I am Mata Bakal co-founder and CTO of Empowered Solutions, a software export house based out of India with strategic partners all over the world. I am a tech woman since last 30 years.So I guess all you young women can call me a veteran deck is all pervasive and has become an integral part and parcel of our life. Pre COVID, the organizations were on a journey towards a digital business model but pandemic has forced a dramatic acceleration. You know, if you look at it, 67% say that they have accelerated their digital transformation strategy as a result of COVID-19 and 63% say they have increased their budgets. So dear friends right now is a great time to be a woman in tech. But there are not enough women in tech. I think it is very important to get more women in tech, more women in stem science, technology engineering and mathematics as really stem is too important to be left to men. I would really like to demystify the myths and break the stereotypes that float around for us women in stem OK. The first stereotype that we see is girls don't do stem but I say girls do stem. Why is it that we have that bias? See when I was young, I never faced the famous myth of the math brain or at any time during my education felt that this is not a girl thing or was told that you cannot do it.

In fact, I'm thankful to my grandpa and my father who used to ask me to handle all the banking tasks. Since eighth grade, I took up engineering long back in 1987 which was unheard of and in a tier two city in India, uh anybody from India would really know it. But it was the wonderful upbringing of my parents who never, ever curbed any of my passion and always supported me. Girls don't work in our community and that to in STEM and here I am. In fact, you know, I was surprised when I got the statistics from women that only 5% women are in math. Yes, that is true. And only 3% women are interested in technology careers across the world diving deep into it. This is the reality. There are uh different perceptions, but this is what across the globe. This is happening, diving deep into it. The studies show that girls lose confidence by third grade initially, you know, 74% girls are interested in stem and by the age of 11 to 15 when they are in middle school, they start losing interest. The unconscious bias. You know who is to blame.

The unconscious bias sets in. When we say pink is for girls and blue is for boys. We go to supermarkets and have pink alleys. We have to stop the pink education in the childhood so that more girls can come in stem and are not afraid of mathematics. Since an early age, the math phobia has to be removed. See why do, why do we give girls dolls? Only? There is an answer to this. Debbie Sterling from Stanford, Founder of Goldie Blocks, a disruptive children's media company, challenging gender stereotypes, fighting against the traditional girl toys and creating engineering toys for girls. Why do we give girls to dolls only? They should be able to choose whether they want to go in for a legal or a Barbie? The choice is theirs. We should not make those choices. We have to make parents, teachers and society aware that these unconscious biases should be avoided and we promote a growth mindset that stem skills can be learned and are not just inherent, it is only in our minds that this happens, you know, so we have to come out a away from this myth.

The second myth is entrepreneurship is not a girl's cup of tea, but I totally disagree while I was doing my MB A and I and my three girlfriends long back in 1993 started our own venture in corporate consulting consultancy and soft skills in the era when there was no internet.

We were very naive and had no idea of what business in India, of what business is. But we did, uh uh can you guys hear me? Can you please ping it? I think there is some problem. Ok. Ok. Thank you. You know, but we did, we initially pulled up a paltry sum of 50 US D each, which was a good amount in India in those days and rented out a garage, even printed brochures. But a second hand computer and lo and behold, we were ready to give training on doors, windows and Lotus 124 which we have taught ourselves as well as English skills. Maybe you girls even don't know what it is looking back. I really wonder how we had the courage to do that. We dared to approach the Corporates with all our confidence and innocence. And I got our first order just based on the spark in our eyes. I look back at that venture with a lot of pride and truly believe that fortune does favor the bolt and you will never know what you are capable of if you don't try. You know, the fact today is India is ranking second in the world's top 20 countries with the highest number of female CEO S. However, the share of female CEO S in tech companies is only a minuscule 5%. This is just in our mindset.

