AMRAIZ KHAN
LAHORE Pakistan Nutshell conferences, Corporate Pakistan Group (CPG) and ACCA jointly hosted Diversity & Inclusion conference under the lockdown globally. Host of the Conference Azfar said that it was initiated a week back and thanks to the digital and virtual World that they were still in the phase of learning. He said that Global community is still restricted to their homes and the places where they w ere one month back. Despite all challenges, barriers and troubles we are optimist and it’s my own personal learning that future is bright, he maintained. He was of the view, “Current crisis provided us opportunity to evaluate ourselves and rethink about our country that where we stand in this crisis as individual as organisations. What we were doing early here and what is future. Because of this lockdown we are witnessing lot of problems no physical meetings or fun get together are being held and virtually we are more connected. We are more focused and more busy gradually. When we started support to the needy people we generated a huge amounts within two days. We generated this amount purely on whatsap not a single call was made to any business leader or any philanthropist and within 48 hours we crossed our target and through three credible oargnisations we distributed food and other stuff among the needy families and this process is still in continuation. Later we hosted seminars and other programmes on COVID 19 and we decided to host a Diversity and Inclusion Conference and I approached all the speakers from around the World to speak on the issue. Speakers were from different parts of the World and initially we designed the conference for three hours but later its time was extended to five hours. I pay my thanks to all the speakers and panelists who spared time and join us on our request and all it happened within short notice of two days. Special thanks to ACCA for being partner with us we are partnering for the last many years in learning activities and knowledge sharing. ACCA team is doing very amazing work in Pakistan and specially its country head Naveed Aslam. I am also thankful to the friends who projected this conference in 22 countries of the World including different African countries, United States, in Canada, in Europe, Far East, Middle East and South Asia as well. Speaking on the occasion Jacqueline Novogratz Founder and CEO Acumen in her speech Said that at the time when World is experiencing a lot of anxiety due to Coronavirus it is very relevant to speak on the human issues. She said, “I feel sorry for losses and crisis the people are facing but gratitude for us that w e are together having houses and shelter. She said that she started her organization Acumen 19 years back in Rawanda so that we could design something to include the poor in the system. It will be more resilient and comfortable for all of us. Government aid is falling short we should use our social contacts to overcome these problems. The most important factor is human capital. Listening to the voices of the poor is not enough for measuring what matters. She said, “Our organization is working on human capital”. Speaking on the occasion Shelley Zalis Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and founder of Female Quotient USA introduced herself by saying, “We are a female own business committed to advanced equality gender. Equality is not a female issue its social and economic imperative the female couldn’t is advancing equality in the workplace and the world through collaboration bringing visibility to women activating solutions for change and creating metrics per accountability. I believe that if there is a crisis there is opportunity I also believe that when there is a significant challenge there is a bigger opportunity. She was of eh view that Genderdiverse teams are more profitable and innovative. Organizations that embrace female specific issues have higher employee satisfaction and less staff turnover. Companies that elevate women are more efficient across all the dimensions. She claimed that if women and men had equal role in labor market $28 trillion could be added to global annual GDP by 2025 an impact that is equal to the combines size of the Chinese and US economies today
