Shownotes

For this episode of The Elephant in the Room podcast I had the pleasure of speaking with two stalwarts of the Indian PR and communications Industry Kavita Lakhani and Radha Radhakrishnan. Aside from being great leaders they are also great human beings. In this freewheeling conversation they share their own story; their perspectives on state of the industry; women in leadership, WICCI PR & Digital Marketing Council initiatives including the soon to be launched mentoring scheme; I Lead survey with IIM Kozhikode and what drives them to do better every day 

Listen to the full episode here 👇🏾

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Memorable passages from the podcast

👉🏾 Sudha, Thank you so much for having us on your podcast. And I'm really happy to reconnect with you after many years. It's nice to know that you're in the UK and making India proud there too. So thank you for this opportunity. To tell you a little about my journey I started my career in communication, over two and a half decades back. And this was when the Indian PR industry was in its infancy. So it was the era of landline phones, fax machines and typewritten hand delivered press releases, and largely editorial media. Things like Microsoft word, internet and digital marketing didn't even exist back then. I think the industry has completely transformed itself since. And it's had a huge impact on the service offerings, as well as the skill sets required to thrive in this industry. With COVID in the last year, I think we are all agreed that this is the fastest-changing, communications and technology landscape that we've ever been in. And I think that's what makes it so exciting for me and every other communications practitioner. And it's been a fantastic journey so far. 

👉🏾 Thanks for this opportunity. It's great to be talking to you and Kavita together. So my journey has been one where I've probably done a lot of things by elimination. I consciously don't work for two companies in the same sector or industry, because I feel that if you have learned something from our particular company, because of your stint there and you go to the competition that, that's a disservice to your previous employers. And that has put a lot of pressure on me because I guess it has brought with it its own challenges and it has also brought with it a lot of opportunities. So I have crisscrossed from advertising to journalism, to Dotcom space. And then to a corporate and in some ways sort of settling with a corporate.

And I think the journey has largely been supported or helped by some of the very good supervisors that I worked with, very nice people, both male and female, and also some fabulous colleagues I worked with. So to that extent, I think I should be grateful to what I have today. And it's been a roller coaster ride. No doubt, but exciting. Nonetheless. 

👉🏾 What I believe is that PR industry specifically, was female-dominated, maybe 10 years back, but that's not any longer. And the reason why more women naturally gravitated towards the communications industry and the PR industry, because women are natural storytellers, they are naturally collaborative and they are very social. They also excel in soft skills and language skills, which explains why they gravitated naturally towards this profession. Also, back then like a decade back, the profession was not very lucrative and hence it did not actually attract male talent. But this industry's changed dramatically, I would say in the last decade or so, and it's so constantly changing. And I think COVID has pushed our clients and the communications industry over the technology tipping point. So employees, whether they are male or female, they need to know things like new digital skills, platforms, and channels that didn't really exist a short while back. And I think that's what's really changed the skill set, the gender or the diversity within the industry? So you see a lot of people who are analytics specialists or integrated brand strategists, content creators, digital specialists, media specialists. This is not something that existed 10 years back. And I think because of that the diversity in this industry, it's almost like a 50, 50 split now.

👉🏾 I think like what Kavita rightly pointed out in terms of, our natural ability to move towards something that is a great comfort to us. If you see how PR has evolved, I remember from being in public sector because it's also tied to the industry, right? I mean, the way industry grew. So from public sector to private sector, to corporatisation, as it happened. PR industry and communication industry also evolved, So I remember some of those people who used to talk to me when I was a journalist who used to tell that most of their time goes around picking people from the airport and doing the hospitality kind of stuff. The challenges today that we have is more from the point of view of a lot of media being here and now whether it is social or otherwise, and the kind of pressure that comes with it, right? Some people immaterial of the gender tend to navigate or gravitate towards those that are less pressure cooker kind of a situation. But I think women by nature also have lot more patience and a lot more tenacity to hang in there. 

👉🏾 It's such an interesting timing for doing this Sudha. So it was during COVID last year towards October that the Women's Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry approached me and they said, why don't you be a part of it? And the first thing that I told them is that, really want to give back to our industry. So if I'm going to be part of the Women's Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, then I would like to institute something which is for our industry. The PR and digital marketing council actually is a give back initiative for women in the communications industry which comprises journalism, PR digital advertising, media and content. What really makes it unique is that currently no other chamber of commerce and industry in India whether it's a CII FICCI or an Assocham - they don't have a representation for the communication sector. Within the council, we have 20 highly accomplished passionate and I would say inspirational women leaders. And we all share vision to equip and empower fellow women within the industry. So we were just talking about the fact that the communications industry is fairly well-represented when it comes to women but I think the priority you were asking me, what is the key priority?

