Diversity hiring in India climbs to 32% in 2020

Diversity hiring is mostly visible in the consulting sector leading with 44 percent, followed by the IT sector with a total of 39 percent and banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) sector with about 36 percent. The diversity hiring percentage in the manufacturing and pharma sectors were at 29 percent and 19 percent, respectively.

Interestingly, these companies did not restrict themselves with just hiring women, but also extended their recruitment to people with disabilities and the LGBTQ community.

Additionally, the study reported that the percentage of companies providing mentoring sessions moved up from 75 percent in 2016 to an incredible 96 percent in 2020.

Unfortunately, a major concern in India is that women are still missing from key management positions. The study revealed that 99 percent of companies now offer leadership training programmes, which has surged to 43 percent over the last five years.

Presently, India has 78 lakh women who have taken a break from their career. Avtar MD, Saundarya Rajesh said, "If corporates are able to bring back even 50 per cent of these 78 lakh women into the workforce, we can easily touch a diversity rate of 50 per cent by 2027."