Resilience and dedication – the mantras for women to rise to the top

ICCC’s 9th International Women’s Day Celebrations bring together talented women leaders

The Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce organized its 9th Annual International Women’s Day Celebrations. The program featured high-powered, high-achieving women leaders from the corporate, government, and diplomatic spheres.

Lisa Lisson, President, FedEx Express Canada, in her keynote address highlighted the significance of the International Women’s Day, emphasizing that it is on this day that women are recognized for their achievements without regard to division whether national, ethnic, cultural, economic, or political. But importantly the day marks the acknowledgement of women’s rights and accelerating gender parity. Some of the women’s day values are justice, dignity, hope, equality, collaboration, tenacity, appreciation, respect, and empathy.

Emphasizing the need to develop resilience, Ms. Lission said, “I have learnt that we are all born with a resilient muscle and it is up to us to decide if we want to strength it. They say that what doesn’t break you, makes you stronger, but I have come to realise that there is an X factor in there. We all need to strength our resilient muscle when life doesn’t go according to our plan because adversity in some form or another is just a fact of life. Some of the factors that make a person resilient are maintaining a positive attitude, being optimistic, being mindful, regulating our thoughts and emotions, the ability to look for life lessons during tough times, and believing that there are brighter days ahead even when we are not sure how.”

Ms. Lisson then shared her story of how she overcame tragedy when her husband had a heart attack and could not recover from it. She confesses that grief hit her harder than she thought it would. Her mother helped her overcome the tragedy by a simple advice: Life is not what happens to you, but what you choose to do with what happens to you.

Her resilience led to her promotion. The COO of FedEx Express worldwide called her and congratulated her on being promoted as the first Canadian and first woman to head the Canada operations of FedEx; in fact, she would be the first woman to head a FedEx operation anywhere in the world. Rather than accept the offer graciously, Ms. Lisson suggested that she be interviewed for the position. “No man would say something like that,” she said.

In her special address, as the Guest of Honour, Hon. Mary Ng, Canada’s Minister of Small Business, Export Promotion and International Trade, said, “Evert year on International Women’s Day, we take time to reflect on the incredible contribution of women to our communities to our economies and everything in between. After a challenging year, which has disproportionately affected women, we know that their inclusion and empowerment is the way forward.”

She said this is also the time to reinforce the government’s commitment to gender equality. This is a key agenda for the government and there is still more work to be done to ensure equal participation of women in every sphere – from board rooms to businesses to classrooms and community centres. “Supporting women is the smartest thing that we can do, by advancing gender equality we can add $150 billion to our economy, and $12 trillion to the world economy.”

The speeches were followed by a panel discussion on the topic: Women Leaders: What it takes to reach the top and stay at the top. Sangita Iyer, an independent documentary filmmaker and positive psychology expert moderated the discussion. Apoorva Srivastava, the Consul General of India in Toronto; Her Worship Bonnie Crombie, the Mayor of Mississauga; and Vasudha Seth, the Director of Sales at ArcelorMittal Dofasco and the Vice Chair at Ontario Chamber of Commerce were the panelists.

Introducing the panel discussion, Iyer said, women Leaders face a glass ceiling in their rise to the upper echelons of their career ladder – whether in the corporate world, or in government or in bureaucracy. This is an undeniable fact that persists despite enactment of legislations globally to empower women.

Although 82 percent of women aged 25 to 54 now participate in Canada’s workforce, they are still underrepresented in leadership roles. Women hold only 25 percent of vice-president positions, and 15 percent of CEO positions. Women are also underrepresented in Canadian Government. Women currently make up 27 percent of the House of Commons, which is the highest percentage in Canada’s history. So, as can be seen, it takes a lot for women to succeed and rise to the top.

Apoorva Srivastava

Apoorva Srivastava’s father was a bureaucrat and wished that at least one of his children joined the public services. The mantle of carrying forward the parental wish fell on her as she was the youngest in the family. She passed the highly competitive public service examination and then waited for her positing, which could have been in any government sphere – administrative, the police service, the railways or even diplomatic. And as luck would have it, she was chosen for foreign service.

“It is such an enriching job, it is a journey of experience, enrichment, you get to travel a lot, stay in a country for three years, you get the opportunity to absorb a culture, make lifelong friends. To be a part of foreign service, you have to learn a language, and I learnt French, which led to a posting in Paris. This was followed by a posting in Kathmandu and then when the Indian Ambassador to Nepal was posted to Paris, he took me and my husband, who was also serving in Kathmandu to Paris. Thereafter, I had an immensely successful and fruitful stint as the staff officer with Sushma Swaraj and then with Dr. Jaishankar before I came here.”

Mayor Bonnie Crombie said that her path to the top was accidental, but once she had chosen the path, she was determined to reach the top. “I have always been interested in politics. I was inspired by Pierre Trudeau, and the policy of multiculturalism. I worked hard for other people for many years in different vocations including my own business, and was always involved with the community and was driven to make my city a better place.” 

Eventually, this involvement led to a political career and she became the Liberal candidate for Streetsville, and won the Parliamentary election, but took an early retirement from the House of Commons. It was then that Hazel McCallion approached her to contest the councillor polls, which she won, and then when Hazel McCallion decided to retire, Bonnie Crombie ran and won the Mayoral polls, and was re-elected.

Since high school, Vasudha Seth was deeply interested in math and physicals and had made up her mind to have a career that would involve both; she decided to follow her father’s footsteps and become an engineer, and when she was in her third and fourth year at the University of Toronto, she had the opportunity to work during summer at Dofasco. The steel industry was then and even today male dominated.

“Since I began, there has been a tremendous change in the demographic of the company, there are a lot more women in the professional and manufacturing spheres of the company. An important part of my journey was realizing fairly early on that even though I had studied engineering, it wasn’t the best fit for me, and I decided to push myself further and do my MBA. So, an important lesson is to be open minded.”

The program was interspersed with three entertainment skits that were submitted by women of the Indo-Canadian diaspora.