Aadesh Goyal wears many hats as Global CHRO, Board Director, and Community Service Director on the Board at Tata Communications Transformation Services Limited (TCTS). Prior to this he has worked with PeopleStrong HR Services, Aricent Technologies Holdings Ltd (earlier known as Hughes Software Systems & Flextronics Software Systems) and Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) in various capacities. At C-DOT, he set-up project management and HR processes which were ahead of their time. A natural thought leader, he is a versatile individual. A tough task master, he mentors his team and creates learning and growth opportunities for them. He also has the ability to strike a good work-life balance.
Aashish Mishra is the Vice President and Head of HR at Indian Metals & Ferro Alloys Ltd. He has been working with IMFA for a decade now. In his prior engagements, he has served as GM HR, Hindalco Industries and AGM HR, Suzlon Energy Ltd. He was Chief Manager, HR at SRF Limited and Plant HR Head at ACC Ltd. Aashish has a masters degree in Social Law (MSW) from Nagpur University and has completed PGCHRM HR from XLRI Jamshedpur. He exemplifies great dedication and exuberant energy while introducing and implementing best HR practices in the industry with his education, and decades of experience.
Abhijit Sengupta is Senior General Manager at Eveready Industries India Ltd. He has worked with Apeejay Surrendra Group as Dy General Manager HR handling Talent Management, Talent Development, Performance Management and Organisational Development Initiatives across Group companies. He was directly responsible for all HR initiatives for the Tea & Shipping business. He has also worked with Eureka Forbes Ltd, Dabur India Ltd and PepsiCo India, at different HR leadership positions. A Xavier Institute of Social Service alumnus, Mr. Sengupta has more than two decades of experience in handling HR and IR functions under his belt. He also possesses strategic capabilities for formulating new concepts and solving complex problems with ease. His sharp analytical skills, thorough professionalism, capability to identify and groom potential in young professionals makes his a stalwart in the industry.
Adarsh Mishra, Associate Director, CHRO is part of the strategic leadership team that drives business and people agenda at Panasonic India. As such, he has put in place a new organization design and structure through creation of high performing teams. He is taking the human resources function to a new dimension with his decades of outstanding experience and notable achievements. His new and innovative methods of talent management and retention of key resources by implementing transformational interventions are considered to be amongst the very best in the industry. He has effectively managed people functions to yield business results, developing employee and industrial relations. Before this, Mr. Mishra was the Deputy General Manager at LG Electronics India, a post he held over a decade, and where handled difficult and complex jobs and situations A proven leader, his mixture of pragmatic and innovative approach commands respect from all.
Presently the Group President, Human Resources at Essar Group, Adil Malia is a people practitioner, learner, ideator, coach, speaker, and writer with versatile experience in domains of people management, change management and leadership. Starting at 19 as a legal assistant, he has headed several positions in diverse industries like manufacturing, services, infrastructure, FMCG, and retail; with global organizations like The Coca-Cola Company, Al-Futtaim, and GE Appliances. Passionate about people, he is a voracious reader, fond of poetry and music, and often indulges in humorous doodling, calligraphy. He also loves public speaking. He has modelled his life on the tenet: “one first needs to be a good person. Everything else follows.”
Aditya Singh is World Wide Director, Global Talent Acquisition at Colgate-Palmolive. He provides HR leadership in all aspects of people processes; setting the template for future capability building in the organization; addressing the current requirements based on market developments and opportunities; and ensuring that the organization has enough talent depth and breadth to leverage it. He has also served at New India Assurance Company Ltd and Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited in different positions. At Ranbaxy, he was instrumental in implementing the best of HR practices across all regions and divisions. Mr. Singh commands over 15 years of experience, spanning sectors like pharmaceuticals, FMCG and insurance.
Ajaj Bhatt is Vice President, HR, Abbott India. He has over 26 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry. He has held several leadership positions in his more than a decade long stint at Abbott, the largest integrated healthcare company worldwide and one of the top fortune 500 companies, operating in 150 countries. He has led the Global HR transformation of Abbott in India and has helped build a strong leadership team. Mr. Bhatt strives to create and implement HR strategy which enables Abbott employees to live the promise. He believes that offering employees challenging and rewarding career opportunities is the best formula to retain and nurture talent. He also believes in giving senior leadership exposure and professional development opportunities.
Ajay Ambewadikar is Director Human Resources at CNH Industrial. Ajay started his professional journey after his post graduation in 1991. He believes that the learning of management starts when one is a child, from one’s parents. He has varied experience in different industries, such as luggage, heavy engineering, pharmaceuticals, automobile, and project organization; and has partnered handling setting and re-setting business and HR processes. Having stayed in the business for more than 20 years has helped him lead, and driving change. The journey has also given him an opportunity to learn the dynamics of different businesses, and drive HR with an “outside in” approach. Ajay’s strength is his ability to relate to people, even at the very first meeting. His open style of management puts him at the top of his league. He expresses his opinions freely, and does not shy away from taking a stand, even if it is unpopular.
Mr. Ajay Kukreja is the Country HR Director at Honeywell International India Pvt. Ltd. He is an HR business partner with more than 20 years of experience across sectors like logistics, FMCG, insurance, organized retail, and engineering. His role provides HR leadership for all businesses and partner with business leaders to drive profitable growth of Honeywell in India. Prior to this, he was the President of HR at Subhiksha; Vice President, HR at ICICI Prudential; and Manager, HR at Cargill India Pvt. Ltd. and PepsiCo India. At Subhiksha he was responsible for setting up the human resource function for FMCG and consumer durables retail across 10 states of India. Mr. Kukreja won Global HR Excellence Award for creating a competency based framework for market development officers in the crop nutrition business.
Ajay Nair is the Chief Human Resource Officer at Housing.com India. He was Chief Projects Officer at Omkar Realtors & Developers Pvt. Ltd. in his earlier engagement. He has also with Provogue India Ltd. as Vice President, Human Resources. He completed his PGDHRM, Human Resources from the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) and also did a program in International Trade Management, from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies. Ajay is everything an HR professional should be– patient, compassionate, a good listener, trouble shooter, people’s person and above all a fantastic co-worker to work with. His business acumen is absolutely exemplary. He’s extremely approachable, most learned and a truly good human being. He is a gentleman where style meets substance, possessing excellent human resource skills. His creative orientaiton and agerness to take up newer responsibilities and handle them to the best of his ability is commendable.
As Director HR at Cleartrip, Ajit Singh leads the HR function and all HR initiatives that help make Cleartrip an employer of choice. Singh joined Cleartrip.com from Kale Consultants Ltd, where he was managing its human resources globally. His job profile includes design and development, manpower planning, resourcing, training and development, performance management, rewards and recognition and employee relations. He has 12 years’ experience in the human resource function and his core competence lies in strategic HR initiatives like change management, organization design and performance management. Mr. Singh is open to experimentation, yet falls back on the knowledge he has acquired from his vast pool of experience. He is a new age HR professional, with his roots intact in an old school HR philosophy, with employees at centre.
Ajit Singh is working as Vice President HR at the Encore Capital Group. Mr. Singh is a senior HR professional with almost two decades of experience with the world’s leading companies. Heading the HR function now, he has managed it in all kind of situations – start up, turn-around, growth phase and stable operations. He has rendered his services to leading organizations like TV18 Broadcast, GE Capital, and Citigroup in his previous engagements. He has managed over 4000 employees at TV18, including at CNN-IBN, IBN7, CNBC-TV18, History TV18 and ETV channels; leading processes, policies, organization development and compensation & benefits design for the group. Mr.Singh has received a special recommendation from CII – Western Region when he was spearheading the team presenting HR practices to them for the HR Excellence Award, which is based on the EFQM Excellence Model. Ajit is a leader who brings out the best in the team by providing a well balanced regimen of autonomy for decision making, with mentoring.
Alind Sharma is Sr. Director Human Resources at Pfizer Ltd. He has also been the Director HR with Monsanto, Agri Business and Innovation; Head Human Resources at Tata International Limited; Sr. Vice President, Human Resources at Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Ltd; and Sr. Manager with Ranbaxy Labs Ltd. An Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad alumnus, Mr. Sharma is a chemical engineer. A hard task master, he sets high standards of excellence for himself and his team. His excellent leadership skills help him establish standards and manage a creative climate where people are self-motivated toward achieving long-term goals. He builds strong bonds with his team and takes pains to maintain relationships. His key strength is his in-depth understanding of the business.
Anand Shukla is Head of Human Resources at Jindal Steel and Power. He is a qualified coach and certified for MBTI & DISC profiling. Mr. Shukla has a rich history of work in the HR function and as a Profit Centre Head for large conglomerates. He has a flair for conceptualizing, developing and implementing innovative practices for organization improvement. Mr. Anand has expertise in effectuating strategies aimed at operation and service excellence, being a skilled change agent and a creative thinker. He was President, Human Resources at Reliance Power prior to joining JSPL, and has developed strategy and built programs to create a seamless structure with clear accountability and interdependencies across two distinct verticals. He has also served as Director, Human Resources at SABMiller India Ltd and GM-HR with BD India Pvt Ltd.
Anil Jalali is HR Director India, SA South at IBM, and a leader with wellrounded experience across HR functions. A professional with high integrity, change leadership, HR program design and execution capability, his ability to understand businesses, constantly question the value added, and looking at innovative and intelligent HR solutions, has surprised clients and fellow business leaders. Having worked with Wipro and RPG in several HR leadership positions, his professionalism and performance orientation is exemplary.
Amrita Singh is GM HR (Corporate) at Satyam Cineplexes, now INOX. Her 20 years of experience includes of expertise in core human resource management, employee relations, business planning, growth strategy development, business performance analysis, resource management and business process management. Her ability to break problems into small achievable steps gives her a formidable advantage over others. Highly enthusiastic, she has the knack for taking people along, is focused and hard working, and keeps the work environment light
Anjali Sachdeva is Head HR and Admin at Groupe SEB India Maharaja Whiteline. A seasoned HR professional, Anjali has more than two decades of experience in HR. She gained expertise in heading HR functions of large Indian companies in consumer durables, telecom and manufacturing organizations. Her specialities are setting up HR functions of startup organizations, and building effective HR systems. She provides strategic direction to Maharaja Whiteline, designing HR policies, which contribute to the growth of the company.
