Opportunities and Challenges of Educated Professional Women Leaders in Environment Management

Methodology

The chapter is written based on literature review and primary data to fulfil the various objectives of the chapter. Literature review covered the research articles that focus on the opportunities and challenges of women leaders in environmental protection in the domains of home, corporate and public life and in the professions of teaching and environmentalism. Primary data was be collected from educated professional women and men using questionnaire that will bring the required data to study the opportunities and challenges for women leaders in environmental management. The primary data required for the analysis was collected from educated professional women and men across India as to how they have exercised their leadership in various domains to bring about a sustainable environment. Further, case studies of three educators cum environmental protectionists is included in the chapter.

The chapter explains how women lead environmental management initiatives at home, work place and society. Managing kitchen waste and waste water at home can be a significant way women can lead environment protection at home front. At work place women leaders can ensure that proper waste disposal, energy conservation, car-pooling, use of renewable energy sources, etc. can be adopted to protect environment. In the society women can be great change agents by volunteering in CSR initiatives and with NGOs to bring about a great transformation in the attitude and behavior of common people in conserving and protecting environment. Thus, in the three common domains and two specific professions where women play a crucial role they can effectively ensure that environment is well managed. Further, when women take up crucial and powerful roles, they can exercise great initiatives as environment protectors. Apart from the primary data and secondary data analysis, even case studies have be cited to make the significant role of women in environment protection. The chapter brings a very wide perspective of how Indian women are currently playing their leadership roles to protect environment covering their regular domains of functioning and their extraordinary roles as powerful leaders in organizations and nations. The chapter will be organized as four parts: Introduction, Literature Review, Analysis and Discussion, Case Studies and Conclusion.