We have to come out of these mindsets. Ok. The third stereotype is that marriage and Children are a setback for the career. No, my dear, the comeback is always stronger than the setback. Our biological clocks and career clocks are ticking at the same time. About 41% of women leave the industry midway called as the leaky pipeline. As women feel they are unable to scale the maternity wall. We need to ensure that the corporate environment is conducive to women and taking short breaks is not bad. It's ok to take a break as a six month or one year hiatus in a career of 35 years is nothing. We have to run these initiatives to get these women back in workforce. We need to remove the fear of missing out foo from the minds of women and have women networks and support groups which will ensure that the pipeline grows like this uh women tech network. Yes, tech industry is ever changing and the rate of tech change of technology is six months now as compared to five years earlier. But then you tell me this is the era of dynamism and even food needs so much of innovation today. So let's accept it. Each one of us, women who is in a leadership position should ensure that we mentor at least five women in a year as everybody needs a mentor and a role model. This would ensure that women can reach out whenever they are in a dilemma.

It is the duty of us to share our experiences. At the same time. Remember, women, there is no such thing as work life balance. You know, we have to put in extra efforts. We have to give 100% to everything. We are 100% professional, 100% mom, 100% wife and 100% daughter-in-law. Each role demands 100% of you. And we have to strike a balance which suits us and is not biased by traditional norms. We have to go the extra mile to make things work as else. A working mom is over driven by guilt as mothers. You know, the guilt naturally comes to us even if your kid fought us at one step in school or for that matter, even in sports or anything. You feel that if you were at home, this would not have had happened, this is natural and we have to accept it. But believe me, when we are working, we are following our passion and that leads us to have positivity in our outcomes. And hence, we would be giving more to our kids and family. There was a phase when I had gone through that guilt but looking back, I do not regret anything but you know, there were some uh key points that I always did. I always ensured that I attended all the PT MS or special events of my Children. I agree that I was an entrepreneur and it gave me more flexibility. But yes, I had to work harder later on to cover up for it.

We cannot have it all or do it all. Let's not try to be super women and prove ourselves in every field. We are normal human beings who just are working harder. You know, time management is the key to achieving some balance plan your day in advance by God's grace. I have two wonderful and amazing kids who are good human beings with good values and beliefs. They always remind me mom, quality time is more important than quantity time.

So ladies remember this when the time comes for you, be confident and don't hold yourselves back. Yes, you will have to keep pace with the technology. But the brighter side to the maternity break is it makes a woman more responsible, compassionate patient, which really goes a long way in making them, making them or us good leaders to tell you, it made me more empowered. As now I was able to combine emotional quotient eq with IQ making me a better leader. When I look back, I find that those who chose to continue with their careers after childbirth have tough lives for the first few years but tended to be more satisfied with their decisions. In the long term. You have to remember difficult roads lead to beautiful destinations.

Always remember this. So when we say these statistics, these statistics, we have to break them. We have to break that for women leave in 10 years of ex uh leave. After 10 years of work, we have to break, break the the stereotype that first five years is the only career time. And then after that, women focus more on their uh what you can say on their uh home responsibilities. Now let me move ahead to the next stereotype that we have. We have the next stereotype. Women cannot embrace challenges and thrive as tech entrepreneurs. No, my dear, we can, me and my husband foray into software solutions at the time when nobody understood what a start up is or what you are doing. There was no start up ecosystem in India. In 1996 there were traditional businesses and social pressures to live up to. We did not have any mentors. At that time, my husband was managing the operations of the business and the owners fell on me to unleash the technical potential as you have to run a tech company from the top down. I was a hands-on coder and now we have done fairly well. We are a software exports house with multiple offices in India and strategic partnerships in us, Canada, Germany and do software and do some good work in software outsourcing.

We faced many challenges, people challenges, skill challenges, bad debts, economic slowdown. But we persisted and came out as winners. You know, I have realized that female entrepreneurs lack confidence. We want to be perfect and are afraid of failure. I just had challenges in the workplace but always assume that that's the ways of the world and not just directed towards me as a woman. As of now, the glass ceiling may not be broken. But believe me, persistent impact has started to form cracks. If you don't focus on the glass ceiling standing in your way, one day, you will look back and realize you have broken through it. Look at the current statistics, you know, Forbes found that women ceo S in the Fortune 1000 drove three at the returns uh as as opposed to uh S and P 500 enterprises run predominantly by men. Look at this according to ey increasing the percentage of women in top spots in stem companies from 0% to 30% is associated with a 15% jump in profits. So yes, do believe in this. You know what I believe is if you are passionate about what you are doing, distracting nonsense fades in the background, I don't focus on issues of bias or look for it because I am too busy doing what I love.

