杰夫·格林在美国公司高管层历练数十年后，如今有更多印度裔男性进入董事会。
By Jeff Green After decades of climbing the executive ranks at US companies, more men of Indian descent are now entering the boardroom.
今年，创纪录的16名印度裔男性加入标普500指数公司董事会，担任沃尔玛公司、西南航空公司和西部数据公司等企业的董事。ISS-Corporate和数据提供商Equilar的数据显示，只有白人男性和女性新增的董事席位更多。
A record 16 Indian men joined S&P 500 boards this year, taking directorships at companies including Walmart Inc., Southwest Airlines Co. and Western Digital Corp., according to ISS-Corporate and data provider Equilar. Only White men and women added more seats.
这一增长集中体现了长期趋势。James Drury Partners的数据显示，自2018年以来，财富500强和标普500指数公司董事会中印度裔男性的占比增至原来的三倍，增幅超过女性、黑人和西班牙裔董事。
The surge caps a longer shift. The share of Indian men among directors at Fortune 500 and S&P 500 companies has tripled since 2018, outpacing increases for women, Black and Hispanic directors, according to data from James Drury Partners.
随着企业更加重视拥有首席执行官或运营管理经验的董事，印度裔男性在董事会中的占比随之上升。招聘人士和相关高管表示，许多印度裔商业领袖在美国历练数十年后积累了这样的资历。James Drury Partners的数据显示，在财富500强和标普500指数公司董事会中的184名印度裔男性中，77%具有运营管理背景，即所谓的损益管理背景；约三分之二曾担任首席执行官。
The boardroom gains come as companies put increased emphasis on directors with chief executive officer or operating experience — credentials that many Indian business leaders have accumulated after decades in the US, according to recruiters and the executives themselves. Of the 184 Indian men on Fortune 500 and S&P 500 boards, 77% have operating, or so-called profit-and-loss, backgrounds, the James Drury data show. Roughly two-thirds have held CEO roles.
今年新任董事中也呈现同样的模式，其中三分之二为现任或已卸任的首席执行官。他们包括史赛克公司和林德公司的高管，以及阿尔伯森公司最近退休的首席执行官。
That same pattern is evident among this year’s directors, where two-thirds are current or former CEOs. They include top executives at Stryker Corp. and Linde Plc and the recently retired CEO of Albertsons Cos.
在公司减少对多元、公平与包容相关工作投入的同时，印度裔男性在董事会中仍取得了长足进展。尽管如此，各公司的董事会仍在发生变化，印度裔男性尤其在加速进入董事会。
The gains come as companies pull back from diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. Even so, boards are continuing to change, with Indian men making particularly rapid inroads.
目前，印度裔男性领导着约12家蓝筹企业，包括Alphabet公司、微软公司和宝洁公司，凸显了他们在美国企业最高管理层中日益增强的影响力。
Indian men now lead roughly a dozen blue-chip companies, including Alphabet Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Procter & Gamble Co., underscoring their growing presence in the highest ranks of corporate America.
与更广泛的女性群体一样，印度女性近年来并未取得同等程度的进步，部分原因在于她们担任首席执行官的可能性较低。不过也有值得注意的例外。百事公司（PepsiCo Inc.）前首席执行官因德拉·库马尔·诺伊（Indra K. Nooyi）和盖普公司（Gap Inc.）前首席执行官索尼娅·辛格尔（Sonia Syngal）今年分别加入了霍尼韦尔国际公司（Honeywell International Inc.）和拖拉机供应公司（Tractor Supply Inc.）的董事会。
Indian women, like women more broadly, haven’t seen the same progress in recent years, in part because they’re less likely to have served as CEOs. There are notable exceptions. Former PepsiCo Inc. CEO Indra K. Nooyi and former Gap Inc. CEO Sonia Syngal joined the boards of Honeywell International Inc. and Tractor Supply Inc., respectively, this year.
维姆软件公司（Veeam Software Corp.）首席执行官阿南德·埃斯瓦兰（Anand Eswaran）于四月被任命为科技公司F5公司（F5 Inc.）的董事。对于53岁的埃斯瓦兰来说，他三十多年前从印度来到美国，每一代印度高管都在建立在1960年代移民法规放宽后抵达的早期员工群体所取得的成就之上。
Anand Eswaran, CEO of Veeam Software Corp., was added to the board of technology company F5 Inc. in April. For Eswaran, 53, who came to the US more than three decades ago from India, each generation of Indian executives is building on gains made by earlier groups of workers who arrived after immigration rules were relaxed in the 1960s.
