Deloitte Report Highlights Shortfall in Gender-Diverse Talent Across Indian Campuses
The 2024 batches across engineering, management, undergraduate, and law campuses in India are falling short of the numbers needed to meet the 45% campus intake of women target set by 200 companies surveyed by Deloitte, according to the campus workforce trends 2024 study shared exclusively with ET.
The study revealed that engineering campuses have only 17% and management campuses have 34% gender-diverse talent. The companies surveyed, which have an average headcount of 2,500 employees, covered 508 campuses.
Neelesh Gupta, partner at Deloitte India, noted that organisations are grappling with the challenge of bridging the gap between their diversity hiring goals and the limited availability of diverse talent at campuses.
Abhishek Misra, head of human resources at Rockwell Automation India, noted a positive trend in female campus hires, rising from 36% in 2022 to 45% in 2024. Women now constitute about 25% of the company’s workforce in India, up from 16% five years ago, despite a 2.25-fold increase in headcount during this period. Most women at Rockwell Automation are in roles such as engineering, software development, and cybersecurity.
MakeMyTrip also saw an increase in female campus hires, with over 40% this year, up from 20-25% last year. Group CHRO Yuvaraj Srivastava emphasised the importance of women’s representation, which currently stands at 27-28%, for serving a diverse customer base.
Despite various initiatives, the gender representation gap persists due to demand-supply challenges, said Gupta. Companies are implementing strategies such as fostering Gen Z-friendly environments and incorporating environmentally conscious practices to attract top talent and create inclusive workplaces.
Progressive firms are intensifying efforts to attract and retain women talent through measures like unconscious bias training, inclusive caregiving leaves, celebrating women’s career milestones, creating specialist career paths, and committing to pay equity and transparency.