Mr. Amol Lahoti, Head of Strategic Sourcing at Gabriel India Limited is a calm and silent professional, who goes through every minute detail of each activity. Previously General Manager, SMS Business at Accenture Services Pvt. Ltd. and Associate Director, Program Management with Ariba India, Amol has also worked as Project Leader at Wipro Infotech and Tata Motors. An engineer by training, Mr. Lahoti’s intelligence and result orientation is unparalleled, and his client orientation impeccable.
Annie Kurian is Vice President, Human Resources, Genpact. An HR professional with over 12 years of end-to-end HR experience in diverse industries like IT, investment banking, business process outsourcing and consulting, Annie specialises in areas of HR Consulting, international HR, business partner HR, and HR generalist. Over the years, she has held several roles in Genpact across geographies and businesses. She was Business Partner HR working as HR Generalist for the Finance & Risk vertical at Lehman Brothers and HR Business Partner with Infosys Technologies Ltd in the past. As an HR professional Annie brought in stability in her unit during a period of downturn. She is innovative, and her patient and subtle approach has proved invaluable.
As Head, HR at Indus Towers Limited, Anthony Kiran is aligning all HR deliveries (acquisition of talent, employee engagement, career growth and retention) to meet business requirements and ensure effectiveness of end-to-end employee life cycle management by complementing the business objectives with the overall HR policies and practices. An experienced HR leader in the automotive industry, Mr. Kiran is energetic, forward-thinking, and creative, with high ethical standards and an appropriate professional image. A Ph.D. in statistics from Madras University, Mr. Anthony is proactive, innovative and an eager team player. A detail oriented developer with great interpersonal skills, his open-minded approach cannot be overstated.
Anurag Verma is presently working as Director, HR at Flipkart.com. Prior to this, he has been associated with ITIL (A TVS and ILFS JV), Bharti Group, and Visisht Group. Anurag is a seasoned HR professional having 21 years of experience in core HR, like strategic HR OD, change management, talent management, employee engagement, learning and development, designing and implementing HR operations, HRMS, and employee communication. Mr. Verma is a great team player, has brilliant understanding of situations and very prompt in acting upon it. His excellent communication skills, high interpersonal skills, leadership skills, strong values and high emotional intelligence are great assets.
Anuranjita Kumar, Managing Director and Chief Human Resources Officer at Citi, South Asia, has worked across Asia Pacific (APAC), Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and USA. She began her career with Procter & Gamble in 1994 and joined Citi in 1995. She was the Head of Compensation and Benefits for South Asia, before moving to London in 2005 as Head of HR Strategy and Planning for EMEA. In 2007, Anuranjita was the first South Asian and woman to be appointed Head of HR, Global Banking EMEA. She has been recognized as an ‘Upcoming South Asia Leadership Talent’ by Asia Networks, won the ‘Significant Achievement in HR Excellence Award’ by CII in 2013 and 2014, and the ‘Excellence in Leadership Development’ award by the Society for Human Resource Management in 2014.
Archana Garg is heading HR at Tavisca Solutions Pvt Ltd, where she is leading the implementation of innovative strategies, developing workforce both in quantity and quality. Prior to this, she was associated with Deloitte Mumbai in FAA department (Special Transactions) and then moved to Deloitte, Pune in Statutory Audit and Assurance. She has a go-getter approach and is very approachable by both management and employees as she balances both with her skillful implementation of HR policies. She crafts a perfect blend of business acumen and employee welfare. She has been appreciated by co-workers and received accolades from the management for her work ethics and culture she operate under.
Arti Raghava is Director Human Resources, HR Projects India at Marriott International. Arti has a pan-India role that involves HR initiatives, employee relations, compliance, talent acquisition and development, hotel preopenings, diversity and inclusion, voyage program, and human capital planning. Ms. Raghava is an accomplished HR director with extensive experience in building multiple, awardwinning teams. She has in spearheaded successful HR programs, policies, and processes, and successfully opened two hotels in the last six years with Marriott. She has been a vital contributor to senior operating leadership teams by providing HR leadership and demonstrating capabilities as an innovative problem solver, strategic decision maker and strong communicator. Her experience of more than 12 years in hotels and three in hotel operations affords her a leverage to add value to the overall business of the organization.
Arunabh Varma is Head, Brand Communication, Digital Media and Retail Marketing at BMW Group India Private Limited. Before this, he has worked with Harley-Davidson Motor Company as Asst. General Manager, Marketing; Audi as Manager, Marketing and Events; and AlphaG:Corp (Partner of Morgan Stanley Real Estate) as Assistant Manager, Marketing. Arunabh completed his Masters Degree in Advertising and Marketing Management, and started his career as Floor Manager with Bharti Airtel. He is a charismatic leader, with a special knack for analysing business outcomes and coupling them up with strategies to have a highly productive workforce. He has exemplified the best business results with his experience of over two decades and has spearheaded the most significant projects for his company.
Arvind Pachauri is Region Leader, HR, South Asia, Energy Connection, GE. He is a senior human resource professional with almost three decades of experience in HR and IR in highly reputed Indian companies and MNCs. He has served as Country Head and VP HR at Alstom T&D India Ltd., and has lead high performance teams operating in new organizational structures, change management and harmonization of HR policies; strengthening the leadership pipeline. Mr. Pachauri is a dynamic personality. His eye for detail, strong focus on targets, and keen appreciation of the sense of urgency ensure that his team is always led with innovation and efficiency. His depth of knowledge on a variety of subjects, and lively spirit hold his team together. He always brings to the table new and innovative ideas which increase efficiency, and continuously works to improve the work environment.
Ashish Mishra is an HR leader at Nippon Paint (India) Pvt Ltd. His previous positions include Manager, Talent Acquisition and Campus Program, Shalimar Paints; Talent Acquisition Manager, Ingersoll Rand; and Assistant Manager Talent Acquisition, Ericsson. An MBA from Institute of Marketing and Management, Ashish started his career at Genpact LLC as an HR Intern. He has taken centre stage in executing important HR functions at Nipon India and has shown significant growth in performance by his acute and effective HR strategies. He balances HR modules and business processes very skillfully and has received many accolades for this knack of managing workforce balancing it with business outcomes. He is also well known as a people person.
Ashish Anand is presently serving as Director and Head, Human Resources at Religare Finvest and is a member of its management committee. He is responsible for HR functions of the entire retail financial services companies of Religare, and runs the gamut of HR activities for around 7000 people across India. Having joined the Religare group in 2008 to set up their training and development function, Mr. Anand managed the business HR function for retail financial services business (capital market, insurance and NBFC). His contributions include setting up training function at group level, playing a pivotal role in setting up the health insurance business, scaling up the NBFC and capital market businesses, organization restructuring, driving compensation philosophy in business, managing productivity programs, and employee engagement. He started his career, now spanning over 15 years, with Piaggio and later worked at Dabur India, where his last role was as the head of HR for the international business, besides corporate and sales HR for the domestic business.
Ashutosh Telang serves as Chief Human Resources Officer at Marico Limited, which he joined in 1999 and since then, served several leadership positions in corporate HR and organizational development. Mr. Telang has been Member of Board of Management at International Consumer Products Corporation since April 29, 2014. He serves as Member of Management Board at Thuan Phat Foodstuff Joint Stock Company. Prior to Marico, he was associated with E Merck and Ranbaxy Laboratories. His unique and insightful strategies have been crucial in orchestrating organizational change. At Marico, under his mentorship, employees are encouraged to contribute towards the larger community through various initiatives and activities that are conducted at the local level in various locations.
Ashwin Shirali is the Regional Director of HR at Accor Hotels India, a French multinational hotel group formerly known as Accor S.A., which is a part of the CAC 40 index which operates in 94 countries since 2007. He has experience of over a decade in the hospitality industry, and has held leadership positions in EIH Limited and Hyatt International in his previous roles, adding to his repute as a distinguished HR professional. Holding an MBA degree in Finance from the Delhi University, he skillfully bridges strategies in business, to be executed in practice by the HR function.
Ashwinder Singh is the General Manager and Head, Administration and Security at Ballarpur Industries Ltd. His responsibilities include security, guest houses, building infrastructure and real estate, project management for office renovation, communications, travel and FOREX management, and transport at the national level. His responsibilities also involve third party contract staffing, cafeteria, administrative role for regional sales offices and units, club memberships, MIS, formulating policies and procedures for various administrative activities, government liaising and employee engagement. A qualified lawyer with over 21 years of experience, Mr Singh is an able administrator who always tries to formulate winning strategies for business growth.
Atul Sharma is Executive President, HR and Administration, at Bajaj Electricals Ltd. With over 20 years of rich and varied experience, Mr. Sharma came to Bajaj from JP Morgan Services India Private Limited, where he worked as Vice President, Head Human Resources. Prior to that, he was associated with BA Continuum Solutions Pvt. Ltd. (a subsidiary of Bank of America) and other reputed organizations like Citibank N.A. HCL Ltd and Capital Management Services. In his current role, he manages business partnering, recruitment, learning and development and compensation and benefits. An arts graduate, he holds a PG Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations, and another in Management and LLB from Delhi University.
Balamurugan Muthukumaraswamy is Head, Talent Acquisition, at McAfee. A highly accomplished recruitment leader with more than 15 years of experience, he has built, implemented and executed recruiting solutions for global industry leaders. He has been providing leadership across the talent acquisition, talent management and workforce planning functions. He is known for his exceptional planning and enterprise-wide deployment experience, coupled with a strong commitment to quality, cost-effectiveness and efficiency. His expertise in syncing HR practices with business results is admired and appreciated across the industry.
Bansi Raja is Happiness Officer (HR) at Gozoop Pvt Ltd, a position specially created for her. A content writer by profession, she handles core HR functions, taking care of policies and practices to develop employee performances by deploying innovative happiness programs. She has expertise in content writing, copy writing, SEO writing, and human resource management. Bansi’s role in Gozoop came with several major responsibilities related to recruitment and employee satisfaction which unfolded as an amazing learning experience for her. She tackles all assignments with sincere dedication. She is also a tarot card reader and has worked with Tarot Tells Tales. An able multi-talented multi-tasker, Bansi is an icon of excellence and world class commitment.