埃斯瓦兰表示，为了来到美国，这些有志成为高管的人必须与数百万同胞竞争，以争取进入顶尖学校的席位。他们在证明自身能力的过程中，从入门级岗位晋升至运营岗位。他说，1990年代末首批大型企业的印度裔首席执行官开辟了机遇，而这些机遇自那以后不断扩大。
To get to America, the aspiring executives had to compete with millions of their countrymen for spots at the best schools, Eswaran said. They advanced from entry-level jobs to operational roles as they proved their mettle. The first big company CEOs in the late 1990s opened up opportunities that have been widening ever since, he said.
埃斯瓦兰说：“这些是巨大的筛选机制。你得到的是那些对风险感到舒适、且很难被轻易动摇的人。”早期的先驱之一是拉杰·古普塔（Raj Gupta），他在1999年接手特种化学品制造商罗姆和哈斯公司（Rohm and Haas Co.）时，被任命为一家财富500强公司的首席执行官。当时，他仅是财富500强中第三位印度裔首席执行官。他的职业生涯包括在15个公共董事会任职，其中包括惠普公司（HP Inc.）和杜邦德内莫公司（DuPont de Nemours Inc.），以及7个私人董事会。
“Those are massive filters,” Eswaran said. “You get people who are sort of comfortable with risk and probably pretty hard to rattle.” One of the early pioneers was Raj Gupta, who in 1999 was appointed CEO of a Fortune 500 company when he took over specialty-chemical maker Rohm and Haas Co. He was only the third CEO of Indian heritage in the Fortune 500 at that time. His career includes work on 15 public boards, including HP Inc. and DuPont de Nemours Inc., and seven private boards.
古普塔表示，他的首次董事会任职是在费城的一家特种气体公司，当时他仍是罗姆和哈斯公司首席执行官的候选人之一。他当时的老板说，这段经历对他未来的晋升很有价值。现年80岁的古普塔表示，他的董事会服务生涯已经结束，目前他正在沃顿商学院和哈佛大学培养未来的商业领袖。
Gupta said his first board stint came at a specialty-gas company in Philadelphia when he was still among the candidates to become CEO of Rohm and Haas. His boss at the time said it would be valuable experience for his eventual promotion. Now 80, Gupta said his board service years are done and he’s currently teaching future business leaders at Wharton and Harvard.
Gupta表示，早期的导师帮助他从员工转型为领导者，例如建议他在会议上多发言，而不是把最好的想法留到私下交流时再说。
Gupta said early mentors helped him transition from employee to leader, advising him, for example, to speak up more in meetings rather than save his best ideas for private conversations.
“当时的心态是，如果我继续比同龄人表现得更好，我就会得到认可并获得晋升，”他说。“但我认为，真正的领悟在于：一旦达到一定层级，你的软技能、影响力技巧、倾听能力会变得更加重要。” 许多当今印度裔商业领袖的职业轨迹与Rakesh Sachdev相似。他于1981年作为高级工程师在美国汽车零部件供应商Cummins Inc.起步，随后晋升为Arvin Meritor Inc.的首席财务官，后担任亚太区总裁。
“The mindset was, if I continue to perform well relative to my peers, I’ll be recognized and I’ll be promoted,” he said. “But I think the recognition of understanding was that your softer skills, influencer skills, listening ability, after you reach a certain level, are more important.” The career trajectory of many of today’s Indian business leaders is similar to that of Rakesh Sachdev. He started in the US as a senior engineer at auto supplier Cummins Inc. in 1981 before rising to become chief financial officer and later president of Asia Pacific at Arvin Meritor Inc.
2008年金融危机期间，他离开汽车行业，加入生物技术公司Sigma-Aldrich Corp.，于2010年从首席财务官晋升为首席执行官，后来出售了该公司，又担任了另一家公司的首席执行官。他目前是涂料制造商Axalta Coating Systems Ltd.的董事长，该公司计划于今年晚些时候与荷兰涂料公司Akzo Nobel NV合并。他表示将担任新公司的董事长。
During the financial crisis in 2008 he left the auto industry for biotech company Sigma-Aldrich Corp. where he rose from CFO to CEO in 2010 and later sold the company before taking another CEO role. He’s currently the chair of paint maker Axalta Coating Systems Ltd., which plans to merge with Dutch paint company Akzo Nobel NV later this year. He says he will be the chair of the new company.
