Women In Security Can Enable Better Prospects And Opportunities: Experts

In a panel discussion on Challenges faced by Women In Security and How to Overcome Them held in Outstanding Security Professionals Awards held on digital platform by BW Businessworld, women security professionals uncover the mystery for growth of the domain with female professionals exceling in their role. The panel was graced by prominent luminaries in the domain of Security and Surveillance, namely Rupal Sinha, Director, IFMS, Quess Corp Limited, Lt. Col. Himani Thapliyal, Chief Security Office and Head Plant Admin, Vedanta Limited, Aluminum Business, Ila Longani, Senior Risk Managemen Advisor,  Monica Verma, Head- Security and Risk, Board Member, CSA Norway, Sonal Jindal, Founder and Director, Medusa

Addressing the conclave Lt. Col. Himani Thapliyal, Chief Security Office and Head Plant Admin, Vedanta Limited, Aluminum Business asserted, “There is often an unrecognized challenge while discussing women inclusion in security domain. There is a prejudice or preconceived notion that women won’t be able to handle the stakeholder engagement; to connect with the local administration will be of difficulty for them or it will be a difficulty for them to handle mob gatherings and likewise. These are kind of pre-conceived mindsets which are much outdated and with time female leadership style in security domain has reaped beneficial results for an organization and is focused much on reducing the risk rather than directly heading on to it. As a matter of fact, there is an urgency to redesign the job roles and implement general nuclear recruitment processes to task female security professionals to their optimum capacity level.”

Her views were further backed by Monica Verma Head- Security and Risk, Board Member, CSA Norway who went on to establish that diversity and Inclusion is not about women not getting hired in place of men, just because they are women. She said: “It is not about less qualified women being given the opportunity because of their gender. It is about women given an opportunity to follow order in comparison to equally qualified men. It is about equality in opportunity that women get and equality in representation in the society, work place, home and wherever we go.it is about equality of opportunities for women from the very beginning they are given for imparting education, work-life or when it comes to women trying to pursue their dreams. Women representation in every wake of life is important because different representation from different ethnicity, race and gender will bring in different ideas to be implemented across domains or security and surveillance. One cannot be inclusive if one is not well represented.”

Ms. Ila Longani, Senior Risk Management Advisor asserted that to enable an inclusive approach to involve women in the domain companies must focus on to define an inclusive job description for female employees and their hiring procedure. She asserted, “The cyber security domain consists of only 25 per cent professional work-force and there is a staggering gap of unfilled jobs of around 1.8 million jobs. As a matter of fact, men are four times more likely to hold executive roles. It is definitely a push for women to be a part of the domain but what is really alarming is it in terms of disparity in terms of security. What is saddening about the industry is the disparity in giving women similar opportunities in comparison to men and companies must looking into their hiring processes to bridge this gap of disparity and more inclusive approach while defining their job descriptions. As a matter of fact it is very important for the industry and the society to promote gender diversity approach and drive the change internally too through a tool or medium.”