Biswarup Mukhopadhyay is General Manager, HRD, Education and CSR at SAIL’s Bokaro Steel Plant. In this position, he aims to develop human resources for better productivity, impart quality education at BSL run schools and facilitate CSR activities for the company. Previously, he headed the Production Planing Control and Sales Coordination Department, where he looked after the planning and monitoring of the production of the different shops of the plant, optimising the product mix, order processing, despatch planning (rail & road) and customer care through CMO. Mr. Mukhopadhyay has laid greater focus on conducting Performance Improvement Workshops (PIW), which has led to significant business improvements like reduction in breakdowns, improvement in plant techno-economic parameters and reduction in inventory. He headed the HRD department to successfully conduct training in technical, managerial and other areas and analyse impact of training for business improvement.
Bhasker Iyer brings over 30 years of pharmaceutical industry experience in sales, marketing, business development and general management to his new role at Abbott as Divisional Vice President of India, Commercial Operations. Abbott’s pharmaceuticals businesses – Abbott India Limited, Abbott Healthcare Solutions and Abbott True Care – report into this newly established position. He has worked for a number of pharmaceutical companies in the past, most recently at Wockhardt, where he held the position of President, India and emerging markets. Mr. Iyer works with the business leadership teams to identify further opportunities to expand Abbott’s broad portfolio of quality products in India, which are adapted to the needs of the Indian population. Mr. Iyer has BSc degrees in microbiology and chemistry, as well as a Masters in Marketing Management from University of Mumbai.
Biju Sebastian is Head HR, India Operations at Apollo Tyres Ltd. He has over 19 years’ rich experience in human resource management, strategic HR initiatives and industrial relations management in leading MNCs and reputed Indian organizations. He is heading strategic and operational HR leadership for sales, corporate functions and support manufacturing units to maintain proactive industrial relations and achieve continuous productivity improvement. His key roles include talent management for domestic and overseas operations, employee development and leadership pipeline, industrial relations and union management activities, standardized IR /ER models, and HR support to manufacturing to improve productivity and cost optimization. He started the Apollo Laureates Academy to ensure organizational capability development across all levels, and is heading leadership development through structured functional training models for sales and skill metrics for manufacturing operations.
Debashis Patnaik is Senior Director, Human Resources and HR Leader for India Center of Excellence (COE) at EMC India. Having worked for giants like Cisco India, Microsoft India, Ernst & Young Consulting India and Cadence Design Systems, he has been instrumental in setting up operations of COE as an established global talent base, operating seamlessly with the BUs, driving efficiency for the corporation with an emphasis on creating value for the BUs, and promoting a culture of innovation. He specializes in multinational HR, organization design, general management, talent architecture, talent strategy, leadership development, change management, and compensation and benefits. He received several Gold Stars (for exceptional performance) while at Microsoft.
BP Biddappa is the Executive Director HR, Hindustan Unilever Ltd andVice President HR, South Asia at Unilever. He has a bachelor’s degree in Economics from Delhi University and an MBA in Human Resources from XLRI, Jamshedpur. Mr. Biddappa has been Vice President, HR Supply Chain in Asia, Africa and Russia at Unilever Asia, and HR Director at Unilever Bangladesh, after joining the company in 1992. Over the last two decades, he has worked in a variety of roles, starting off in a factory in Orai (Uttar Pradesh), then working in supervisory development, corporate learning and Research & Development. He was appointed the Executive Director, HR for HUL with effect from February 1, 2013, and since then has only bettered the world class commitment and standards that he has brought to the organisation throughout his experience and career.
BVM RAO is presently the head of Human Resources at Shoppers Stop. Prior to this, he was engaged with Jubilant Retail Ltd, Bangalore as head of operations and had led Reliance Retail as general manager operations. Having graduated from Andhra University Mr. Rao is a team builder and maintains excellent relations with everyone. He has set up fully functional HR teams at Shoppers Stop outlets and has extended his reach till the grassroots. Shoppers Stop has recruited thousands of employees in his tenure at several level of leadership. His skill of managing process orientation while keeping an eye on objective is admired by many and so is his unique ability to come up with new HR strategies with winning outcomes in business.
Chitbhanu Nagri is the Senior Director and Global HR Head at Tavant Technologies. Mr. Nagri has over 14 years of experience across various roles in HR business partnering, performance and career management, process integration, audits and certifications, frontline generalist roles, corporate HR, recruitment, and leadership development. Earlier he was Regional HR Business Partner at Dell where he was responsible for managing HR strategy and solutions for Dell’s sales workforce spread across various countries and managed design and implementation of various high impact HR initiatives at a regional and global level. This included HR transformation and change management interventions, workforce optimization, best employer studies, employer branding and media strategy.
Debasis Sarkar is the HR Lead, HCL BPO, and Associate Director, HR, at HCL Technologies, a company he joined as a management trainee in 2000. In his 14 years of experience, his specialization has been in the areas of talent management and engagement, global rewards and benefits, global policies and business HR. His responsibilities for the BPO division include talent management, business partnering, organization structure design, talent acquisition and retention, as well as participating in the bid management process for new business acquisition. Apart from HCL, he has also worked for Bharti Airtel Limited as General Manager, HR. He has also dealt with payroll administration, recruitment, employee engagement, data base management, and engagement surveys.
An erstwhile officer in the Indian Army, Capt. Partha Samai is presently the Senior Vice President, Group Head HR at AGS Transact Technologies Ltd. His role involves engaging with key stakeholders and business leaders and leading a set of HR professionals. His experience includes OD interventions, change management, placement and induction, and manpower projection and planning. With experience in SAP enabled systems and various Six Sigma Green Belt Projects under his belt, Capt. Samai has co-faciliated outdoor training programs like “Back to Basics” and “Basics & Me” in TTSL. He was named one of the 10 Most talented HR professionals in India and 50 most talented global HR leaders in Asia by the World HRD Congress.
Bobby Kuriakose is Director HR at Forbes Marshall since June 1990. He did his schooling from Sainik School Trivandam and Post Graduation in Management, HR from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (1988-90). As per Bobby Kuriakose, when employees face a personal crisis, their HR manager is among the first few people they contact. He himself is used to employees calling him at odd-hours for help with a personal situation. “Fun at work is one element that I think we used to be better at 15 years ago,” says Bobby. “Over time, people have gotten busier and the challenges have increased with excessive focus on results. It’s important to remind ourselves that if we are at work for 45 hours a week, we should have fun doing it.”
As Chief, Human Resources, Administration and Group Learning Academy at Bajaj Finance Ltd., Deepak Reddy heads the HR and Administration teams, with a mandate to sustain and enable the high performance journey Bajaj Finserv has embarked upon, with appropriate people and work place initiatives. He is responsible for all learning activities within the organization as the head of Group Learning Academy. Before this, he has successfully led the mortgages business, loan against shares portfolio as well as the HR function. A people’s person, Mr. Reddy has led the company to become one of the most preferred employers in the BFSI sector. Earlier, he also led the business loans portfolio to become a benchmark of success for the company. Prior to this, he worked with American Express in various capacities, and Standard Chartered in the auto loans division.
Dinesh Kumar is Director HR Aspire Systems (India) Private Limited India Information Technology and Services. He heads the global talent acquisition and talent management for Aspire that includes the India, US, UK, Benelux, Singapore and the Middle East. Mr. Kumar is responsible for developing and establishing human resources objectives in line with organizational objectives and serves as a key member collaborating with the leadership team to drive business results. Some of the best HR policies in Aspire have been his contribution. Mr. Kumar believes in the power of knowledge and power of people and believes in a collaborative environment based on mutual respect is vital for holistic growth.
Dinesh R is the Chief Human Resources Officer at OYO Rooms. He was Director, compensation and Benefits, Asia Pacific at The Coca-Cola Company before this, and Head, Rewards, Airtel Africa at Bharti Airtel Limited before that, where he was responsible for design and execution of total rewards strategy for 16 countries across East, Central and West Africa. He looked after managing expatriation and international mobility across Africa and India. He also managed executive compensation and design incentive plans including stock and cash plans, benchmarking global best practices and creating reward mechanisms to help drive growth. He has also been associated with Hewitt Associates and ITC Limited.
Dhinakaran K is Area Director, Human Resources Southern India at InterContinental Hotels Group. Prior to this, he was Director Human Resources at The Zuri Hotels and Resorts, Human Resources Manager at The Lalit Suri Hospitality Group, and Training Manager at ITC Hotels Ltd. He has always challenged the system an introduced new ideas. His commitment towards staff satisfaction is exemplary. A thorough professional, he brings real “added value” to the organization. He is extremely resourceful and knowledgeable and establishes a professional and supportive tone; traits that enable him create followership among diverse constituents and networks effectively.
Dipankar Bandyopadhyay is Vice President HR, Global R&D at Monsanto. Dipankar is a global HR leader with an established track record of driving organizational change with broad international leadership experience in HR strategy, business partnership, talent management, organization development, HR technology, HR shared services and change management. He has led by example and risen progressively in his nearly decade long stint at Monsanto. Making it to the “40 Under 40” of St Louis Business Journal, Mr Bandyopadhyay has an extremely sound conceptual understanding of HR subjects with a proven record of putting them into practice, be it in India or beyond.
Deepak Shetty is Senior Director Human Resources at Philips Innovation India. Mr. Shetty has more than 22 years of experience as a HR leader, providing strategic HR direction and leadership to several multi-national organizations in India and around the world. He has broad experience in all areas of HR, including in specialist roles and in general management roles in multinationals like Hewlett Packard, BEA Systems, and Genpact, and Indian companies like Nestle India. A mechanical engineer by qualification from National Institute of Technology, Karnataka, Mr. Shetty completed his MBA in Human Resources from XLRI Jamshedpur. His experience has spanned large multi-nationals to startups, and he has also been instrumental in leading M&A from a HR perspective starting from due diligence to post
merger integration.
