Male Allies - Dr. Dhrumil Shah and Ramakrishna Penumarthy on why Women Empowerment is Important to Them
“When women are living safely, given respect, and are provided opportunities , they can reach their full potential and carry their own productive lives. Women empowerment is crucial to our societal and community growth” (Ramakrishna & Dhrumil) As we wrap up our 1st year, we are excited to kick-off our Male Allies series, where we spotlight men who are leading women empowerment in their communities. Today, we have Dr. Dhrumil Shah and Ramakrishna Penumarthy, two wonderful community leaders, who have been a true support in the Women Who Win journey. They share their stories and how they seek to empower women across the many organizations they work with such as IMANE, Telugu Association (TAGB), Volunteering for Seniors, Society of Physician Entrepreneurs and more…(and of course, we had to ask them, who is a woman in your life that you most admire?) Check out their stories below!
Dr. Dhrumil Shah and Ramakrishna Penumarthy
1. We are excited to kick-off our male allies series with you both. Tell us your stories!
Dhrumil: I am an individual with professional background of being a physician entrepreneur, innovator and advisor in digital health space currently working as Chief Medical Information Officer at Compass Medical in Massachusetts and also contributing as 2020-21 President of Indian Medical Association of New Engalnd (IMANE). My journey started in India as a student with engineering background somehow chose the path of being a medical professional now living in USA for last 17 years plus collaborating and learning from my peers and community leaders.
Ramakrishna: I’m originally from Andhra & Telangana in India, where I completed my education and received a degree in Mechanical Engineering before moving to Mumbai. After spending sometime traveling because of work, we have chosen Boston as our place to live in - considering Boston’s legacy of good education and innovation. I’m currently working at Oracle as a risk management executive. I have always resonated with an excerpt from Bhagawad Gita - “When you feel the suffering of every living thing in your own heart, that is consciousness”. I feel very thankful for my parents, my wife Pratima, daughters Akhila and Alekhya and of course my friends for sharing the values on serving the community as much as they can. This encouraged me to be a part of various organizations in the New England area and associate with the same organizations in serving community. Few of these organizations include Volunteering for Seniors, Adopt a Village Global Foundation, Telugu Association of Greater Boston, Team Aid, and Easton Lions Club where I am serving under various capacities.
In addition, while I didn’t get an opportunity to learn music, it has always been an important part of my life as I strongly believe that it is a way of expressing our feelings. Music has been a stress reliever and an escape from monotony that tends to creep into our lives now and then . Music and sound engineering have and will always play an important role in my life. Video editing and other Audio Video related work brings me closer to my friends and family even when I was growing up. Outside of Office work, through Sraveo, we collaborate with other organizations in the New England region and provide all sorts of audio-visual works including streaming. I am always open in helping other people and sharing some of my experience and learnings. Through such collaborations, e.g. Chai with Manju, Sruthilayalu, IAGB, IMAN, NEKK, NATS Boston etc, I not only had an opportunity to learn, but most importantly it associated me with wonderful individuals serving the community.
2. Why is women empowerment important to you, and how do you try to incorporate it in the work you do with community organizations?
Dhrumil : Women empowerment is crucial to our societal and community growth as we all work towards supporting our individual communities in becoming one global ecosystem. Part of my work as Executive leadership team member of IMANE over last few years, I have come across some very impressive and dedicated community leaders many of whom are women and I take pride in working side by side with some of them in many of my professional and community engagements. I work with many women founders of digital health companies as their advisor/mentor and also participate in forums along side women leaders from various non for profit community and global organizations. There is a unique sense of inclusivity, equity and collaboration one can experience when we all come together and embrace our strengths and move past set of obstacles which our society has put in place around individual and collective vision.
Ramakrishna: When women are living safely, given respect, and are provided opportunities , they can reach their full potential and carry their own productive lives. Empowering women is the key to economic growth, political stability and social transformation and this is very evident in many success stories. However, there is still more work to be done and as a community everyone should encourage women empowerment. Women form an important segment of the labor force and the economic role-played by them cannot be isolated from the framework of development. The role of women is gradually increasing all over the world. Empowerment leads to self-fulfillment and women become aware of where they are going, what their position is in the society, their status existence and rights. Women are becoming more empowered, personally, and economically through business ownership.
There are many organizations/programs like Volunteering for Seniors, Women Who Win, Chai with Manju, Saheli, Lokvani, IIFFB etc, which are led by Women in New England region and there is no need to explain further how successful they are. I have had the chance to be part of these communities and share my support to see them thrive and advance. I strongly believe that when women adopt leadership roles, they contribute a unique set of skills, ideas, and life experiences that can broaden the entire company’s insight, strategies, and bottom line (success). This is proven over time and again through the work accomplished by the women who I worked with - be it in my day job or community organizations. I always encourage my spouse and my daughters to take lead in the opportunities that they come across and do not hesitate with the thought that they will not get right encouragement / empowerment.
3. Who is an empowered woman in your life that you admire?
Dhrumil: This is a challenging question as I can go on and on about many examples here. The one closest to me would be my wife who has unconditionally supported me and our family through many years of changes and challenges. I am proud to work along side my co-worker and our chief operating officer who is an accomplished and very intuitive women leader who has helped me through my professional growth and daily learnings of being an effective communicator.
Ramakrishna: Inspiration, I believe, is not only the key to a happy relationship, but a key to general happiness in life. When we feel inspired, we feel alive. We feel, which can sometimes be a refreshing change from the mundane nature of every other day. If you want to live a happy life, you need to live an inspired life. So, to answer the question and begin with, my wife is one of the women in my life that I greatly admire. I believe the right person for you is the person who inspires you without even trying, but instead, by just being. My mother is also another woman in my life that truly showed me how trust, empathy and belief plays a crucial role in one’s life and to create harmony with your relations with others. Both these women allowed me to understand and appreciate the role of helping others, as well as being grateful to the opportunity of serving.
Thank you both for sharing your stories with us. We appreciate everything you do to support women empowerment!
Bios - Ramakrishna Penumarthy - With over 20 years in IT Industry, Ramakrishna has experience in IT management consultation, team building, professional development, IT Risk management, and governance. In the nonprofit arena, he contributes his time and talent as a Co-Founder of Volunteering for Seniors Inc org and National coordinator for Team Aid, President of Telugu association of Greater Boston, Past president of Easton Lions Club etc. When he’s away from the office, you can find him playing music, DJing, photography through SRAVEO or exploring downtime with his family.
Dr. Dhrumil Shah - Dhrumil Shah is a family physician and a CMIO/CIO at Compass Medical, an independent provider led organization in Southeast Massachusetts. His primary interests and focus areas are Digital health innovation, Data science and Care analytics, Health innovation and Entrepreneurship and Life science technology commercialization.Dr. Shah provides advisory & consultation services for and speaks to companies and entities around the globe, who are looking to explore disruptive innovation ideas and create a scalable business model in the areas of bio entrepreneurship, bioscience, healthcare, healthcare IT, medical tourism – nationally and internationally, new product development, product design, and financing new ventures. Dr. Shah did his Family Medicine training at New Jersey Medical School and subsequently graduated from University of Illinois Chicago completing his Post Masters in Health Informatics. He is actively involved in Health IT space via many of national and regional speaking engagements and collaborative fueling the much needed disruption to redesign Healthcare delivery space. He also leads Greater Boston Chapter of SOPE(Society of Physicians Entrepreneurs).
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