What we see is that the dropout rate. While women enter very enthusiastically. The challenge before our industry is a high drop out rate, And the ratio drops to just about 11%, at senior management positions, and as we go even higher at leadership positions, it's barely 3%.

And if I were to put it down as only one single objective that the WICCI PR and digital marketing council is trying to address it's to ensure that we have more women at leadership positions. We continue to inspire them and show them the way to reach the highest levels of leadership and, thrive within their careers.

👉🏾 So just to add to what Kavita said, why I wanted to be part of this is because, as women, we still face a lot of challenges. When it comes to all fronts, you know, professional and personal fronts. And sometimes our industries are so unique that if you're working for another industry and if I'm in Y industry, for example we will not 

be in a position to relate to each other. We'll not be in a position to support each other though we may be knowing each other. It's always important for industries to rally together and, solve the problems that are faced by people in our particular industry. So when Kavita came up with this thought of, having a council which is specifically addressing problems that we face, I found it very, very relevant and required right now. Because like what Kavita rightly said, otherwise we will lose a lot of good talent. 

👉🏾 Here I would really like to say that, many of the challenges that women face in their careers are the same as those that are for men. And they include work-life balance, parenting, juggling many responsibilities and multitasking. However, in comparison to men, women either take a break to start a family, or take a break to look after aged parents. Also things like lack of learning and growth opportunities at the workplace, if there are very few women to kind of look up to at senior levels you're not going to feel very inspired. And then what Radha was talking about, lack of networks, very, very important. These are some of the things that I think contribute in making women leave their careers midway. They don't feel inspired to work to the top. Also at times, their own inhibitions come in the way of them seeking the rightful place, at the top. And then there are other issues like safety, which is very important in North India and smaller towns. It might not be so relevant for a city like Bombay or Bangalore, but North India it's a huge concern. But I see these things changing, and the huge difference now is that there is a greater acceptance for women who are now seen as individuals, professionals rather than just wives, sisters, and mothers? So there's also lot of sharing of responsibilities at home, in some households, not in all. Also the larger environment, whether it’s husbands or families and more importantly, workplaces. They are a lot more supportive now. So I think there is a change happening, but is it good enough is it fast enough? I think a lot needs to be done. 

👉🏾 I mean, just to add to that, I think one of the things that typically happens Sudha is that and I'm sure you must have also experienced it early on in your career, is that sometimes we tend to get taken for granted, And somebody else decides on what our capability is, what our skill is and what kind of drive we have, what kind of ambition you have. In your workplace sometimes I have seen that somebody else is sort of deciding that this is what it is and somebody else is putting that limitation, a boundary and you are expected to operate within that boundary. And very few people actually felt it is worth changing that perception. It is worth fighting for. Some of them just felt that it is not a fight that they want to take up and they just moved on.

And some of them felt that they're not going to be able to navigate and win. And so they just gave up. 

👉🏾 I would prefer to focus on what we are attempting to do. So point number one I think we are trying to address the fundamental problem of dropout what Kavita was talking about right. I mean our entire objective is to move that needle and make more women achieve their ambitions and get to the top of the ladder point. Point number two focuses more on mid-level and senior-level career professionals. It would be a combination of mentoring and coaching and it would be a lot more individual need-based because coaching works more one-on-one than as a group. And also, it's based on what the current industry requirements are or what the current skills are. So for example, a lot of mid-level professionals are not so comfortable with the rapid changes in the digital world? Or there are people who are not very comfortable having conversations at a very macro level, about the economy, about finance about an industry, for example. So these are some of the issues at a skill level, at a knowledge level that we want to address. At the same time, we also want to equip them better in terms of fixing their weaknesses so that they are as competitive as anybody else in the organisation for any senior position tomorrow. 

👉🏾 We've been hearing about, the fact that women have aspirations, however within the organisations, they don't really get that support and nor are they comfortable seeking it, So through the mentoring initiative, I think one thing that we are very conscious of is that, while we are providing all the support to upskill them.The most 

important thing is that we want to create a safe place for them to come and share their aspirations. Seek all the support that they can kind of get from the mentors who are going to be aligned with us and in a very unbiased objective fashion. And I think that's a very important part of what we are doing. 