Dinanath Kholkar is Vice President and Global Head of BPS at Tata Consultancy Services. With over 25 years of IT and BPO industry experience spanning across various services, technologies and domains and 16 years of experience in financial services, Dinanath is an excellent people manager, and is responsible for organization development activities. He has handled responsibilities across P&L management, account management, delivery, sales and R&D. His specialities include managing large accounts and global delivery centres; complete solution development and deployment for BPR (Business Process Re-engineering), and transformation. An extremely passionate professional with an exceptional blend of business and technology, Mr. Kholkar is a multifaceted leader with excellent techno-domain, people management skills along with the business acumen to develop stronger customer relationship and strategically grow businesses. He has in-depth understanding of the BFS vertical and believes in ‘knowledge sharing’ and ‘Open door policy’. His constantly high energy level brushes off on co-workers, creating a vital work space.
Dr. P.V. Ramana Murthy is Senior Vice President, Global Head-HR at Taj Hotels Resorts and Palaces. Mr. Murthy’s responsibilities include human resources, learning and development, CSR and Tata business excellence (TBEM). Prior to joining the Tata Group, he was the head of HR for Hindustan Coca- Cola Beverages as its Executive Director, HR for India and Bangladesh operations and was responsible for the HR function for about 20000 direct and indirect employees in 27 locations, spread across India and Bangladesh. In his career spanning about 28 years, he has done short-term assignments in countries such as Denmark, Sweden, Romania, Brazil, China, Philippines etc., understanding different cultures and learning the country specific management practices.
Ellyn J. Shook is the Chief Leadership and Human Resources Officer at Accenture India. She is responsible for the people programs that empower 373,000 Accenture professionals to improve the way they work and live. Ms. Shook leads a global team of human resources experts who aim to deliver an exceptional employee experience for Accenture’s people. Her team is focused on re-imagining leadership and talent practices in the digital age to help attract, develop, inspire and reward the very best people so that Accenture can bring deep specialization to its clients, drive growth and differentiate in the market. She is a strong advocate for inclusion and diversity, and Accenture has been widely recognized externally as an employer of choice and for its diversity efforts. Ms. Shook is a member of Accenture’s Global Management Committee as well.
Divakar Kaza retired as President HR, Lupin Ltd after over three decades of experience. His key responsibilities were organizational transformation, talent management and preparing the organization for the accelerated growth envisaged. Before Lupin, he worked with leading global organizations like Wipro and General Electric – both in India and the Asia Pacific Region. He has also worked for Tata Power, Asian Paints and Hutchison Telecom (now Vodafone). He is one of the few Business Master Black Belts in Six Sigma in HR function. A frequent contributor to business magazines, Mr. Kaza is also a visiting faculty at reputed institutes like IIM-A.
Dr. Debsmita Tripathy is working towards mapping workforce for productivity at NTPC as the HR Head at NTPC, Korba. She is looking after the entire gamut of activities and responsibilities pertaining HR, IR and PR of a 2600 MW power station, handling a workforce of over a thousand. In her earlier role she was deputy general manager HR and handled the entire industrial relations, employee relations, public relations, legal responsibilities including employee welfare activities at the power station. With her depth of knowledge and versatile experience, she has proven herself as one of the best HR leads of NTPC, with her perfect blend of making progressive HR strategies and executing them, yielding business results.
Dr. Tanaya Mishra is the Managing Director, HR at Accenture India. She also served as the Senior Vice President, Human Resources, JSW Steel Ltd and as the Chief People Officer at ACC Concrete Ltd. She has also worked with Shoppers Stop Limited as Head of Human Resources and ICICI as Deputy General Manager (HR). Dr. Tanaya has over 17 years of experience and has held leadership roles with various corporate houses including WPP, SBI Life Insurance and DHL. Her varied experience allows her to bring outstanding cross-cultural and cross-functional expertise into every area that she handles in Accenture. With her contributions, she is amongst the most respected professionals in the HR space today.
Dr. Gayatri Puranik is Director, Human Resources at JM Financial, where she has served for more than a decade with exceptional loyalty and dedication. Prior to this, she was Deputy Manager Human resources at Cholamandalam. She has been named one of the Best 30 HR Leaders at the World HRD Congress and Foundation for Liberal and Management Education. She holds a PhD from the Department of Civil Engineering, Anna University and is currently pursuing the Associate Power Coach program with Coaching and Leadership International, Apexcels. She has also completed the XLRI certification for managing the training function, being a certified NLP a counselor.
Emrana Sheikh is the Vice President, Human Resources at Asian Paints Ltd., India Consumer Goods. Prior to this, she worked with Mahindra & Mahindra Automotive and Farm Sector, and FedEx Express. She handles the entire HR function for Asian Paints, including subsidiaries and international operations, with 23 manufacturing facilities and operations in 17 countries. She has been instrumental in implementing diversity initiatives in the organization and creating an inclusive ecosystem to support the international growth and geographic expansion of the business. Emrana has an experience of more than 22 years in transformational and strategic HR management, organizational development, employee branding, engagement and change management within matrix organizational structures. Ms.Shaikh is adept at devising and implementing coherent HR strategies across global markets and has proven success in achieving integration of HR programs towards organizational goals and values.
Ms. Gagan Jyot is Vice President HR at RMSI Private Limited. She is an HR icon who has excelled in establishing innovative HR systems and institutionalizing a strong performance driven culture at RMSI. She is playing a significant role in defining people strategies and aligning them with the business vision and growth of the organization with her high ethical standards and absolutely outstanding commitment to excellence. A Graduate of Delhi University and an MBA in HR from Indian Institute of Planning and Management , she has been key in the business success and successful turnaround of RMSI through her dynamic HR leadership.
Gajendra Chandel is Member Executive Committee & Chief Human Resources Officer at Tata Motors Ltd. He is also member Corporate Steering Committee at the company. He has served as a President – Human Resources at Tata AutoComp Systems Ltd. before stepping into the role of CHRO. Before joining Tata Group he was General Manager & Group Head for Shared Services at Siemens Ltd. working there for more than 12 years. He is a person who is highly respected as a friend, colleague and mentor in the HR network by all employees. Gajendra always strives to come up with new ways of creating an employee friendly work culture and policies to bring about holistic growth.
Gaurav Ahluwalia is Managing Director Human Resources at JPMorgan Chase. In a career spanning 17 years in HR, Mr. Gaurav has been associated with leading organizations and has worked both in India and abroad in industries that include Banking, Telecom and IT. He is currently responsible for leading the HR function for JPMorgan Services India. Gaurav joined JPMorgan Chase from HSBC, where he was Head of HR and also a member on the Board of the GSC Company. He established and strengthened the HR function in various legal entities of HSBC and in other organizations. Mr. Ahluwalia is an ethical professional who is never afraid to do what is right for the business.
Harbhajan Singh is presently working as Vice President General & Corporate Affairs at Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India Pvt Ltd. He was Vice President of Tata Workers Union and serving in his capacity as Joint Director-Michael John Center For Research & Human Resource Development at Tata Steel where he worked for almost 3 decades before joining Honda Group. Mr. Singh has completed his Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management from XLRI Jamshedpur. An innovative thought leader, Mr. Harbhajan believes that HR Managers are well equipped to handle IR; he also believes that the militancy which is now increasing in industrial relations is a matter of concern that must be addressed. He says that HR professionals need to take risks in order to build mutual trust with employees. He is known for his unique way of designing comprehensive HR policies which go hand in hand with business outcomes.
Geethaa Ghaneckar has an interesting career track spanning over two decades that started off in Marketing & Business Development, Profit Center Management before she made a choice to move into Leadership Transformation and then HR. She moved into the role of Chief Human Resource Officer (CHRO) for the Lifestyle Businesses of Raymond which comprises Textile, Apparel, Retail and Garmenting. Having led the OD, Talent & Learning function for the group in the last few years, she brings in strong Business orientation and OD process understanding into core HR practices and processes. Her key responsibilities include setting up and enabling HR practices, creating processes to drive a customer centric organization. She also has handled key restructuring of the business to enable growth, leading the Talent and Engagement practices for the Group and leading the leadership development process at Raymond.
Gopi Nambiar is Executive VP – HR & Administration at Pernod Ricard India. A management graduate from XLRI Jamshedpur in Human Resources, Mr. Nambiar has been employed in Indian and multinational organizations like Eicher India, PepsiCo and Bacardi prior to joining Pernod Ricard Group in 1999. Mr. Gopi is responsible for HR operations for 30 manufacturing units and 17 sales offices across the country. Managing a manpower of 1000 employees and outsourced manpower of 5000 employees, he is a subject matter expert in HR including statutory compliance and employee relations, Mr. Nambiar’s unique efforts have led to Pernod Ricard having one of the most wellmanaged HR/Employee relations/Administration functions in the industry space.
Jagan Mohan is Senior Vice President HR at Brigade Enterprises Limited. He has served at SRF LIMITED in his capacity as Chief Manager- HR for almost a decade. Mr. Jagan is an inspirational leader with an employee friendly approach. He is an easy to go person and still stands for business results. He couples his experience of over 2 decades skillfully to motivate employees and also helps to groom them so as to make them productive. He is known for his work standards and proficiency to channel the human resources. His code of conduct and work ethics are benchmarks of excellence, and are models of efficiency that are appreciated by each and every employee in the organisation.
Harish Nayak is Senior Director Talent Acquisition at Teleperformance India. He was Account Manager Client Services in his last role at Teleperformance before moving up in the ladder. Harish has an innate capacity for resource management and his erudition of management skills makes daunting tasks, simplified and challenging. A valuable resource and great team player, Harish is one of those rare managers who is a perfect balance between technology and man-management. He has consistently provided thought leadership to the accounts he has handled. Harish is a strong supporter of collaboration between academia and industry and has constantly worked towards making this happen. His skills are admired by the management and also appreciated by employees. He is a ‘go to’ person and has an open door policy towards any given situation and person. He is known for his crisis handling abilities and his focus on innovative solutions to resolve the issue.
Hema Malhotra is Director Human Resources at MSM Media Distribution (Sony Pictures Networks Distributions India Ltd.) She was with NDTV Imagine Limited in her last work engagement as Manager – Human Resources and Assistant Manager Human Resources with Star India Pvt Ltd. Hema graduated from Delhi University and has completed her Diploma in Human Resource Management Studies and Personnel Administration from Welingkar Institute of Management. Hema is known for her transparent way of working; with her strategic planning of HR policies keeping business agendas productively focused. She has proven herself as a rescue mechanism in many conflicts and situations. She has a keen interest in employee welfare and also has a deep understanding of HR functions and their associations with each other reflecting in business outcomes. Employees praise her focus on ensuring a productive career path for all.
