Ambition shouldn’t be the downside holding women again in company India.
The Women Leadership Survey 2026 by the All India Administration Affiliation and KPMG in India exhibits 79 p.c of women professionals aspire to carry leadership roles, but barely 1 p.c at present occupy board-stage positions. The research additionally highlights a vital inflection level: 65 p.c of respondents determine the mid-profession stage as the time when women are most certainly to depart the workforce, typically simply when leadership trajectories start to speed up.
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But inside India’s quickly increasing World Functionality Centres (GCCs), a special leadership story could also be taking form, one that’s quietly widening the pipeline of women leaders. Over the previous decade, multinational corporations have more and more positioned women at the helm of their India-based mostly functionality centres, increasing the pool of seen function fashions whereas bringing numerous views into international choice-making.
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Trade estimates counsel that greater than 1,100 women have taken on international leadership roles inside India’s GCC ecosystem over the previous 5 years, signalling a structural shift.
Structural Components Driving Women’s Leadership in GCCs
For Anuprita Bhattacharya, Head of Merck IT Centre (MITC) and IT Nation Head India, the rise of women leaders in GCCs is carefully tied to how these organisations are structured.
“The rise of women main GCCs in India shouldn’t be incidental; it’s embedded in the mannequin’s structural design,” Bhattacharya says. GCCs function inside international, matrixed governance frameworks that prioritise enterprise-large outcomes reasonably than native hierarchies. This reduces reliance on legacy networks and permits advantage-based mostly development.
Direct reporting strains to international headquarters additionally improve govt visibility and strengthen sponsorship. “Efficiency in GCCs is measured by means of end result-pushed metrics centred on innovation, transformation and worth creation,” she explains, including that this rewards impression reasonably than tenure.
The same view is echoed by Mrinal Duggal, Head of the Sanofi World Hub in Hyderabad, who notes that GCCs actively nurture leadership pipelines.
“We actively determine and nurture excessive-potential women early in their careers, giving them clear pathways to leadership roles,” Duggal says. She believes the GCC mannequin blends international considering with native expertise, creating environments the place leaders are evaluated based mostly on the impression they create reasonably than assumptions tied to gender.
World reporting strains additionally convey progressive office insurance policies into play. Based on Duggal, initiatives corresponding to gender-impartial parental depart, rigorous pay fairness analyses and nil-tolerance discrimination insurance policies assist create a extra equitable basis for leadership progress.
How World Publicity Builds Leadership Confidence
Working at the intersection of world stakeholders, regulatory complexity and enormous-scale transformation mandates, GCC leaders typically achieve publicity that accelerates leadership maturity. “The GCC ecosystem operates at a demanding crossroads of world stakeholder alignment, regulatory complexity and enterprise-scale transformation,” Bhattacharya says.
This setting quick-tracks leadership evolution past operational administration into enterprise technique, innovation stewardship and folks-centric leadership. Reflecting on her personal journey, Bhattacharya recollects a pivotal second when her centre transitioned from being considered primarily as an execution arm to being recognised as a functionality hub. She led a strategic push to strengthen capabilities in regulated supply, knowledge and analytics, automation and repair resilience. “The turning level was when international leadership started trying to India to set requirements for different geographies,” she says.
For Duggal, international visibility is one in all the most empowering points of working in a GCC.
“As women, we get to construct relationships and showcase our capabilities to executives throughout completely different areas and capabilities,” she says. “That international visibility has been a recreation changer.”
Leadership improvement applications, worldwide mobility alternatives and worldwide assignments have additionally broadened entry to experiences that had been as soon as restricted. “The alternatives that had been as soon as primarily accessible to males at the moment are accessible to all of us,” she provides.
The Mindset and Expertise Wanted to Lead GCCs at Scale
Main a GCC at scale calls for each a basic mindset shift and intentional functionality constructing.
“Women aspiring to guide GCCs should transfer past a practical lens and undertake an enterprise-large perspective,” Bhattacharya explains. Leadership immediately entails shaping international technique, steering innovation agendas and influencing cross-border stakeholders.
“The shift is from operator to enterprise architect,” she says, emphasising the want for enterprise acumen, stakeholder affect, threat governance and the potential to guide numerous groups by means of complicated transformation.
Government presence is equally necessary. Leaders should have the confidence to have interaction international boards, provide constructive problem and articulate impression in clear enterprise phrases.
Duggal describes an identical shift in her personal journey.
“The most important mindset shift is transferring from being an knowledgeable in one space to turning into somebody who can join the dots throughout the enterprise,” she says. This requires creating what she calls ‘international confidence’ — the potential to affect throughout cultures and geographies.
The precept that has anchored her leadership journey, she says, is steady studying. “When your leadership is constructed on real competence, steady progress and constantly delivering worth, confidence turns into a pure byproduct.”
How Inclusive Are GCC Leadership Environments
Whereas GCCs are sometimes considered as extra progressive workplaces, leaders acknowledge that the journey towards equitable leadership remains to be ongoing.
“In intent, coverage design and leadership metrics, GCCs are forward of conventional companies sectors in fostering extra inclusive workplaces,” Bhattacharya says. Nevertheless, she cautions that structural gaps stay, significantly round mid-profession development, entry to accelerator applications and publicity to P&L roles.
Stronger sponsorship frameworks, versatile profession pathways and higher entry to international alternatives might be essential to sustaining leadership momentum, she provides.
Whereas women already make up round 40 p.c of the GCC workforce, making certain that this variety interprets into equitable illustration at senior ranges stays an ongoing effort, Duggal says. “The pipeline is robust, however we have to preserve nurturing all of it the option to the prime.”
The Mid-Profession Problem Nonetheless Persists
The broader company panorama continues to grapple with structural boundaries. The mid-profession stage stays one in all the most important strain factors, the place competing calls for associated to caregiving, work–life stability and organisational expectations intersect with leadership ambitions.
Importantly, the Women Leadership Survey means that women not often depart as a result of their ambitions fade. As a substitute, exits typically stem from amassed organisational frictions, function design constraints and uneven assist throughout essential profession transitions.
For organisations, the message is evident: variety should transfer past symbolic commitments and grow to be embedded in buildings, insurance policies and leadership pipelines.
Proof constantly exhibits that gender-balanced leadership strengthens organisational outcomes, but progress stays incremental. The Women Leadership Survey 2026 notes that whereas 23 p.c of organisations final yr had 30–50 p.c women in leadership roles, the determine has edged up solely marginally to 24 p.c this yr, whilst the share exceeding that threshold has dipped barely.
As India’s GCC ecosystem grows in scale and strategic affect, it might provide an necessary blueprint for company India, displaying how international governance, advantage-based mostly analysis and deliberate expertise pipelines can translate women’s leadership ambitions into actual govt roles.
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