Demystifying Inclusion in Indian Startups
/Startups in India show a great deal of promise when it comes to creating inclusive climates and engaging organizational cultures from the get-go. Serein and Psymantics recently completed the first study of its kind in India, to focus on the relationships between team climate factors (e.g. psychological safety, climate for initiative etc.), inclusion (composed of a sense of uniqueness, belonging and authenticity) and employee engagement.
We focused on startups in India, and investigated how they are building inclusive climates and organizational cultures to ensure employee engagement and retention. The key findings of the study are highlighted below and the public report is available for download.
Women and men working for startups in India are mostly seeking the same things from work – a culture that supports innovation, results orientation and being a reputable organization that one would be proud to work for.
The good news is – the startups in our sample seem to be set up to provide all this. The employees in our study felt high (and equal across organizations, across genders) levels of psychological safety, climate for initiative, autonomy and a sense of clear direction from their organizations: these are the conditions where inclusion exists.
This is critical because the key finding of our study is that inclusion really matters! Inclusion is key for retaining employees and also to foster a sense of engagement in them.
We did this study to see if the enabling work environment one seeks exists in startups - and whether they are set up for diversity to thrive, and we think they are, based on our small sample. Their challenge is to ensure that gender gaps or other gaps don’t appear in these over time, as they grow, stabilize and scale up.
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