Ila Sharma is an Associate Vice President, Human Resources at OYO Rooms. She is taking charge of leading the People Strategy through developing and executing HR strategies around Leadership, HR Business Partnership, Talent Management, Recruitment, Performance Management, Rewards, Employee Relations and Change Management. She has a rich experience of over 12 years working for technology, pharma, finance companies like Cvent, UHG, Baxter, IBM & Escorts Finance. As a professional, Ila possess the ability to influence at a senior level and can manage a large HR team autonomously with a drive for professional excellence in diverse cultural environments while maintaining strong ethical standards.
Jaleel Abdul is the Senior Director Human Resources, Asia Pac & Japan at Adobe Systems. He is also the Director of HR, India at Adobe Systems. Prior to this, he was the Director of Human Resources-Asia Pacific at VeriSign. Jaleel was with Motorola as an HR Manager Global Software Group. An Arts graduate from University of Mysore with an additional MSW qualification from Mangalore University, Jaleel believes that employee expectations and priorities in India are evolving dramatically, largely owing to rapid influx of millennials into the workforce, changing work-life pattern, and rising employee aspirations. He has been instrumental in investing in employee motivation.
Jayanthi Vaidyanathan is Director HR at PayPal India. Jayanthi leads HR strategies that support the company’s growth, talent management and enhance the employment and business value proposition of the firm. During her 18 years of diverse experience in Human Resources, Jayanthi has led both generalist and specialist HR functions in the high technology and consulting fields in companies like Covansys and eFunds International, where she has designed and executed programs that drove organizational value in partnering strategically with business leadership. Industry peers mention that she is an inspirational leader always there to give advice to anyone who needs assistance.
Indranil Bhattacharya is Regional Head HR East at Titan India. An HR professional with a decade long experience in Human Resource operations, he has considerable experience in driving sourcing, developing, engaging employees. With strong interpersonal skills and innovation orientation, for him, people management is not a process but a passion. His responsibilities include HR business support handling functions like strategic staffing, managing the entire employee life cycle, HR cost budgeting, compensation management etc. He also looks after manpower planning for the region with employee cost budgeting specially creating of robust processes and systems to synergize productivity.
Madhavi Lall is serving as Managing Director and Head HR India at Deutsche Bank. She has previously worked as Managing Director HR at Accenture and Group Head, Employee Relations, Group HR Standard Chartered Bank. She succeeded in taking virtual operations to a new height and ended up being a trend setter to her peers at Standard Chartered Bank on the value shared services could deliver in the value chain. She started her career as an intern at GlaxoSmithKline and has had experience working with HCL, Colgate-Palmolive and ABN Amro Bank, leading the HR function for these organizations. A masters in Mathematics, Madhavi got her MBA degree in HR and systems from XLRI Jamshedpur. She also has completed a program in leadership from the University of Oxford. Always aware of corporate and local strategy, Madahavi is disciplined in her focus to deliver world-class productivity through the HR process to her organisation.
Jim Gemmell is Executive Vice President and CHRO with Akamai Technologies, driving business aligned performance through expertise in areas such as change management, diversity and inclusion, reward systems, high performance work teams, organization development, and organization design. He has shown leadership skills with a strong track record of developing and implementing HR strategies that improve business performance. At Akamai he provides global HR leadership and drives global people strategy aligned to and supporting high growth business opportunities.
Kaustubh Sonalkar is Group Chief People Officer at Future Group. His previous positions include Partner and Executive Director at PwC and Senior Vice President and Head HR at Essar Group. At Future Group, Kaustubh acts as an innovator and out-of-the-box thinker. Mr. Sonalkar believes in unshackling the uncommon when it comes to HR practices. With a motto of “shun the old, do the new”, he believes in making a difference by doing things differently. From India’s first digital app for Future Group’s employees to demolishing the bell-curve practice, his ideas are eyebrow raisers. He brings an evolution of the word HR. With new ideas, new practices and innovative trends on the anvil, he is all set to take HR at new level altogether.
Kiran Yadav is Director HRA Canara HSBC OBC Life Insurance. A seasoned HR professional with over 17 years of experience, Kiran has spent over 12 years in the insurance sector. She has worked in complex business environments and possesses the ability to work on intricate business issues. She is an experienced professional in job evaluation, talent acquisition, designing and conducting assessment centres, learning interventions, benefit planning, reward strategy, benchmarking and designing policies, organizational development and performance management planning aligned to organization philosophy and principles. Previously, she has worked as with PNB Metlife India Insurance Co Ltd, Aviva Life Insurance and GE Capital.
As Chief Manager, Corporate HR at Reliance Capital, Karan Makhania is involved in various central HR initiatives, including HR polices, talent management, learning and development, HR MIS and analytics, budgeting, and preparation of leadership dashboards. Prior to this, Karan has worked as the HR Business Partner at the sales head quarters for the passenger vehicles business unit of Tata Motors. He also handled the performance management process for their entire service team. Karan has been part of various performance apex committee meetings which handled fitment of the ratings distribution curve to the one prescribed by policy. He is the recipient of the Best Emerging HR Talent Award.
Mahalakshmi R is Head HR India at Mondelēz (erstwhile Cadburys) with over 19 years’ experience spanning HR leadership roles with conglomerates like Bharti Airtel, BILT and Ranbaxy. Prior to this, she has worked as a business consultant with global consulting majors like Hewitt, Arthur Andersen and Ernst & Young. She was HR head for BILT, a 12000 employee string manufacturing business, and HR Head Global R&D for Ranbaxy, ahead of moving into Bharti Group and Airtel where she has handled two global CEO and organization transformation roles spanning organisation design, M&A, talent management and rewards across the group’s operations in 20 countries across Asia and Africa. She has worked extensively in defining people strategy in organizations at various stages of maturity (startups, JVs etc). Her change management experience includes large scale transformations, multi geography acquisitions and integrations. Mahalakshmi holds a graduate degree in physics and a masters in HR.
Krishna Deshpande is Chief Manager HR at RPG Life Sciences Ltd. with 16 years of experience across industries like steel manufacturing, online travel and pharmaceuticals. A thorough professional, his focus has mainly been on HR operations, HR technology, automation of the HR processes, statutory compliance, compensation and benefits, HR budgeting and manpower planning, building policies and processes and general administration. He worked as Manager HR at Cleartrip, where his achievements include coordination with LIC and framing the group gratuity scheme. He started off his career as Executive HR at JSW Steel Ltd where he effectively executed the centralized punching system as well as the E-leave management system across the organization.
Manmohan S. Kalsy is Executive Vice President Human Resources at United Breweries Ltd. Mr. Kalsy is an HR professional with proven business partnering and organization building capabilities across the FMCG, telecom, technology and outsourcing industries. He has served on the board of Xerox India as a full-time Director and is experienced in governance roles. He is a past member of Vodafone’s operations board on a global business transformation project. He was Executive Director HR at Xerox and Vice President Human Resources with Vodafone. He has worked at PepsiCo as well. He is one of the most charismatic and respected leaders in the HR space, with energy, vibrance and grace that have set a benchmark.
Mann Bhatt is HR Head at Venus Remedies Limited. Mann is always eager to gain greater insights into the field of Human Resource Management by way of exposure to the real work atmosphere in a well established organization. Also, Mann drives a challenging career in the field of human resources and has channelised his abilities towards individual, organizational and societal benefits which add value both to him and to the company. His responsibilities include looking after the HRIS package, appraisals, personal files, induction, payroll management, ISO and other HR activities. At a relatively young age, Mann has shown great capability to tackle critical HR issues and conflicting situations, winning confidence of the workforce.
Manu Narang Wadhwa is Global HR Executive and Head HR Transformation and Capabilities at American Express International, handling a 50,000 strong workforce operating in over 36 markets. She has extensive experience in driving organization talent, leadership development, transformation and change agenda. She has been with Amex for the last 9 years and has strategically driven the organization’s charter through transformational strategies for growth – the recent one being the institutionalization of Amex Global HR Operating Model which has become an industry best practice on Global HR transformation.
Manoj Kumar Sharma is Head HR for Solar Business and Renewable Energy at Adani Green Energy Ltd. His specialization areas are pharmaceuticals, starch & allied chemicals, textiles, non-ferrous metal, electrographite rods, thermal/hydro, sponze iron, packaging, and steel cold rolling. Mr. Sharma has handled the HR function for all the locations of Adani Power Business at Ahmedabad. Before joining Adani, Mr. Sharma was working as Sr. Vice President HR at A&M Resources. He has also been VP HR at Ispat Industries Limited and General Manager HR at Flex Industries Limited. His integrity, authenticity, and humility are qualities that set him apart.
Manish Bhatia is GM and Head HR at VIP Bags since 2014, serving key functionalities from talent acquisition to employee welfare. He has been a vital force behind VIP’s HR policies to craft a better work culture and aligning the business with HR practices. In his previous engagements, he has served as HR Leader at Delphi Automotive Systems Pvt Ltd and as an HR Manager at Arvind Brands Ltd., followed by a post as Asst Manager HR with Bombay Dyeing. A commerce graduate from University of Lucknow, he is an MBA in HR and MPIM. He couples his education and experience to hone his expertise in formulating and deploying several strategies in the HR function to yield better business results. His visionary approach has served VIP Industries well by extending their workforce efficiency manifold with effective productivity. He is regarded as a prudent and dedicated HR lead at VIP and respected in the industry.
Manjit Lakhmana is Head Human Resources at Canara HSBC Oriental Bank of Commerce Life Insurance Company Limited and a member of the company’s executive management team. Mr. Lakhmana leads a team of human resources professionals responsible for recruiting, leadership development, learning, compensation, benefits, diversity and inclusion, and heads employee relations in 29 offices and hubs across India. He has worked at Bank of America Merrill Lynch as Senior Vice President and Country HR Head, India. He also served as General Manager HRM and Country HR Head, India for Chevron Inc. He also has rendered his services to STP Ltd., a Turner Morrison Group Company as General Manager Personnel, Country HR Head and also worked with Hero MotoCorp as Deputy general Manager Personnel, Country HR Head. He started his career as an HR professional at Hindustan Petroleum and stayed there for more than a decade. A law graduate, he did his post graduation in Personnel Management from Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi.
