SHEROES Community Meet - Gurgaon

A big shout-out to Sairee, Srishti and the SHEROES team for the successful launch of the SHEROES Community Meets across the country.

On January 9, 2016, I was invited to attend the community meet at Gurgaon (at the quirky yet youthful Gurgaon office of 91 Springboard, the venue partner for these meets) and to share my professional journey with the community members. I went with my ‘Mentor hat’ on, geared to give – to motivate, share and impart learning. Little did I realize how much I would end up taking back with me - conversations, new friends, inspiration, connections and an overall feeling of warmth and camaraderie.

The group was a vibrant mix of young women barely a month into their career, mums on a break, working women who were exploring workflex options, returning professionals and entrepreneurs. As Ruchi Bhatia (fellow SHEROES Mentor and Recruitment Lead @ IBM) and I shared our experiences and our journey, we not only learned from one another, but also from the group of enthusiastic participants who listened to us with rapt attention and asked us a myriad questions, ranging from professional advice to personal tips.

The SHEROES team then updated the audience on their exciting plans for the year ahead. The post event networking session saw the participants milling around and interacting with one another over coffee (and the juiciest samosas!), exchanging thoughts, advice, problems, solutions, encouragement. One of the greatest gifts of value you can give someone is to share with them that “this is a possibility, and it is a possibility for YOU,” and therein you can open up entirely new paths in their life. And that is what, in varying degrees, each one of us in the room experienced that day.

If the success of the debut meet in Gurgaon is anything to go by, the SHEROES Community Meets are poised to increasingly become a very valuable and much sought after platform for sharing ideas and knowledge, support and inspiration. I, for one, am looking forward to being an integral part of many such meet ups going forwards.