MUMBAI: What happens when an association has accomplished the undertaking of making an orientation adjusted labor force? Is it content with its success? No! It begins with an endeavor to achieve ethnic diversity. That is precisely what Ikea aimed to accomplish in India, where it now has more women than men in leadership positions (more than 60%).
The global furniture retailer wants its stores in Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and the soon-to-open Delhi to reflect the market it serves by taking ethnicity into account. As a result, the store would also reflect its customers.
Women make up half of the workforce worldwide. Women make up 48% of Ikea's coworkers in India, so the company is getting close to gender parity.
Ulrika Biesert, global people & culture head at Ikea's parent company Ingka Group, spoke exclusively to TOI, stating, "I see that we have more women in the pipeline for the future." Because of this, I'll say, "We now need growth for men as well."
Notwithstanding, Ikea keeps on keeping 50:50 orientation variety as each pioneer's objective. Biesert made sense of that on the off chance that the organization doesn't continually screen and work on it, it tends to disappear. " Biesert stated, "Now I can see that gender balance is occurring by itself." She went on to say that the business must now "win in ethnicity and race."
According to Parineeta Cecil Lakra, Ikea India's country people and culture manager, "At Ikea India, we define ethnicity in a different manner." In order to build our pipeline of leaders, our objective is to contribute to the growth of our primary market areas. At the moment, 70 percent of our coworkers have been hired from the areas surrounding our Ikea stores. Keeping our global EDI (equity, diversity, and inclusion) objectives in mind, we intend to cultivate leaders and talent from these primary markets in the future. It will be gradual, but we will ensure that our pipeline is strong so that our teams in the future are representative of the markets we serve.
By 2030, Ikea intends to increase the total number of coworkers in India from the current 3,000 to 10,000. Ikea has more than 1.7 million coworkers worldwide. Under "Bloom," a fast-track program trains 100 coworkers from diverse backgrounds at the start of their careers to become market managers in three years.
Ikea, which began this journey 20 years ago when there were few women in managerial positions, is not new to EDI. When we first started hiring more women, some people were resistant because they thought, "Aren't we recruiting based on competence any more?" That simply vanished, enriching the culture. Having just a single gathering isn't the most ideal work space. Biesert, who acknowledges that this is not an easy task, stated, "We want our coworkers to thrive in that work environment."
There may be more tensions when there are more people from different backgrounds. Yet, I accept that it's great that the strain makes something better for us, as long as we try to have gallant discussions. It won't be a good thing if you suppress things. However, Biesert stated, "if we work with psychological safety so that people can dare to speak up and if we have a climate where one can dare to speak up, which we are really encouraging."
Ikea is one of the programs designed specifically for India that gives people the option to work part-time. The business has seen a lot of interest in these programs from women and students who want to work on weekends. The work week at Ikea is five days.