Mahesh Medhekar is Head of Human Resources at Mercedes Benz Research and Development, India. Mr. Medhekar, who is a commerce graduate from Pune University has earned a master’s degree in personnel management from the Institute of Business Management & Research, Pune. He is known for his HR skills and proficiency in handling critical concerns of employee issues. He is a specialist in HR operations in the automobile sector, having over a decade of experience in the industry and knows smallest facets of nuances of the employee concerns. He has been appreciated by both management and employees for his skill to balance business results while maintaining employee welfare. He has been a key contributor in Mercedez Benz’s HR policy execution throughout plants and business teams.
Maria Rajesh is presently the Head of Human Resource at Embassy Group. She has worked with PSI Data Systems and Subex Systems before Embassy Group. Maria has excellent inter-personal skills and her understanding of the job is amazing. She always strives to work around the company’s goals and accomplishments and her leadership gets others aligned to the structure. She is open to knowledge transfer, which makes for an excellent HR leader. She believes in taking initiative and driving things to a closure. The most amazing quality about her is that she connects with any level of employee, from the C-level to the lower cadres, and makes them feel equally important.
Mihir Mallick is presently working as Director and Head HR and General Affairs at Samsung India Electronics Ltd. He was General Manager and Operating Head HR, IR and Corporate Affairs at Honda Cars India Ltd and has served as Head Human Resources & Administration at the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company. He also was Manager Human Resources at New Holland and has worked with Indian Express as Chief Manager Human Resources; having started his career as Sr. Executive Human Resources, Munchur Industries Ltd. Mihir has a rare quality of reaching out to people and constantly keeps track of the wellbeing of employees, ensuring a better work culture.
Milin Rakesh Prasad is GM HR at Metro Cash & Carry India Private Limited. He is an accomplished HR professional with over 13 years of business partnering in the retail, real estate and telecom sectors. With a sense of business orientation and inclusive style, Milin has successfully translated business requirements into effective HR action plans, thus providing visibility of the function as a valued business partner. Previously, he was DGM,HR and OD at Mantri Developers Pvt. Ltd, and Bharti Airtel Limited, Reliance Retail Ltd and McDonalds India handling their HR functions in several capacities. Milin is a very capable HR manager with a 360 degree exposure on best HR practices and organizational development.
T.K Srirang is Senior General Manager, Human Resources Management Group, ICICI Bank. His responsibilities include shaping HR policies for the bank and driving them across various business groups. He has led various initiatives in areas like leadership development, performance management, organization restructuring, staffing, mergers and employee relations. Before ICICI, he worked with Coca-Cola India Limited, Ford India Limited and ICI India Limited. He has more than 16 years of experience and was instrumental in establishing Branch Banking Academy and Sales Academy for ICICI. Currently, he is also chairman of CII Western Region HR sub-committee. He holds an MBA degree in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from IIM-C and a bachelors degree in Industrial Engineering. He is a member of Society of Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and Governing Council of Indian Institute of Production Management.
Milind Apte is an HR professional with extensive experience in driving change, engagement and employee relations. He is presently heading Human Resource function at Godrej Properties Limited as Executive Vice President Human Resources and Administration. Previously Mr. Apte was associated as Vice President Human Resources at their Group Company Godrej Hersheys Ltd. In his last work assignments he worked as HRD Manager at DHL Express and HR Manager in Cadbury India Limited where he rendered his services for over a decade, starting his career there. Milind has completed the management program in MHRDM Human Resources from Welingkar Institute of Management. He has a keen eye on business and has exemplified his proficiency in several projects at Godrej. His ability to streamline process with reference to human capital is appreciated and welcomed across all organizations where he has worked.
Meenkshi Priyam is Head HR Global Product Strategy and Commercialization (GPS&C) and Global Functions at Novartis. An MBA in HR from XLRI Jamshedpur, she is an outstanding professional and is highly skilled as an HR business partner; she is also a compensation and benefits specialist. Her ability to understand business and evolve innovative solutions and plans is exceptional. She combines conceptual insight with a strong result orientation that helps her build credibility with business leaders. In her previous engagements she served as Regional HR Director APAC at Johnson & Johnson executing the role of Head of HR for the ASP (Infection Prevention) & OCD (Diagnostics) business for ASPAC. During her stint at YES Bank, she worked under intense pressure during the initial build up phase across all facets of HR, especially in the areas of retail banking and operations.
Namrata Sawant is Head of Human Resources at FedEx for Middle East, Indian Subcontinent and Africa. Ms. Sawant is a graduate in commerce and legislation from Bombay University and an MBA from Institute for Technology & Management. She maintains open channels of dialogue, so team members can tell her what’s working, and she can act on their feedback. She, as a leader, has created an environment in which people are excited to participate and contribute their best as FedEx provides them with various growth opportunities within the organization. She introduced fair employee practices that enable employees to operate in a culture wherein they know and feel their worth to the business objectives.
Muralidharan S is Head HR at Equitas Micro Finance Ltd. Before this assignment, he has worked with Datamatics Staffing Services, Citicorp Finance (India) Limited, and Cholamandalam Investment and Finance Company Limited. Mr. Muralidharan is a person with excellent planning and organizing skills. He has a very positive energy and is very straightforward. A voracious reader, he follows what he reads and preaches what he follows. He gives detail to every task that he undertakes. A qualified engineer, Mr. Muralidharan is BE, Mechanical from Kumaraguru College of Technology Coimbatore and has completed his MBA, Marketing from Bharathidasan Institute of Management Tiruchirapalli. He is known for his open work ethics which makes him the ‘go to’ person at the workplace, yet he maintains discipline and is strategic and methodological in his approach towards any work, producing world-class results.
Nadeem Pasha is Associate Director, Talent Acquisition at Mindtree. Nadeem is a career oriented management professional with 15 years of experience in the area of Human Resources, which spans across talent acquisition, merger and acquisition, organizational policies and HR-operations. He has cross-regional experience working with APAC, European and US clients and this has contributed to his in-depth knowledge of the business. In his current role with Mindtree, Mr.Pasha has collaborated with leadership and business teams across geographies to strategist and fulfill the hiring needs both on volume and niche skills. He has effectively executed the transition of complete HR integration activities during merger and acquisitions at Saudi Arabia and Egypt. He has a unique ability to drill down to the exact need of the hiring managers and finding the right channels to hire. He also brings to the table a wider industry view which helps to focus the effort.
Namrata Gill is Vice President HR, Business HR Head and Leader for Talent at Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories. She heads the Corporate HR function for a workforce of 20,000 employees, spread across 25 countries. The Centers of Excellence she leads include HR strategy, compensation and benefits, talent management , performance management, HR technology and analytics, campus recruitment, business partnering, leadership development, employer branding and organization design. Prior to this, Namrata was Vice President HR with Mahindra & Mahindra. Driven by her belief that passionate people are the primary drivers of business results, she has turned organizations into passion hubs. She has been ranked amongst India’s Upcoming Women Leaders, Women for leadership India by WILL forum.
Nanda Kumar is leading Human Resources at Hibu India Pvt Ltd, responsible for talent acquisition and directly involved in managing the recruitment system, making it costeffective, timely and capable of providing good quality candidates. He has over 15 years experience with more than nine years in core HR in IT and ITES industries. He possesses recruitment specialization from senior management to entry level positions for India and Philippines markets. He has been a key force behind setting up the entire IT department for Hibu India. Mr. Kumar is an electrical engineer who brings in knowledge of implementing technology advancements to couple them with HR, resulting in business growth.
Murali MRM is AVP Human Resources at SKS Microfinance Limited. Murali holds a masters degree in HR Management and 13 years of experience with progressively increasing responsibilities and exposure in handling all the functions of HR like talent acquisition, HR shared services, HR strategy development and its implementation and performance management, change management, talent management, HRMS implementation, compensation & benefits, talent management, OD interventions, and corrective action procedures. He has also been instrumental in setting up HR processes and has had experience with large teams, liaison with statutory authorities and even Civil and Criminal court procedures.
Munish Jain is Executive Vice President at Capital Local Area Bank Ltd. He is leading all HR functions of the organization, to execute best HR practices across the branches and is known for his skills in meeting the business objectives while making the employees be productive. He is a Chartered Accountant and Company Secretary by training. Mr. Jain is progressively modelling HR practices with his innovative strategies to couple them with business outcomes. Mr. Jain has been working towards improving human resource practices for employee welfare. His proficiency in areas of administration and business are the basis for his innovative plans in the HR domain streamlining them into productive work ethics.
Ninan Joseph is Deputy Vice President, Human Resources Talent Acquisition at Axis Bank, India Banking. A proactive HR professional with a strategic bent of mind and a penchant for seamless execution, his career spans over seven years in different domains of HR with Axis Bank. Mr. Joseph is leading the talent acquisition team for the centrally managed business verticals, support functions and for the central office, handling talent acquisition for leadership roles across verticals. Ninan is very result oriented, focused and possesses hands-on knowledge. His abilities to sharpen greenhorns are impeccable and he possesses skills of mapping business goals with HR policies to ensure the organization earns profits while maintaining employee satisfaction.
Nora Bhatia is Chief HR and Corporate Admin at Mahindra Intertrade Limited. Nora is a passionate, result oriented HR professional with two decades of experience. She believes that HR is about human relationships first and ‘resources’ later. She is also Chairperson of the Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) Council at Sector (Mahindra Partners), a part of the Mahindra Group. She won the ‘HR Professional of the year’ award at the Asia’s Best Employer Brand Awards, 2015, and ‘CHRO of the year’ award at Asia HR Leadership Awards, 2014,. She got her MBA in HR from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies. She is a visiting faculty at management institutes in Mumbai and has also taught students virtually vide Blackboard, Edexcel and other IT enabled platforms.
Prakash Ranganathan is Deputy General Manager at Shriram Value Services Limited. He handles core HR functions like talent mapping, workforce management, compensation and benefits analysis and growth projection. He has been instrumental in processing the workforce optimally through various projects for bringing in desired utility of resources mapped for respective departments. In his last assignment he was Manager Recruitments at CareerHub Consultancy Services where he was heading the entire landscape of recruitments, while handling fresh talent management. He earned his PG Certificate In HR Management and Personnel Administration from XLRI Jamshedpur.