现年70岁的Sachdev表示，他曾帮助招募印度裔高管进入董事会，并越来越多地看到他们被列入他任职董事会的潜在董事名单中。
Sachdev, 70, said he’s helped recruit Indian executives to boards and increasingly sees them included on slates of potential directors for boards on which he serves.
“之所以获得势头，是因为印度人在职业生涯中取得了成功，这使他们作为董事会成员更具价值，”他说。
“It has gained momentum because Indians have done well in their professional careers and that has made them more valuable as board members,” he said.
Asian American Foundation（亚裔美国人基金会）首席执行官Norman Chen表示，关注印度裔男性的成功不应忽视更广泛的亚裔男性和女性面临的不那么积极的现实。该基金会致力于为美国的亚裔和太平洋岛民发声。他说，亚裔社区的其他成员在董事会中代表性不足，一些研究人员将此称为东亚裔高管面临的“竹子天花板”。他表示，该组织正在开展项目，帮助所有亚裔董事寻找更多机会。
Focus on the success of Indian men shouldn’t overlook the less positive reality for the broader population of Asian men and women, said Norman Chen, CEO of the Asian American Foundation, which advocates for Asian and Pacific Islanders in the US. Other members of the Asian community are under-represented on boards, which some researchers have described as a “bamboo ceiling” for East Asian executives, he said. His group is working on programs to help all Asian directors find more opportunities, he said.
许多印度商业领袖所走的道路正变得更难复制，因为特朗普政府收紧了移民限制，包括印度技术和医疗领域工人广泛使用的H-1B签证计划。政府对寻求引进某些H-1B工人的雇主施加了10万美元的支付要求，这一措施正面临法庭挑战，并提出了一项包含类似费用的单独计划。根据美国公民及移民服务局的数据，2024财年获批的H-1B申请中，印度出生的工人约占71%。
The path taken by many Indian business leaders is becoming harder to replicate as the Trump administration tightens immigration restrictions, including on the H-1B visa program widely used by Indian workers in technical and medical fields. The administration has imposed a $100,000 payment requirement on employers seeking to bring certain H-1B workers into the US, a measure facing a court challenge, and has proposed a separate plan with similar fees. Indian-born workers accounted for about 71% of approved H-1B petitions in fiscal 2024, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services.
Indiaspora执行董事Sanjeev Joshipura表示，美国大多数顶尖印度裔首席执行官，包括那些掌管全球巨头企业的人，最初都是持学生签证来美，后来通过H-1B签证工作，如今正为美国经济做出重大贡献。Indiaspora是一个为美国及其他地区印度社区发声的组织。他说，学生签证数量已经在下降。
Most of the top Indian CEOs in the US, including those running giant global companies, came on student visas and later worked with H-1B visas and are now making significant contributions to the American economy, said Sanjeev Joshipura, executive director of Indiaspora, a group that advocates for the Indian community in the US and elsewhere. Student visas are already on the decline, he said.
“规则的制定不应阻碍美国继续成为全球最优秀人才的主要磁石，”他说。
“The rules shouldn’t be made in a way that prevents America from continuing to be the primary magnet for the best talent all over the world,” he said.
Veeam的Eswaran表示，在某种程度上，印度人在适应美国商业挑战方面具有优势，因为印度本身的多元碎片化特性，为在美工作的移民领袖所需的领导特质提供了良好的训练场。他说，许多印度人从小习惯在本国应对语言和文化差异，跨越一条州界就可能意味着遇到完全不同的语言和社会规范。
To some degree, Indians have an advantage in adapting to US business challenges because the fractured nature of India itself presents a good training ground for leadership traits that work for immigrant leaders in the US, Veeam’s Eswaran said. Many Indians grow up accustomed to navigating linguistic and cultural differences within their own country, where crossing a state line can mean encountering a different language and set of social norms, he said.
“你会明白，坐在你旁边的人往往基于完全不同的假设在思考，除非你考虑到这一点，否则什么事也成不了，”Eswaran说。“这从根本上塑造了你的领导方式，并产生了实质性的影响。”
“You learn that the person sitting next to you is often working from a very different set of assumptions and nothing gets done unless you account for it,” Eswaran said. “That also fundamentally shapes how you lead, and that makes a difference.”