Shriram Housing Finance Announces ‘Back to Work’ Initiative to Bring Women Back After a Career Break
MUMBAI : Shriram Housing Finance Ltd, a leading affordable housing company and part of the Shriram Group, has announced a ‘Back to Work’ initiative by opening its doors to women professionals looking to return to the workplace after a career break. Shriram stands for Equality & Diversity in the workplace and celebrates ‘Diversity Month’ in June 2022 with the announcement of a slew of women-centric policies.
As Shriram Housing Finance grows in terms of business, customers and people, the company has expanded its diversity and inclusion policy to focus on hiring a diverse workforce and putting women first. One of the crucial pillars of these initiatives is the ‘Back to Work’ policy to welcome and support women professionals who had taken a career hiatus owing to personal or other reasons, commitments or goals, and want to now re-join the workforce.
Women today represent a larger part of the decision making population and contribute significantly, both as customers and employees of Shriram Housing Finance and other companies. However, they remain under-represented in the Indian workplace due to lesser opportunities and often take a back seat due to household responsibilities.
The company’s ‘Back to Work’ policy applies to women professionals of varied skills and attributes applying to all job roles and designations at individual and supervisory levels, across Sales, Credit, Collection and the Operations Department. The hiring process includes a structured onboarding process, focused mentoring and reskilling, flexible work options, and on-the-job learning to help these women regain confidence and face the daunting task of transitioning back into a workplace environment.
The initiative is a part of the ‘SHeFirst’ programme introduced by Shriram Housing Finance in June 2022—designated as ‘Gender Diversity’ month at the company. The ‘SHeFirst’ programme looks to improve women’s representation in the workplace and double the number of women employees within a year at the company. This is proposed to be achieved through a host of new policies and initiatives, undertaken to support and promote the wellness of women employees, especially working mothers, single mothers and women in nuclear families -such as flexible working hours, a hybrid model which provides the flexibility of working-from-home, and the facility of opting for a sabbatical. Further, under the ‘Women Referral Policy’, employees will be eligible to earn double the normal referral bonus for referring women that get hired for vacant positions. As an ongoing practice, all teams have also been empowered to hire additional women employees, over and above the approved headcount for their function.
Mr Ravi Subramanian, MD & CEO of Shriram Housing Finance said, “The ‘SHeFirst’ initiative will enable Shriram to be a gender-balanced organisation that will increase innovation, profitability, customer success and employees satisfaction. The ‘Back to Work’ policy, among other initiatives, is an attempt to bring back talented, hardworking and resourceful women professionals who may have to had to step back from work, by offering equal and appropriate opportunities as per their personal and professional goals.”
