Wide Angle Conversations: DEI Talks
Wide Angle Conversations: DEI Talks are meaningful conversations with champions and advocates of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and those who are committed to bringing about a positive change in their sphere of influence.
Our increasingly diverse yet connected world must shift towards being empathetic and inclusive. Building a culture of inclusion is an imperative for the future of work; a focus on building Inclusive Cultures will enable organisations and individuals to leverage diverse perspectives and thought processes to power innovation and thrive in the BANI world.
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is a multidimensional, multilayered and complex topic. I believe to be truly a DEI advocate, champion and change-maker one has to value empathy, fairness and equality and be truly human-centric. DEI at workplaces will becomes easier if we focus on building an inclusive, fair and equitable society.
This for me brings social inclusion, wellbeing, youth empowerment, culture, corporate responsibility and sustainability under the purview of DEI. And these are the topics that Wide Angle Conversations will bring to you.
Wide Angle Conversations is an initiative of Life by Design with Taruna Aggarwal
Wide Angle Conversations: DEI Talks
Vinceya Xavier Edwin | Breaking Systemic Generational Poverty through Education | India
This is the story of a little girl from the lowest socio-economic strata, born in Lingarajapuram, a slum in Bangalore India. She was destined a life of extreme poverty, violence and deprivation until everything changed at a tender age of 3 1/2 years, when her father, without the knowledge of her mother, left her at the residential school Shanti Bhavan Children’s Project, providing education, home and security exclusively to children born into India's lowest socioeconomic class. The NGO is working to eradicate systemic generational poverty through quality education since 1997. Their philosophy is that one underserved child, given the same opportunities as a privileged child, can break the cycle of generational poverty for themselves, their family and community. Their graduates are authors, psychologists, computer scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, teachers and more.
My guest Vinceya Xavier Edwin is a graduate of Shanti Bhawan, MBA from MIT Sloan Business School of Management and currently Inclusion Program Manager at Google.
The podcast is about Vinceya, how she coped with separation, how she took many years to accept her identity and be able to feel pride in where she comes from, her personal struggle as she stepped out from a nurturing, protected environment into the real world harsh, full of distractions, non-linear and anxious. She draws our attention to the critical need for a focus on youth mental wellbeing.
She talks about DEI agendas of organizations, concentrating their efforts only on a few areas like gender, disability, race. She believes Diversity and Inclusion is multidimensional, with every geography and culture having layers of unique issues that need to be tackled.
Vinceya feels deep gratitude for the opportunity and lives by the values imbibed at Shanti Bhawan - a resolve to impact lives and make a difference. She has already moved her family out of Lingarajapuram, she is supporting her cousins and other children in her community, sponsoring a child and has the lofty vision to impact many more lives. She is a role model, an agent of change and the future of our world!