Increasing Employment Opportunities
for Women: Policy Initiatives

Women empowerment is one of the biggest tools for ‘effective development’ of any country. For this, it is essential that women are skilled. Skill development not only creates employment opportunities but also empowers them.

Currently, a majority of the female workforce in India is unskilled. They can be motivated to develop their life skills – that will give them higher paying jobs / better livelihood opportunities and confidence to earn for their families. Many experts have observed that the concept of training and skill development needs to move beyond imparting technical and managerial skills, with more focus on enhancing literacy, numeracy, political and life skills. Some skills that training institutes must impart women trainees are communication skills, business etiquettes, language development, personality development, leadership skills, management skills, entrepreneurship skills, basic accounting, computer skills etc.

In 2015, Prime Minister Narender Modi, launched the Skill India Programme announcing the aim to skill around 402 million people by 2022. This paved the way for formulation of the National Policy on Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, 2015 which is a way towards creating a skill ecosystem in India involving all stakeholders (government, industry, trade unions and civil society). It is mandated that the focus will be on increasing productivity of workforce in the organised and unorganised sector, increasing participation of women, youth, disabled and other disadvantaged sections.

The comprehensive reforms that have been made to the Apprenticeship Act 1961 have opened up opportunities for apprentices in the service sector. However, there still exists a huge gap between the demand and supply side of employment/self-employment/apprenticeship for sectors, especially the service sector in India. Therefore, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and Development Alternatives (DA) have agreed to enter into a collaboration to develop and deploy a unique blended model called ‘Bridge to Livelihoods’ that aims to benefit large number of girls and women by linking them with job and apprenticeship opportunities while providing them appropriate counselling and placement support in five states of India including Delhi, Haryana, Maharashtra, Telangana and Karnataka. As part of the programme, the employer demands are matched with the supply of skilled/semi-skilled/unskilled candidates while providing required sector specific bridge course trainings for entry level jobs, leading to larger number of girls and women being linked to employment opportunities.

Transforming Perceptions...

Name: Shalini
Age: 24
State: Delhi

Her father is a contract labourer in Jharkhand Coal mines. After she completed her 12th, she wanted to work to make her dreams come true. One of her friends provided her with Development Alternatives (Da’s) contact number. A representative from DA suggested few methods on how she can improve her skills. So she was given two weeks’ time to prepare herself and one Friday, she was called for a placement drive and orientation session that was conducted in Ghitorni where the trainers guided her own how to kick start a professional career. Her interview was lined up at South Ex II at Croma. She got selected as a Customer Support Executive and the salary offered was 11000. Her family is extremely proud of her.

While focusing on employment of women through apprenticeships and jobs in the service sector, one should also focus on the challenges that women are facing especially in entry level jobs due to their social, cultural and psychological barriers. The main challenges that women have shared during various interventions conducted as part of employment programmes conducted by Development Alternatives are as follows:

• long distance travel for work every day,

• late / odd working hours,

• negative notion for jobs like BPOs in the society,

• societal pressure for women to be home makers and not go out to work,

• household chores / children to be managed with work and

• no support from family for women to work outside the home.

It is because of these challenges that the actual number of women joining the workplace is low as compared to women who shared their interest to work and are offered jobs.

Name: Jayashree Balaraju Burakonda
Age: 20
State: Maharashtra
Qualification: B.A(Arts)
Date of Joining: 27/06/2019

Jayashree lives with her parents and four siblings in Mumbai, where her father works in the Water Supply Department. After completion of her graduation, she started looking for a job opportunity as she wanted to support her father in taking care of the family. One day one of her friends gave her the contact of Bridge to Naukri team member who helped her in understanding different sectors and jobs available. After proper orientation, she was sent for an interview in a company named Data Links Services wherein after the interview she got placed as a Customer Representative Officer and was offered INR 11000 per month as salary. Jayashree’s goal in life is to become an IAS officer for which she will prepare by taking proper coaching from the authorised institute.

Policy Initiatives

Some initiatives which can be taken at the policy level with various stakeholders in the employment sector to retain women in the workforce are as follows:

1. Introducing more part time job opportunities for women, which could be either working from home or dividing one job in two shifts wherein morning shifts can accommodate women.

2. Making workplaces gender friendly while focusing on providing appropriate hygienic conditions and benefits for women to work.

3. Creating awareness about apprenticeship opportunities through NAPS (National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme) introduced by NSDC to a large pool of employers so more apprenticeship opportunities can be made available for women.

4. Providing women with various forums where they can get appropriate counselling and bridge course trainings as per their needs including interview readiness, gender sensitisation, sector specific training etc. to help reduce their attrition rate in the job market and for their overall career growth. ■

References:
• KPMG FICCI Skilling India – a look back at the progress, challenges and the way forward
• Overview of India’s evolving skill development landscape, Leighton Ernsberger, Skills India, British council
• Vyas Anjali, International Journal of advance research and development, volume 3, issue 1 – The impact of skill development on women empowerment
• Skills Development, Social Mobility and Educational Change: A Sociological Analysis of the Effects of the National Policy on Skills Development in India, DRAFT REPORT, Centre for Budget and Policy Studies, Bangalore

Tanvi Arora
tarora@devalt.org