ISB’s Efforts Towards Gender Balance Pay Off: Highest Ever Number of Women in Class of 2015

By Shikhar Mohan

Increasing the number of women in the classroom should be a big focus for B-schools in India – Indian B-schools have a ridiculously low number of women participants.

Getting more women to take up an MBA is critical not just to create more women leaders, but for other reasons too. Given India’s patriarchal mindset, having women in the classroom sensitizes men to women’s perspectives, helps them establish a healthy working relationship with them and also introduces them to the idea of women running the show.

More women in the classroom could also have a far greater impact. As per recent research, women managers tend to be more ‘risk averse’ than men and as per some management thinkers, the financial crisis in the USA may have panned out differently had more women been part of the financial system.

Instead of paying lip service to the issue, ISB has taken concrete steps to make more women in the classroom a reality through initiatives such as scholarships for women and through partnerships with leading companies such as Axis Bank. The effort seems to have paid off with a record number of women in the ISB’s Class of 2015.

The Class of 2015 of the Post Graduate Programme in Management (PGP) at the Indian School of Business (ISB) has 231 women students constituting 30% of the total class size – the highest number ever since the school’s inception thirteen years  ago.  The number of women students at the school has been rising steadily and has increased by almost 120% in the last seven years.

Speaking on this development, Savita Mahajan, Deputy Dean, ISB, said, “With 231 women in the class, ISB has the largest number of women students among premier business schools in the country. This is a heartening development and is a result of the various initiatives that we have undertaken to encourage women professionals to take up management as a career, in association with the corporate world over the last few years. We hope this increased participation of women will go a long way in meeting the need for gender diversity across sectors.”

Overview of the Class of 2015 

The author, a brand management expert, is Founder of Oneyearmba.co.in, the world’s leading resource for news, analysis and guidance on one-year MBA programmes