Padma Panda is Sr. HR Manager and Business Partner at Cadence Design Systems, India Semiconductors. Ms. Panda is an exceptional professional who can be depended on to provide top level client service and can manage a full service staffing function. She is considered by her peers to be an outstanding manager and channelizes her energy towards the company’s growth and objectives. She is approachable, empathizes with her business partners and has been quite successful in building very good professional relations. She is very structured and has an ability to understand and connect to people. Previously, she has worked at Sapient Corporation, DCM Technologies, and Binary Semantics Limited.
Navneet Prasad is Director Human Resources at KPMG. He is a human resources professional with strong business partnering experience. He has played a pivotal role in designing and delivering customized approaches to talent acquisition, engagement and retention, talent management and strategic capability building initiatives in businesses. His ability to work in a matrixed organization and experience in handling cross cultural sensitivities, setting up new businesses, is commendable. His speciality is playing the role of HR Business Partner with a focus on end to end delivery of HR value proposition. In his prior engagements he served as DGM HR at Firstsource Solutions Limited. He earned his MBA in HR from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management, Pune and received the Young HR professional of the year 2009 award from the World HRD Congress for hiscontribution to HR fraternity as a whole with his innovative HR practices.
Nayantara Kowshik is General Manager Corporate HR at Bombay Dyeing. Nayantara is a seasoned professional with over 19 years’ of robust experience in HR function in professionally managed organizations in manufacturing, retail, real estate, financial services industry. She has earlier worked with BPL Mobile Communication, CRB Corporations, Venkey’s (India). She has played a key role in HR leadership for over 10 years transforming passion to reality, demonstrating how Strategic HR can build and mature a business. She has handled the leadership role in Corporate HR as well as Business HR. She has initiated and handled the project of launching end to end Human Resources Management System (HRMS) in the organization successfully and has developed Business Unit based attrition analysis and retention measures. A commerce graduate, she is additionally an LLB and has completed a program in Personal Management from Welingkar Institute, Mumbai University.
Narayan BL is the CHRO at Capgemini India and manages the HR practice for more than 55,000 employees across India. He has over three decades of corporate finance, audit and operations experience in various industries and has performed several business and finance roles in large organizations. Narayan joined the Capgemini Group in October 2006 and was instrumental in building and scaling up BPO operations across Capgemini centers in India. Before that, in 1989, he had joined the Unilever Group as Commercial Manager where he spent 17 years, performing seven different functional and business commercial roles. At the later stages of his role in Unilever, he set up a captive shared services center (Indigo) for Hindustan Unilever and subsequently merged it with Capgemini through a joint venture.
Prashant Srivastava is President Group HR and People Excellence at Reliance ADA Group. He has worked on performance management and engaging employees to drive performance and improve retention, and developed leadership pipelines to sustain performance. Prashant helps businesses win by leveraging HR as a differentiator, based on his 27 years of experience in leadership development, employee engagement and performance enhancement coupled with business strategy and corporate governance. In his previous workplaces, he has been Partner – Engagement and Culture; Talent and Performance at Aon Hewitt. He was also Country Manager and Managing Partner India, Director on the Board at Gallup.
Preethi Madappa is Director HR, South Asia at Intel Technology India Pvt Ltd. Preethi has overall accountability for providing HR support to the 6500 plus strong Intel South Asia employee base, spanning R&D, sales and marketing, enterprise IT and manufacturing solutions, business enabling organizations among others. Preethi leads a 60 member HR team that straddles the gamut of HR imperatives from HR operations and strategic employee relations to leadership capability building and driving key culture transformation efforts. Preethi is also responsible for formulating and driving the HR strategy for a dispersed team of almost 500 employees; accountable for HR leadership and strategic capability development, workforce planning and execution, strategic employee relations, performance management and building strong and capable HR teams for the region. Industry peers regard Preethi as amongst one of the most notable experts in the HR space, ensuring the growth of the Intel legacy.
Poulomi Bakshi B is Director of Human Resources at Marriott Hotels. Earlier, she was Director of Human Resource, Talent Development & Quality, at InterContinental Hotels Group and Director Human Resources Lebua Hotels and Resorts in her prior work assignments. Poulomi is a master of all departments and always hands-on in training of team members, with emphasis on improvisation and implementation of guest friendly practices. Her peers acknowledge and commend her transparent management style.
Pradeep Bahirwani is Vice President, Talent Acquisition at Wipro Technologies, leading the global recruitment practice for them, previously having been a territory manager. He is an Electronics and Power engineer from Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology. What defines Pradeep is his eye for detail and his sense of humour to ease situations, which works wonders with both employees and management. He has a skill of putting across his point very properly in any given situation. He is a people’s manager, who is ready to go to everyone in need. He has crafted some innovative practices which are implemented across Wipro, particularly for fresher’s hiring. He has always strived for bringing in operational excellence in HR processes.
Preeti Barshilia is presently working as an Assistant Vice President Human Resources at Bank of America. She has been instrumental in moulding HR practices in previous assignments with Hutchison 3G and Intelenet Global Services. A Bachelor of Arts in Economics, Preeti has done her Masters in Labour Law and Labour Welfare and is also an MBA in HR. She has over 13 years of experience, spread across recruitment, talent acquisition, lateral hiring, strategic sourcing, employer branding, project management and market intelligence with HR data and metrics reporting. She has been responsible for lowering early life attrition with the aid of various interventions in the hiring as well as the post hiring space. Preeti can lead complex staffing projects with a common sense approach.
Prabir Jha is a most well known and highly respected HR professional and also the Global Chief People Officer Cipla. Mr. Jha is an HR leader with diverse industry experience, from civil services to engineering, information technology, pharmaceuticals, automotive and a conglomeration of hydrocarbons, retail, media and telecom services. In his previous engagements, he has served with Reliance Industries Ltd, Tata Motors Limited, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories at different leadership roles. He has been the CHRO
of two New York Stock Exchange listed companies and of two Fortune 500 companies. Mr. Jha won The Asia HRD Award 2012 from The Asia HRD Congress, a commendable title for his hugely respected achievements.
Protima Achaya is Director Staffing for NetApp India & APAC. She has over 15 years experience in HR with focus on staffing management and full cycle recruiting. She has managed teams in multiple locations in India and APAC. She has considerable experience in translating business strategy into talent acquisition plans, process innovation and has experience in both high volume and niche recruiting. She has additional experience in Learning & Development, C&B and client facing HR. Before this, she was Head of Staffing-India & APAC in the same company. As the Staffing Leader for India and APAC, she has been responsible for managing the overall recruitment operation for both sites and also has undertaken responsibility for developing and executing recruitment strategies and driving overall recruiting programs. She has also held the responsibility of being the India Staffing Head for NetApp and was leading all staffing activities for NetApp.
Puja (Khanna) Kapoor is HR Director Asia at Dunnhumby (Tesco PLC). Prior to this she was HR Business Partner Manager Sales at Google where she worked for over five years, taking up leadership roles handling HR operations. She was earlier associated with Sapient as Manager, People Strategy, and Xansa as Manager HR and started her career as Supervisor HRD with Wildflower Hall, The Oberoi Group. Puja is very strong at helping an organization build its human resource capability. She is very passionate about employee development and her innovative ideas help with retention and growth of employees in the organization. She has notably developed a career development program that has led to strong engagement and retention results.
Puneeta Rampal is Head Talent Acquisition- Institutional Financial Services at Wipro BPS. Puneeta is an energetic, detail oriented domain expert and an astute leader. She is an effective person to reach out to for senior mandate profiles. Puneeta looks after leadership engagements in banking and financial services, shared services for Middle East Clients across corporate and investment banking, private banking and wealth management, investment advisory and across functions like finance, risk, human resource, process consulting, compliance, legal, and audit. She is a core HR professional and her partnership in the search for the right career path is highly sought for.
Raghavendra K is Senior VP and Global Head HRD, Infosys BPO. He has over 28 years of experience in the HR domain. His expertise lies in aligning HR’s functional role to drive business plans. His areas of interest are development of HR competencies, managing cultural diversity and change management, especially in the context of mergers and acquisitions. Mr. Raghavendra has created strong synergies between performance management systems and employee development platforms, ensuring that Infosys has a strong internal talent pool to meet business challenges. A strong proponent of “learn while you earn”, he has institutionalized a number of interventions creating opportunity for a person to move up the value chain while working.
Rajeev Dubey is Group President HR head and Member of the Group Executive Board at Mahindra & Mahindra. He was with Central Managerial Cadre, Tata Group at Tata Administrative Services prior to joining at Mahindra Group. His key focus areas are leading HR initiatives for the group, looking after the aftermarket sector with two CEOs reporting to him, corporate communications, government relations, and infrastructure. In addition, he is on the boards of several group companies including Mahindra China Tractor, Mahindra Intertrade, Mahindra First Choice Wheels, Mahindra Insurance Brokers and Mahindra Retail, and is the chairman of Mahindra First Choice Services. He also serves as chairman of the sustainability and CSR councils of the Group, and is a member of the Governing Council of the Mahindra Institute of Quality and the Corporate Governance Cell. Rajeev studied Economics at St. Stephens College, Delhi University, where he was ranked first in the University, and at the Delhi School of Economics, where he received a National Scholarship. He went on to do his MBA from the Yale School of Management, USA.
Raj Raghavan, Amazon’s Country HR leader, believes that a good HR Manager not only knows how to handle crisis situations, but also strives to find a balance between the needs of the employee and that of the company. Prior to joining Amazon in April 2011, Raj was the Head of Human Resources for General Electric’s Technology Centers in India and based at John F. Welch Technology Centre, Bangalore. He joined GE in 1999 at GE Capital International Services (now Genpact) and held various senior HR leadership positions of increasing responsibility. Raj has previously held various HR leadership roles at Unilever, Ford Motors, GE India Technology Centre, HSBC Group, and GE Capital. Raj is a University of Madras economics graduate and a PMIR post graduate from the Madras School of Social Work, India.
