Focus On QA In Entrance Exams Keeps Women Away From MBA, says ICICI Bank chief

ICICI Bank chief Chanda Kochhar on Monday blamed excessive focus on quantitative aptitude (QA) in entrance tests for lower representation of women in business schools (B-Schools), and stressed on need for the exams to be “all rounded”. Kochar was speaking at a Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) summit on human resources.

“The MBA entrance exams are so quantitative-oriented that it keeps out more and more women from joining the MBA classes. If we were to make the entrance exams more all-rounded you could see more participation,” Ms Kochhar, the managing director and chief executive of the country’s largest private sector lender, said in a speech.

Kochar’s comments might stir up controversy. That exams such as the Common Admission Test used by B-School in India, are excessively focused on higher mathematical concepts that have limited real world application, is a common complaint. But Kochar’s comments suggest that women are at a disadvantage as compared to men, when it comes to higher math.

In a report on Kochar’s comments, the Times of India notes that former US treasury secretary and Harvard University president Lawrence Summers had kicked up a storm a decade back when he suggested that the shortage of women in science and engineering could be explained by a difference in mathematical ability. The controversy that followed contributed to Summers’ exit from Harvard.

Ms Kochhar, who went to a B-School before joining the bank, said women constitute only 10-15 per cent of the B-school students at present. 

She also questioned the need for so much focus on QA, saying a course on developing general managerial abilities does not require so much of focus.

“If there is a course that is quant-oriented, you need to focus on that but if it is a course that is more general management oriented, do you not need entrance examinations  which are more all-round?” she said.

A majority of reputed institutes holding MBA tests focus on QA, data interpretation, logical reasoning and verbal ability while selecting students. QA includes topics considered tedious like trigonometry, quadratic equations, logarithm etc.

Ms Kochhar also stressed on the need to make workplaces more diverse, saying a business can deliver better results with more percentage of women. Also, with half of the consumers being women, there is a need for businesses to have more women to understand the consumer better, she said. 

On representation of women, she said that we have come a long way in her 30 years in corporate world and added that today women-headed banks account for 35 per cent of the overall assets in the system.

She also regretted that over 80 per cent of ‘workforce-ready’ women are not joining the organised sector, and exhorted women to believe in themselves and be ready to put in long hours and travel if the work demands. 

Ms Kochhar, however, sought to underplay the impact of careers on personal lives, saying women can maintain work-life balance even while pursuing their careers. 

Flagging the fledgling e-commerce sector as an area of opportunities, she said there are opportunities of “cottage entrepreneurship” like made-to-order meals, handicrafts etc which women can capitalise on.

To address the difficulty around safety and security, Ms Kochhar said the bank has created a mobile application in-house which also has a ‘panic’ button.

The application was being used for employees itself and Ms Kochhar on Monday announced that it will be made available for all the companies in the country for the safety of their women employees.