👉🏾 In fact, I was just about to talk about that too because both of these are actually correlated. You know Radha touched upon something very interesting earlier on she said, social conditioning plays a very important role in how we react to certain things, how we move up the career ladder, how we look at the opportunities presented to us or don't look at them. And that's where we said, Let us actually come up with an online counselling initiative, especially during COVID. I don't know how many women are really thinking about their move up. Are they feeling comfortable? Do they have the avenues to actually seek help, mentorship in an unbiased fashion. So we said let's actually launch an online counselling initiative. And once again, it is to create a safe place for women to share their aspirations, their concerns, and to seek unbiased opinion on matters related to their personal career growth. And I would say, this online counselling initiative is open for women who are facing mid-career challenges, workplace issues, women wanting to return to the workforce after a break or anyone who's struggling to strike a work-life balance. Or if they just want an opinion on their career progression.

All they need to do is write to the team at the WICCI council. They have to write in to [email protected]. And we would connect back with them and connect them with an online counsellor, who be able to guide them forward. 

👉🏾 You know Sudha, I mean I think all of us are aware of the impact COVID continues to have. It's had a disproportionate impact on women. Some have lost jobs. Some have stalled their careers, they've taken a call to stall their careers because of the huge responsibilities at home. And others who remain within the profession are very stressed and stretched. And sometimes they don't have any support or sufficient support. So we all had house help, we had cooks. Now all those responsibilities are also added on. And in that they're still trying to kind of work and, support their families or have a career, 

👉🏾 I think this also is a factor in some ways of the way we think, and also kind of a social conditioning that I was talking about Sudha. Because when organisations are faced with the aspect of who is a good performer, who's not a good performer or what you need to do and if you're paring down teams, if you're paring down functions and departments. Invariably, it becomes very easy look at paring down a woman's job over a man's job. Because man is, you know, sort of expected to provide for the family, he's the breadwinner or whatever, else. In fact a lot of statistics during the pandemic also brought in the fact that how women continue to be paid less and during the pandemic, the pay gap only widened.

So it's all very easy and convenient steps, I guess, for many organisations to take and I think some of them have used it to the hilt during the pandemic. And that's a very sad state because for many people to fight back and come into the professional working life and a career is going to take a long, long time. Because at the end of the day this is a very small industry. 

👉🏾 Sudha if I may add the PR industry actually didn't brush this COVID reality under the carpet as though it didn't exist. I agree that, there have been organisations that have paired down their workforces and women have been sacrificed.

But, on the other hand, there have been leaders and teams across agencies, across PR agencies who have accepted it as a challenge, and they have rallied tirelessly and generously to support their clients. And the whole perspective has been that especially women leaders in agencies, they don't view emotions as a weakness, but they've used it to strike the right chord with their coworkers. One thing that I've observed across male and female leaders across agencies, one is that they really have risen to the task to trust and, to really show empathy.

👉🏾 Especially with all those remote working challenges that we've all gone through. And the second one is that they've also been very humble at times to admit that they don't know all the answers, you know? So there have been instances where employees have come and told them we don't know what to do with this client. We don't know how to push back the client. And the leader has also stood by their side and, helped them with that particular situation. And I think the third thing is that agency folk at least have done is that they've had a forward-looking mindset, to try and see if they can give people hope right now because that's very important in our situation. So being real, being authentic and saying that this will pass this too shall pass.

👉🏾 I just like to say that the face of the PR industry has changed or the communications industry has changed. Digital, video content, data analytics, integrated brand communication, they've taken centre stage and if people within this industry, don't really upskill now there's a very good chance that they might become redundant. So as you go forward in your career, whether you're striving towards leadership or otherwise, I think learning is very very critical and in my mind, learning and leadership are interrelated, So I would think that for women or for men. I think they have to really keep upskilling themselves. 

👉🏾 I think so. On the one hand we have all seen what is happening on the media front right? And I personally feel that this is just the beginning and I think post-pandemic or later this year, we will also see some very drastic shakeups in the media world. Suddenly your operating parameters have also changed, right? What was considered to be a kind of a manual that we all used to follow during a crisis that manual doesn't work now right? Because that manual was not meant for a pandemic kind of a situation.

All our crisis communication, a larger emphasis was on external stakeholders than internal stakeholders, right? A majority of it, I would say, and now suddenly things like internal communication, employee communication, they are all becoming very very prominent and very...