I may have overlooked it if there were any unconscious biases. Yes, it is a fact that we have to work harder to prove ourselves as you know, it is human nature to be skeptical about any change, human nature is such that we tend to gel with people who are similar to us. So that is why in coding. We have a bro culture where men tend to reach out to similar men for guidance. So let us not take it otherwise, but take steps to eliminate that in today's world. You know, we have to establish the community of women, helping women. We need to teach women that having ambition is not a wise, you know, VC funding. Today in today is a measure of success. But you know, women are hesitant to ask for funding pitching even apologetic in asking for money in women, network support groups too. There are very few women who have done it and hence are very skeptical. The format of pitching itself is very intimidating. And one more thing generally, V CS would like to fund people who are very similar to them. For example, a Stanford alumni will fund a Stanford alumni and there are very few venture capitalists who are female. But again, I would like to say that the scenario and awareness is very promising.

But at the same time, you know, like we have VC funds and angel investors specifically targeting women entrepreneurs and making a point to have at least one women back start up in their portfolio today. The atmosphere is very conducive to women. But remember one more thing, embrace your feminism, do not misuse it, let's not misuse the privileges that we are now getting as that leads to misrepresentation and goes towards keeping the stereotypes alive. Let us be women of substance. The framework of meritocracy cannot be given up in a quest for diversity. We do not want special treatment, not undue advantage, just a fair short of success. It doesn't matter if you are a man or a woman. The important thing is determination. See I being an entrepreneur, I also and or in any walk of life, if you want to succeed, I would just give you last in last two minutes. These 10 commandments for success. The first commandment that I say is believe in yourself and the world is yours. This is cliche. But remember where there is a will, there is a way we faced many ups and downs death in family financial crisis.com burst some personal setbacks but we managed to come out of it and survived and sustained, you know, like a PJ Abdul Kalam. He, he used to say he has written it in his book, Wings of Fire. Also. Dream is not that what you see in sleep. Dream is something that does not let you sleep.

Michelangelo says the greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it but that it is too low and we reach it. You know, girls, be confident, be yourself and don't ever try to emulate men. I was never afraid of anything. I'm from an electronics engineering background and I trained myself to code. I passed my Microsoft certifications when I was eight months pregnant. And had to travel to another city for giving the examinations. Back in 1999 we believed in ourselves and had the courage to have our own start up in Kyoto City. You know, so let's not limit ourselves because of others, limited imagination. There is no limit to what we as women can accomplish. My second point is knowledge is power. You know, you girls already know this, learn to unlearn and adapt yourself to the dynamic world. Always improvise the biggest challenge today is keeping pace with technology. But then as I earlier said, it is there everywhere. We now have moved from conventional online, digital to real time and technology from conventional databases. We have moved to no SQL desktops, virtual machines, cloud to serverless A I analytics, mliotarvr Blockchain. All this is everywhere. But remember education is the passport to future.

Tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today. Another command commandment is be passionate, do everything with your heart and soul love, what you do, you can overcome anything. If you love whatever you want to do, you have to be insanely motivated when I was giving corporate training and I had very small kids. I used to get up at three in the morning when my kids were asleep to prepare for my training sessions. Yes, the fourth one is there is no substitute for hard work that you will totally agree. Opportunities are for the takers. You have to take the opportunity never hold yourselves back. We have to find role models. See, you know, there was a survey wherein they said how many of you can ma name a female stem role model. People could only name one. Take intelligent calculated risks. Be finance savvy. You have to learn as you have already crossed the hur hurdle of stem. You should also cross the hurdle of finance. The key is to sustain success. Always, never be complacent. Never be ok. Don't let that inner fire die, build relationships and trust stories, build relationships with your customers. Commit less and deliver more. Keep that your mantra and you will have customers who would always believe in you. Commitment to client is sacrosanct.

And in the end, I would like to say adhere to your value system, then we cannot ever make any compromises on our value system because integrity is the most valued thing. Thank you so much for giving your time to listening to me. Thanks a lot.