Women employees don’t raise their hands very often when the opportunity to showcase their skills at work comes knocking. This is what some heads of HR say when asked why most of the women managers don’t make it to the top even when there is scope for them to break the proverbial glass ceiling.

But why must a woman employee have to prove herself all the time? Why does she need to speak louder than the others, work extra hard, look for challenging assignments to get noticed and be more `visible’ to prove she is doing her job well? Is it not enough that she has exceeded her annual or quarterly targets so as to deserve a good promotion? Don’t such assignments come naturally to male employees who meet their targets and appear to be doing well at their jobs?

To say that a woman manager must speak up and seek out, rather than be offered challenging tasks to rise up in the hierarchy is an unfair bias against her. Take, for instance, this typical scene from the workplace: ‘She has just had a baby. She may not be able to go on an out-of-city assignment.’ That’s a wrong presumption male bosses tend to make even before they offer an onerous task to a woman employee. Of course, it is only out of concern that line managers make such decisions on behalf of women employees, but unconsciously and unknowingly somewhere a bias creeps in. As for women employees facing such situations, one can’t blame them for feeling discriminated against.

So what are companies doing to rid the powers that be (because the powers that be today are predominantly men) of such unconscious biases? One is to sensitize every employee on why such biases must be kept at bay. Any statement that remotely suggests any kind of bias must be avoided and all employees must be appraised on merit, irrespective of gender. Secondly, women are conditioned differently. A majority of them would not be able to promote themselves. So they need sponsors.

All companies want to achieve a gender balanced workforce and are keen that more women take up leadership roles. But they agree there are no quick fixes. Although companies dole out a laundry list of practices at the workplace that have been framed solely keeping retention and attraction of women employees in mind, right from flexi-working hours, day care centers, job share, extended maternity leaves and other policies to ensure their safety, they have not been able to solve the puzzle entirely.

If a woman manager quits her job to take a career break due to child birth or any other reason, it is difficult for the company to predict her return. Most of the times women don’t come back to the same company as former colleagues have moved up the ladder and the company can at best retain her at the same level she took a career break. This can result in erosion of self esteem and also create a sticky situation at the workplace which is not in the best interest of all.

Companies are increasingly talking about women’s networks as well to help women connect with each other and disseminate success stories, learnings, etc. But, wait a minute; is that not alienating them from the rest of the lot?

The solution truly lies in inclusion, which is the operative word here. Women employees, as some companies have learnt it the hard way, don’t want to be treated as separate. Women don’t like preferential treatment. They want to be treated as equals. So the policies which were hitherto targeted at women are also being thrown open to men. So increasingly, men too are working from home and opting for job share arrangements as and when required. Such conscious efforts on the part of organizations can bring about a liberating feeling of equality among women.

A gender balance, as they say, must end at that: a balance; and not lead to a skew of any kind.