Taking the centre stage

There is an old saying that behind every successful man there is a woman. By the time we reach the end of this edit the saying might change!

Behind the successful men, there are women who still choose to stay at home and raise the children, run the household, entertain sophisticatedly and do everything possible to support their spouses’ career goals. They provide moral support to their husbands by supporting their decisions and taking household responsibility off their shoulders. Indian culture reflects a strong bond between family members. Wives support husbands by taking care of all their needs in every possible way to make them win in their business or job. But with changing times, more and more couples seem to be agreeing that independent identities and separate careers or outside interests are better.

There were a lot of sacrifices that the past generation of women made in order to get ahead, and those sacrifices were often marriage and children. But that is changing. The new age women want to develop independent personalities of their own and not to look to their spouse’s company and title for an identity. These women are not only taking care of their families but are playing multiple roles as a wives, mothers, presidents, CEOs et al.

I strongly believe that behind every success story of a woman there must be some support from everyone. No one can achieve anything without someone’s support. It could be direct, indirect or moral support. I doubt if any successful woman exists who hasn’t had a mentor at some point in her career. Role models are essential to exhibit to women the value and attractiveness of a career. Mentors can prevent the feeling of isolation for women and also help them steer the path to promotion. Women should not only be encouraged to find their own mentor but they also should throw a challenge to themselves by becoming a mentor to someone else. Today’s female entrepreneurs are figuring out new ways to combine their careers with family. But how do they do it?

For this superwoman, life is all about her kids, the kitchen menu, her brainchild – the Dhirubhai Ambani International School and her IPL cricket team’s agenda. Yes, we are talking about Nita Ambani who is a businesswoman, actively involved in various philanthropic activities in the fields of education, human resources and disaster relief. She is actively involved in Project Drishti, a social initiative taken by Reliance Industries (RIL) and National Association for the Blind. To her, power is responeditorial Role models are essential to exhibit to women, the value and attractiveness of a career Taking the centre stage power women 5 june-august 2012 sibility. And she derives it from her family, her work, her passion and her very middle-class values. She always wanted to be a teacher, and she has surely converted her passion and dream into reality.

Women should always feel the need to be involved in something and to know that she is creating value. For one’s own self worth, its very important.

Richa Agarwal is one such name who has carved a name for herself in a field that is far apart from her husband Aditya Agarwal’s Emami Group. She manages the group’s foray into art auctions and related infrastructure under the Emami Chisel Art (ECA) banner. It is a collaborative effort between the reputed Emami group and Chisel Crafts, a parent company of the Kolkata based Aakriti Art Gallery. Richa always believes that the world is its stage and she feels confident that their participation in various exchange programmes will make the combined influence incredibly far reaching and the combined expertise immensely valuable in taking art to tomorrow’s connoisseurs.

Another super role model was at the peak of her career as a leading actor when she gave up a successful career to marry one of the heirs to the Reliance empire. Tina Ambani is among the first ladies of business in India—a role she does complete justice to. Today she is involved in a number of charity, arts, and talent endeavours. From taking care of certain aspects of the business to being involved in various works and promoting the arts, she has her hands full. She is involved in Harmony Foundation - For Senior citizens, Harmony Art Foundation - For Promotion of Art. In addition to that she looks after Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital & Medical Research Institute and Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Nursing College. Tina is a complete woman in so many ways.

It is now more important than ever that women have successful female role models. This issue is dedicated to such women who have created an identity for themselves apart from being a celebrity/CEO’s spouse. These women from various fields inspire in many ways. Also, now as there is a big change in society where women are coming out and proving themselves in various fields, a lot of credit goes to their mentors. And in majority of the cases, behind all their success there are men – that could be a father, a brother, a husband or a teacher. So can we say that behind every successful woman there is a man?

Only if the old saying goes like this, “Behind every successful man is an even stronger successful woman”.

