem to encourage women’s empowerment through employment generation. The meeting started with celebrating the appointment of India’s Honorable President Draupadi Murmu, a great step in demonstrating women’s empowerment. Mr. Rajan Aiyer, Chairman – Tamil Nadu Chapter, AMCHAM welcomed participants and gave an overview of how American companies were employing more women on the shop floor who were engaged in assembly, packing, financials and in service companies doing all kinds of jobs that men do. Experience shows that in manufacturing companies, women were often more productive and the same was noticed in service companies.

The first presentation was made by Mr. Jerry Kapoor of Modine who shared some good practices of how the company has created gender neutral roles with significant number of female plant operators, who benefited from career development programs for women employees which provided them job progression to higher levels. His presentation had scenes of women employees who expressed how they were feeling empowered and that they were now able to build their homes, share in family responsibilities by educating their younger siblings and getting them married. They were thankful that Modine provided the means for them to accomplish this.

The next presentation was made by Ms. Minakshi, Joint Director, Department of Employment and Training, Government of Tamil Nadu on how the department equips women to become self reliant through job skills training and employment. She also mentioned that they now have a Private Companies Portal where private companies can upload their requirements of candidates for various positions. The presentation mentioned many of the career and job fairs that were conducted across the state.

The next presentation was made by Mr. Amitrajit Ghosh, Director, Dow Global Engineering Center where he explained how in Dow they have programs such as Campus2Corporate Internship Programs and Project PUTHRI (daughter) wherein female students from financially weaker sections are trained and sponsored in engineering education and given full time employment. They also have Project Catalyst which aims to bring back women engineering talent after a career break. The point was clear that for women to thrive in industry the ecosystem as a whole has to support these initiatives.

The last presentation was made by Mr. Gaurav Daga, Vice President and Ms. Mathivathani RP, Associate Vice President of Guidance Tamil Nadu who took participants through the work done by WorkLabs Cell through academia industry collaborations which engages students and freshers through plant visits, internships and apprenticeship programs. They also explained the consultation with 65 industries across fintech, logistics, electronics, auto, wind, general manufacturing, construction and chemical sectors in Tamil Nadu.

AMCHAM suggested that the government of Tamil Nadu could help by providing support by providing accommodation through women hostels, transport to and from the workplace after shifts for women employees in prominent industrial zones so women employees from remote areas can take advantage of these facilities. The Guidance personnel said they provide hostel facilities to women employees of Foxconn and that this could be expanded to include women employees of American companies as well. For India’s growth to further accelerate, everyone has the collective responsibility to do whatever it takes to help create opportunities for women to join the workforce in large numbers. The meeting concluded with a vote of thanks by Mr. Rajan Aiyer.