Women in research need to balance work and family

Women in research often face a moral dilemma when they are offered research opportunities that take them away from home. Many are pressured to reject a good professional opportunity to be with their family.

More often than not, the burden of raising a family falls on the woman, and it’s not uncommon for them to leave their jobs because of this. Usha Vijayraghavan, faculty at the Department of Microbiology at IISc., says, "Companies have to work on how to retain their talent. Can you permit employees to work from a remote location for, say, a week of a month?"

Geetha Manjunath, Xerox Research Centre India (XRCI), feels that inclusive work policies will greatly help in retaining women in science and technology.

"At Xerox, we have a woman CEO and woman CTO. We have remote working policies for everyone, right from the CEO," said Dr. Manjunath. She completed her Masters in IISc. in 1991 and returned 11 years later to complete her PhD.

Institutes should look at best practices adopted by other institutes.

“In the U.S., institutions try to make sure that they can hire both husband and wife. I've seen cases where the institute wanted the wife so they made a position for the husband," said Yogesh Simmhan, assistant professor in the Department of Computational and Data Sciences, IISc., evoking laughter from the crowd.