Women have reached everywhere

I haven’t yet come to terms with this new role of mine, and to imagine three months are already over and it is time for the new issue. Actually, as the deadline for this edit was coming up, I was feeling helpless thinking how I would manage writing it with so many other important things to do. But then here I am writing this. Voila! This is what power women are capable of. Juggling work and home is a cakewalk for them. This being my first proper edit for Power Women, it is my ode to the very concept of power woman!

A woman has always been described as a source of strength. She stands tall even after never ending turmoils. I believe that every woman can make seemingly impossible things happen if she has the will and commitment to do so. Gone are those decades when women were typically involved in domestic tasks, where wifehood and motherhood were regarded as women’s most significant professions. In recent decades women in most societies now have access to careers beyond that of the traditional homemaker. Awareness, education, and life’s struggles have forced them to shed their inhibitions. Great women leaders, artists, scientists, and other professional women have inspired other women to overcome social obstacles. Women have left the secured domain of their home and are now in the battlefield of life, fully armoured with their talent. If on one hand she is at the top of the ladder of success, on the other hand she is efficiently handling the household chores and taking care of her family. She is the new age woman, ‘The Power Woman’.

These women have broken the barriers and have made a difference to society with their outstanding work and other pursuits that touch our lives, in more ways than one. Women started coming out of their shells, in the past decades mostly as reformers. However clichéd it might sound but the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize ‘Mother Teresa’ nonetheless inspired countless volunteers to serve, and with the help of these social reformers women slowly started recognizing their true potential. They started questioning the rules laid down for them by the society. As a result, started breaking barriers and earned a respectable position in the world. Today women have excelled in each and every field from social work to visiting space stations. There is no arena, which remained unconquered even by the Indian woman. Be it politics where names like Sarojini Naidu, Vijaylakshami Pandit, Sucheta Kriplani who were the torchbearer for the women of India. The most important name in the category of women politicians is Late Mrs. Indira Gandhi, the first woman Prime Minister of independent India. She was the one who made the world stop and notice the talent and potential of Indian women.

Women have achieved great laurels for the nation in every sport too. Whether it is cricket or hockey, our country has a national women team for every game. The Indian women cricket team has won Asia Cup of 2004 and 2005 and made the country proud. Some women sports icons of India are P T Usha (Athletics), Kunjarani Devi (Weight lifting), Diana Edulji (Cricket) and Sania Mirza (Tennis). In the past women of India used to write, but their work did not get the recognition. Today they are getting their due Arundhati Roy, Anita Desai, Kiran Desai, Shobhaa De, Jhumpa Lahiri are famous names in Indian literature. Not just in India now these women are recognised all over the world. Arundhati Roy has been awarded with the Booker Prize of 1997 for her work God of Small Things. Kiran Desai has been given Booker Prize of 2006 and Jhumpa Lahiri got recognition in the form of Pulitzer Prize. Women have not just made their mark on earth but they have engraved their name in the whole universe by flying to space. Kalpana Chawla, who was a member of Colombia Space Shuttle, which exploded on its way back, was the first Indian womn astronaut who visited space station. And now following on her footsteps another women of Indian origin Sunita Williams has become the second one to be the member of International Space Station crew.

Women have even made great strides in the corporate world in the last three decades. They are also enjoying the impact of globalisation and making an influence not only in the domestic, but also in the international sphere. Women are doing a wonderful job striking a balance between their house and career. Indu Jain of Bennett Coleman, India’s biggest media house, has even reached billionaire status.. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw started one of India’s first biotech companies, Biocon. Lalita Gupte and Kalpana Morparia, both were the only businesswomen in India who run India’s second-largest bank, ICICI Bank. Anu Aga turned around an ailing company, the engineering firm Thermax Group. Simone Tata built one of the first indigenous cosmetic brands, Lakme, now a unit of Hindustan Lever. Priya Paul became the president of Apeejay Surrendra Group at the age of 24 when her father was assassinated in 1990. Sulajja Firodia Motwani, managing director of Kinetic Motor, has ensured that in the past six years her company has collaborated with firms in Korea, Italy and Taiwan and has helped it grow from a niche moped maker to a manufacturer of a full range of two wheelers and auto components.

