Soma Mondal, the first female chair of the state-run Steel Authority of India (SAIL), has taken the 70th position in Forbes’ 2023 list of the World’s Most Powerful Women.
Notable Indian women on the list also include Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, HCL Technologies Chairperson Roshni Nadar Malhotra, and Biocon Chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw.
Taking charge at SAIL in January 2021, Mondal steered the Indian government-owned steel giant to unprecedented profits, surging threefold to 120 billion rupees in her inaugural year.
Her association with SAIL started in 2017 when she assumed the position of Director (Commercial).
Before joining SAIL as a Director, Mondal was the Director (Commercial) at NALCO. A graduate in Electrical Engineering from the National Institute of Technology, Rourkela in 1984, Mondal started her career as a Graduate Engineer Trainee at NALCO and rose to become Director (Commercial) at NALCO. She then joined SAIL in 2017 as the Director (Commercial) and subsequently became the Chairman of SAIL.
Mondal played a key role in implementing marketing strategies, resulting in consecutive record-breaking sales volumes from 2017-18 to 2019-20.
Sixty-year-old Mondal has over three decades of experience in the metals industry.
Her remarkable journey, ascending from a Graduate Engineer Trainee at the state-run National Aluminium Co. to becoming the first woman Functional Director of SAIL and subsequently its Chairperson, underscores her expertise and leadership prowess.
Forbes wrote, lauding her: “She’s responsible for launching an 80,000-million-rupee effort to expand production capacity.”
She implemented reforms in the Marketing Organization Structure by establishing three verticals—Sales, Marketing, and Services—to intensify focus and micro-management. To tap into the potential of rural India, Mondal orchestrated “Gaon Ki Ore” workshops nationwide, amplifying the branding initiatives for SAIL’s products.
Born and raised in a middle-class Odia family in Bhubaneswar, Mondal is not only the Chairperson of the CII sub-committee on ‘Safeguard for Tariff and Non-Tariff Barrier’ but also a member of the CII-National Committee on Steel, as mentioned on SAIL’s website.