Pat Mitchell, the first female president of PCNN Productions, and the first women to own and host a national show, in one of her books, ‘Becoming a Dangerous Women’ addresses every woman as ‘dangerous’ and capable of being ‘dangerous’. She says that the slow pace of change towards equality is making the world a dangerous place and hence, it needs dangerous women to lead. However, her idea of ‘dangerous’ here is not to be feared but to be more ‘fearless’.
Fearless, but how? The idea here is to speak the truth when silence is much safer and speaking in rooms where decisions are made. Such fierce women leaders should stand up for one another, challenge cultural construct that influence other women, and create opportunities for other women to stand up and speak.
A fearless leader of the 21st century will recognize that all the aforesaid is possible and that they are more than prepared to bring change when compared to any other generation of leaders. Recognizing the surge in such influential powerful leaders of today and in our quest to find one, our paths crossed with Kamaljit Kaur Gatore, HR Manager at iResearch. Her evolution as a women leader of the 21 century teaches us the lessons of unfathomable persistence.
A Leader in Making
The fact that success is not easy to come by requires no validation and applies to Ms.Gatore’s story as well. “I think there are ‘no shortcuts to success’ is the most important thing one should understand. The success graph should be rising in life. If you choose shortcuts you may have dips in the carrier personally and professionally,” she says.
Her aforesaid statement depicts us her journey to the top was not easy and had no shortcuts. Serving as an HR Executive kick-started her professional journey. Her role helped her understand the foundations and even set the foundations to become an HR Leader.
She made it her point to understand the basics of HR right from the early stage so that years ahead she could use all her experience and knowledge to bring change. “I have worked in the entire life cycle of HR functions, starting from the basic role of sourcing candidates from professional networks and portals, interviewing candidates, employee retention, creating compensation benefit plan for employees to managing complex roles like creating HR policies, leadership hiring, driving culture, nurturing talent, and setting business-aligned workforce strategies,” comments Ms. Gatore.
Persistence is the Key
If not for the challenges, success would not have felt so glorious. Ms. Gatore too had her share of challenges. It too had many challenges and even exists. “One of the main challenges that is persistent in our industry is retaining talent and since we work in a hyper-competitive labor market, compensation isn’t enough to keep talent satisfied, culture and the employee experience matter a lot,” she recalls.
However, the key here is to overcome the trepidations of these challenges and to stay afloat. For Ms. Gatore, her focus and persistence to achieve the desired goal acted as the wherewithal to achieve success. “Focus and Inspiration on what I wish to achieve in life keep me motivated”, she adds.
That being said, she also considers Mr. Yogesh Shah, the Director of iResearch Services, as her source of motivation and inspiration. “He is a true inspiration and benchmark for me. He leads his team and me to never stop learning and exploring new things in personal and professional life,” she adds.
However, the biggest lesson of her life, to be content with what one has and to continuously work towards one’s dream was taught by her mom. “And my Mother is my Idol in my personal life. I have learned to be content and satisfied with whatever you have and focus to achieve what you desire with honesty and efforts,” asserts Ms. Gatore.
“The key attributes that have helped me in my evolution and in running my operations are Honesty, Transparency, Focus, and Clear communication,” she adds further.
Making Decisions that Matter
Today, Ms. Gatore takes decisions that are best suited for her company and is at the lead of making decisions that contributes to its extraordinary growth. However, this leads us to the question, what is iResearch? iResearch is a marketing first agency providing marketing-first services to global brands – with a focus on dependability, customer service, and uniqueness. Its services are survey led thought leadership, lead generation, and investment research.
The glimpses of Ms. Gatore’s result-oriented decisions have been taken to implement business-aligned workforce strategies to grow the company from a 70-man company to 400+ in 3 years. The company’s human resources team under her leadership has grown from a team of one to a team of five.
Ms. Gatore’s continuous endeavor would be always put the company’s interest at the forefront and drive it to success. While that remains her professional goal, at a personal ever she will strive to evolve as the best in the industry. “I would like to see myself at the forefront of deploying strategies wherein my team transforms themselves to be workforce advisors and not limiting themselves to stay on top of current HR trends,” she concludes.