Be it any field, women have reached everywhere. So it’s not only Venus but women are conquering Mars too! We should be proud of such trendsetters who have not just carved a name for themselves in their chosen path, but have become the torch bearers for countless others in urban and rural India who want to follow their dreams, reach their goals, and give back to society. I salute these and the countless other “Power Women” who have inspired not just us women, but the entire mankind today.

This issue is on the wonderful women like - Pooja Jain, Divya Modi, Sminu Jindal, Shradhha Suri, Zia Mody, Lara Balsara, Monica Oswal and Himani Modi who have not only inherited their family businesses but are positively impacting it and taking it forward. My best wishes to them and hope more and more women get inspired by such super achievers and make greater strides in life and business!

I am the power woman!

That’s exactly how I feel as I sit down to write this edit. I can’t believe that I am writing the editorial of this wonderful magazine brought to you by ICPAR in association with the IIPM Think Tank. Although now someone far better than I ever was – Abhimanyu Ghosh – runs it, ICPAR was almost like my baby. It brings back the best of my memories... of the making of ICPAR as a sought-after and respected PR company!

Of course, nothing would have materialised without my first boss Amit Saxena’s sincerity and crazy dedication to make the vision of a world-class PR company a reality, Deepak Shah’s ability to carry on alone when no one seemed to trust our abilities and finally Dipali’s tremendous positive energy and ability to bring an unseen vibrancy in ICPAR!

In the middle of all such lovely people, I had barely started cracking a few clients, when I realised that I was made the boss of the Delhi operations and asked to run the show, as Amit Saxena was asked to take care of more important activities! That’s how the founder of the Planman Group, Arindam Chaudhuri operates. Just decides the biggest of things one fine morning without any prior notice and then drives them to success!

I spent quite a few number of years running ICPAR and building it up, before shifting to my current special consulting position. And though I don’t run the show at ICPAR anymore, no one can ever take ICPAR out of me!

I remember that then, I used to so often suggest that we must have a special magazine as our contribution to the industry! And the one magazine I often said I should have wanted to give to the media industry was a world-class product focused on women at work.

I felt it would act as a great tool, firstly to showcase our intellectual research and analytical capabilities; secondly, to honour the sincerity that women bring to work – a sincerity that so often goes totally neglected in this male-dominated corporate world; and finally, above all else, to salute all those women who work tirelessly in this particular field of PR (an industry which requires soft-skills more than anything else), which is perhaps one industry which has more women than men and so many of them leading right from the top.

And then one day, as I said is Arindam Chaudhuri’s habit, I suddenly got a message that he was planning to publish this magazine and that he wanted me to be the consulting editor for it! It’s no use arguing with him. But still, with all my sincerity, I told him that I had no such past experience, so I could just suggest ideas but couldn’t write.

But he reminded me of the couple of articles I had written some years back on the PR industry for my own interest – which he had liked very much. Even I had forgotten about them, but he remembered. So finally, here I am writing the first editorial of this lovely dream magazine – Power Women – and happy that ICPAR and my relationship takes a special turn here on!

Although this time, I am too overwhelmed and consequently might have ended up finishing my entire editorial simply talking about how I came to be seen and be heard (ICPAR’s punch line is ‘Be Seen, Be Heard’), I do hope that I will be able to do justice to this column – especially from the next issue – by picking up cases of the real power women who have made the corporate sector and society at large a better place. I would also try to pick up and write about ways we women can take inspiration from such power women and reach for the stars.

As of now I really hope that you enjoy the woderful contents of this issue which covers some of the most respectable names from varied fields.

Till the next issue then, let me relish this opportunity and responsibility that I have been given, for right now, I am the power woman