90: Aspiring women in tech: A conversation with Aarushi Nair, Ambassador & Community Volunteer AnitaB.org | #GHC22 #NextIsNow | #GirlsWhoCode

The Elephant in the Room - A podcast by Sudha Singh

Shownotes36 %: No of women employees In the Indian tech sector (the biggest employer by far)51%: Women entry level recruits 🤩🤩🤩25%: Women in managerial positions 😕☹️ (how bad or unsupportive does the culture need to be to get educated women to leave)1% : Women in the C-Suite 🤷🏾‍♀️🤷🏾‍♀️ (This cannot happen without entrenched and systemic biases)The statistics are so predictable it is almost boring. We have seen similar statistics in other markets, markets that are supposed to have been advancing the cause of women for decades. The numbers are depressing and disappointing. Considering that 50% of India’s population is below the age of 25, I invited @Aarushi Nair, an engineer and aspiring academic to hear her perspective. The perspective from a generation who have faced and are facing great uncertainty and isolation due to the pandemic. A generation who lost years of socialising, classroom learning, and opportunities. The inheritors of a world that is literally going up in flames or down the drain or seems bleaker - take your pick. In the course of the freewheeling chat we spoke about her role as an Ambassador/Community Volunteer at AnitaB.org, her thoughts on the challenges facing women in tech; her aspirations; changing priorities; equity & inclusion; what climate change means to her, friends, peer groups etc. We also spoke about optimism, about changing your mind, mental health and the one super power she would like to have to change the world (Twilight 🤔🤔)Want to hear more, head to the podcast 👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾Shownotes👉🏾 Thank you so much for having me. I'm very excited to be on and yeah, let's have an amazing conversation. 👉🏾 So hello, my name is Aarushi Nair. I am 21 years old, I'm gonna turn 22 soon. I've only recently completed my bachelor's in technology and I majored in computer science engineering. I completed it in June, 2022. I feel like most of my character development has only happened in the last four years, honestly, only since college. My personal journey as such, I moved a lot as a child, we moved a lot. We moved from a city called Mumbai to Gurgaon. And we moved back and then moved back again.👉🏾 So I think that helped me become more adaptable to different situations and people and cultures. But it wasn't anything crazy or something that I would say was significant to my journey. I think in the last four years, and I'm talking about when my college started and when the pandemic hit, I think these are the situations that really helped me grow.👉🏾 One of them being that when I joined college. Before that I was in a very protected golden bubble sort of environment. I like to think that I come from a very privileged background where I've never had to struggle for anything as such. I mean, financially or emotionally. I've been blessed with a great family and only in college did I meet people from different backgrounds in different situations where they grew up and...