Ep 82: Shuchi Sharma: Women Will Change the World...For the Better

Diva Tech Talk was honored to interview Shuchi Sharma, Global Head and VP, Gender Equality & Intelligence, SAP, the software giant  that creates enterprise software to manage operations and customer relations for Fortune 500 companies all over the world.

Shuchi never intended to enter software.  “I studied chemistry, with the aim of being a doctor,” she said “because it explains the ‘why’ behind everything. But I excelled in economics. I combined science and economics and got a degree in public health.”  She obtained her bachelors of science at the College of William and Mary, and her masters of public health at the University of Michigan.  “I took courses in maternal and children’s health and HIV policy,” Shuchi said. “I knew that I wanted to focus on women’s issues, in some form.”

She began in management consulting working for The Advisory Board, among others. “I worked with technology for many years. Then I had an opportunity to move overseas to Germany.” She worked, in Heidelberg, for SAS, a leader in software analytics, running software consulting across eastern, central and northern Europe.  “That was great fun.” However, “women were not really helping each other. I saw opportunities missed. I thought ‘what can I do about this?’ “ What Shuchi did, in her personal time, was create The Heidelberg International Professional Women’s Forum (HIP), to bring together women to exchange ideas, learn from each other, and develop skills to enhance success.  “I spent five years, building and leading that organization. It made me realize that this is what I would like my life to be about.”  Among HIP ongoing results were “people finding new opportunities; people starting businesses; people developing new friendships that carried great impact to their lives; creating new ventures they never thought they could achieve.”  There were many new partnerships and businesses, and significant events including “a big summit to fuel entrepreneurship in the community.”  Shuchi is still amazed at “the multiplier effect that something like this can have on lives.”

In 2008, Shuchi left SAS to join SAP, to grow the consulting business in northern and southern Europe and the USSR.  “I have been at SAP for 10 years. Now in my fourth role, I feel so blessed,” she said. “I started in business consulting, and after I had my second daughter, I wasn’t ready to travel.”  Shuchi was lucky. Her empathetic boss asked her to build a marketing organization. Over the subsequent 5 years, she built a marketing function for business consulting. Then she was asked to lead a digital transformation team in North America for SAP’s Success Factors, delivering dramatic improvement in the way companies handle their workforces. She had great fun helping customers use design thinking to envision the state of their workforces 5 years in the future.  In her volunteer life, Shuchi became a salary coach for AAUW’s SmartStart Program, and worked with organizations like Moms Rising. “I stayed very involved in women’s topics.” She then evolved into her current position “changing the mix of gender in the organization and creating that very inclusive culture --- a strategic transformation. It was a wonderful opportunity to bring my skills and interests together.”

Shuchi is determined to deliver on SAP’s mandate: “to ensure that we, as an organization, can meet our target of having 30% of women in leadership by 2022.” She tackled leadership in process-oriented fashion.  “First we look at data, to see where we are, where we have to go, and how we are going to get there.” SAP has amassed internal data on their own enterprise analytics platform and use dashboards that track many areas:  gender, early talent benchmarks, diversity and inclusion categories, and more. The analytics tools “help us slice and dice the data by so many different dimensions.” Using it, Shuchi’s team drives the revamp of corporate processes and organizations that have implicit bias. “We use data to have discussions with Level 1 managers” to encourage individual plans to reach the 30% goal.  

Shuchi’s team has worked on projects including re-certification of SAP under the IMF’s EDGE (Economic Dividends for Gender Equality). “It is very robust analysis that involves data, review of policies and practices, an employee survey, and a third-party audit. Through that, we understand how we are progressing from leadership and development, pay equity, recruitment and promotion, and flexible work culture, perspectives.  That data is going to help us drive change for the next 6 years.” Her team is rolling out programs centered on male allies, sponsorship and mentoring and “return-ship” – recruiting those who dropped out for life reasons, but now want to come back. Nothing can be accomplished in a vacuum, so her team is working on collaborative partnerships with other visionary organizations to help achieve SAP’s target of 30% by 2025.

For other companies fielding inclusion programs, Shuchi shared SAP’s ingredients for success: strong executive sponsorship, an effective ecosystem, with diversity and inclusion team members scattered throughout the company, and employee network groups. SAP is thrilled to have received much deserved recognition for their progress in diversity and inclusion. The latest is being named one of the top 5 companies for women technologists  by the Anita Borg Institute.

Shuchi offered wonderful wisdom for women.  On pay equity, she said “if you are in university, seek out resources that the AAUW provides. You can find a workshop to  teach you the skills to negotiate salary, which is something you must do in every facet of life. Just become comfortable with asking. JUST ASK.”   She also recommended books including Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Why We Should All Be Feminists and watershed works by Dr.  Louann Brizendine, particularly The Female Brain.   In her own career, Shuchi is joyful about her SAP role. “Women are going to change the world…for the better.  If you look across history, women are almost always at the heart of every positive social construct.” But she isn’t free of stress. “I worry that entrenched biases we have seen will continue to exist through our technology. We need to take a very active role to ensure that there is no prejudice; that it is open, available to everyone, and people have opportunities regardless of their race, color, appearance. NOW is the time.”  

Shuchi’s two daughters are her personal inspiration. “I want to equip them with everything I can to help them overcome what they might face in the workplace.”  She proudly mentioned that one of her daughters recently beat a boy in a footrace, and when one of his buddies commented that he was beat by a girl, her daughter turned and said: “that’s a normal thing; get used to it!”

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