Rajaram K is General Manager Human Resources at Ford India Pvt. Ltd. He is a corporate HR professional, part of the senior leadership team, providing strategy to delivery of HR services across the organization. He is one of the key forces implementing Compensation Planning for the region, HR IT projects implementation for the region and is also the HR business partner for IT across Asia Pacific at Ford India. Previously, he was manager, HR at HCL Technologies and has served as Senior Consultant with Datamatics Staffing Service. By qualification, he is an M.Sc., MMS, Chemistry, Management from BITS Pilani. He has a unique knack for tackling HR issues skillfully. He has been a force to reckon with in Ford India with his exceptional domain knowledge and innovative and executable HR policies are exemplary.
Rajeev Tupsakri Rajeev Tupsakri is Chief People Officer at People Combine Educational Initiatives Ltd. He leads the entire gamut of HR functions across multiple lines of business and geographies, working as a strategic advisor to the senior management and board of directors. A combination of engineering and MBA training has laid a solid foundation for Rajeev. Over the last 19 years, cross functional experience in areas like manufacturing, product development, performance management and organization development and marketing, strategic planning and human resources, corporate HR and strategic business HR has reinforced his capabilities and helped build an understanding of the business. This well rounded exposure has enabled him to develop overall professional skills, multi-functional expertise and an ability to lead large teams. He has worked with global consultants like AonHewitt, BCG, Mc Kinsey, and Bain and Company, which has helped him further develop his conceptual skills. He is a certified trainer of seven habits, situational leadership, coaching, mentoring, leading shadow boards, HR and business trainings.
Rajendra Ghag Rajendra Ghag is an Executive Vice President Human Resources at HDFC Standard Life Insurance. Mr. Ghag has worked in the HR field for more than two decades in well known multinationals. Prior to joining HDFC Standard Life, he has looked after the quality process for DHL Express, South Asia (Six Sigma), branded as first choice employer in Deutsche Post World Net (DPWN). This was a massive change management undertaken by DPWN, the world’s No.1 logistic company valued at more than 70 billion euro, and. His dedication and ‘go getter’ attitude have helped many to pursue their goals and achieve them. His guidance has helped peers climb up the learning curve much better than what would have been possible otherwise. Mr. Rajesh is an extremely down to earth and approachable person, always keen to help, highly diligent in his work and always gets into the finest of details.
Rajesh Kumar Rajesh Kumar is Vice President Human Resources at The Lemon Tree Hotel Company. He joined Lemon Tree Hotels in June 2008 as Deputy General Manager HR and got promoted as GM-HR in 2010 and Assistant Vice President HR in October 2012. He is now heading Human Resources for the group. In his previous engagement he was Senior Manager HR Northern Region at Mahindra Holidays & Resort India Limited. He also served as Manager Human Resources at Select Holidays & Resorts Private Limited, and as Human Resources Supervisor at Oberoi Hotels and Resorts, Wildflower Hall, Shimla. By qualification he is PGDPM & masters in Public Administration, HR from Himachal Pradesh University.
Rajesh Padmanabhan Rajesh Padmanabhan, Director and Group CHRO of Welspun Group, started his career with the ICICI group, handling systems on mainframes, and went on to become a corporate banker. As Group CHRO, Vedanta Resources, prior to join Welspun Group, he created a platform for enabling businesses with cost-effective strategies, culture building, leadership effectiveness, driving people growth with a clear vision, capability development and get high engagement levels across the group. A Narsee Monjee alumnus, he won the prestigious UN Award as CHRO of Capgemini for building diversity and inclusive practices using his global mindset, influencing skills and utilized technology to chart a new graph in HR.
Rajiv Kapoor Rajiv Kapoor is the HR Director India at G4S. He is a Non- Executive Director at Ecom Express Pvt. Ltd. and Chief People Officer at Fortis Healthcare. In his previous assignments, he was the Executive Vice President HR and Legal at JCB India Ltd, where he worked for over a decade, handling the complete gamut of HR and legal functions. He was also responsible for the CSR initiatives of the company. Before this Mr. Kapoor was Head of HR at Tecumseh Products India Ltd. and Plant HR Head at Goodyear India Ltd, where he was responsible for Plant HR activities and initiatives as well as employee relations. He started his career as Asst. Manager, personnel and admin, Hindustan Vacuum Glass Pvt Ltd, taking care of the personnel, administration and legal functions.
Rajiv Sahdev Rajiv Sahdev is Sr. Vice President Human Resources, Moser Baer India Ltd. Rajiv has an extensive and varied experience of almost three decades in a wide spectrum of HR activities, both at plant as well as corporate in various industries from high end technology products, spinning, steel, electronics, fertilizers, to continuous process plants, both in unionized and nonunionized environments. Mr. Sahdev has handled M&A in two of his previous assignments and ensured smooth transition and cultural integration from the due diligence stage. He has been instrumental in creating Paperless HR by leveraging technology extensively to automate all major HR processes, thus creating transparent systems, saving time, building administrative efficiencies and creating a grievance free organization.
Raman Angra Raman Angra is Head HR at Sentiss Pharma. He earlier worked with Alkem Laboratories Ltd, Cheema Boilers Ltd. and Torrent Pharmaceuticals Ltd at several levels. His people connect, process orientation, networking and genuine interest in people development is admirable. His collaborative and mature style of functioning has brought good results for the HR function. He continually looks for opportunities for improvement and this has been vital for individuals and organizations he has worked with. Mr. Angra always has a creative, positive outlook and is good at organizing and bringing people together. He is indeed a perfectionist at his work and for his organisation.
Ranjan Bandyopadhya Ranjan Bandyopadhya is the Global HR Head for TCS, driving overall HR strategy for business process services. He is responsible for developing employee focused policies and processes that reflect the ethos and strategic direction of the Tata group. He has designed and engineered various initiatives and brought about improvement in operational and administrative procedures. Under his leadership, TCS’s BPS division has grown from 200 to 55000, between 2005 and 2013. He has been the key force behind the formulation of HR Policies for TCS BPS.
Ranjit Pandya Ranjit Pandya is vice president and group HR head at Adani Group, India Human Resources. A versatile value based HR professional with over two and a half decades of experience in HR in industries like pharmaceuticals, bulk drugs, chemicals, city gas distribution both at plant and business unit as well as corporate levels, he has been responsible for designing and implementing HR interventions to suit business needs ensuring effective and efficient HR service delivery. He has been instrumental in talent acquisition, lateral hiring, campus relations, performance management, rewards and recognition, SAP HCM, talent management, HR operations, HR policies and processes, employee relations, PR and community relations. An excellent communicator, he is also considered a star motivator by his industry peers.
Ravi Shankar Ravi Shankar is Vice President Human Resources at Jindal Power Limited. His role at JPL is to facilitate HR activities like talent acquisition, learning and development, performance evaluation, reward and recognition and developing a culture of camaraderie where “Joyful Working” is of paramount importance. A self-driven, enthusiastic and result oriented professional, he has an enriching industry experience with proven abilities in managing HR of large size enterprises. Driven by a passion to create and add value to people and organizations, he has always focused on spearheading numerous interventions that have demonstrated direct results anchored to business growth and organizational effectiveness. His contributions towards the growth of HR philosophy in JSPL is commendable.
Rex Michael Rex Michael is presently serving as the head of talent acquisition at Thomson Reuters. Rex joined Thomson Reuters when the company was setting up and expanding the operation in Hyderabad. This represented a terrific opportunity to be part of a growing firm and making a mark in Hyderabad’s IT ecosystem. A passionate HR professional with varied experience in IT, ITES and consulting firms, he has over a decade of experience working for Fortune 500 firms like Thomson Reuters and Deloitte Consulting across talent acquisition, workforce strategy, employee relations, performance management and global compensation. As a part of the HR leadership team, he tries to constantly evolve and align the HR strategy to the changing business needs and emerging trends in the digital economy. He is a visionary and engaging leader who embraces change and motivates teams to achieve superior results, and has a strong history of recruiting, retaining and mentoring high performing talent.
Ratish Jha Ratish Jha is a transformational leader and Head HR at Raychem RPG Ltd with key focus on strategy, culture and HR to create a competitive edge for the business. He is an accomplished HR leader with broad expertise in organization design, talent management, strategic human resources, cultural transformation and integration, performance management. Ratish has a track record of conceptualizing and sustaining scalable leading edge people and processes for diversified Indian and multinational companies across steel, power cables, tyre, pharmaceuticals and energy industries. Under his leadership, RPG has been recognized for its various people initiatives by winning prestigious awards like “Most Innovative HR practice” by NHRD, HR Leadership Award, 2010.
Ravi Gupta Ravi Gupta is Head HR Operations at DB Corp Ltd and is responsible for their HR initiatives and activities. Mr. Gupta has 23 years of experience across industries like media, pharma, telecom, consumer durables and automobile. He has gained expertise in devising and implementing HR strategies, change management, organization development, HR business partnering, enhancing engagement and ability to shape the HR agenda aligned to business needs. Earlier, he has held the roles of VP HR at Sentiss Pharma, Head HR at Vodafone and Divisional Manager HR at Samtel. He received the 50 Most Talented HR Leaders in India: ET Now – Talent & HR Leadership Award in 2013 and the HR Leadership Award 2012 from KRDWG at HR Conference at IIT Delhi.
Ritesh Rana Ritesh Rana is currently the Head HR at Britannia Industries Limited, one of India’s leading FMCG companies. In his previous work assignments, he worked as Head HR with Max New York Life Insurance Ltd and HR Leader at GE, SBI Cards for GE Money. He was also HR Business Partner with Intel for a year. A science graduate, Ritesh has completed his program in PGDPMIR, Human Resources from XLRI Jamshedpur. Mr. Rana applies his rich and diverse experience of almost two decades to hiring and retaining the best talent and grooming them into the best prepared employees. His networking skills and approach towards co-workers is admired by all. He is always in the process of crafting something unique to deploy the best HR policies and practices at Britannia. He has ensured that all the projects where he has been involved, have been executed to world class standards with benchmark results.
Ritu Verma Ritu Verma is the Regional Director HR, South Asia, at Starwood. She is responsible for pan India HR operations including South Asia. In her previous engagement she was director of HR at Westin, Gurgaon and Director HR at Marriott International. She also has served as general manager HR at TCS and at Jetair Group. A skilled and dynamic HR professional with over ten years of progressive experience with the hotel industry, she possess hands-on exposure in all Human Resources functions in various five star deluxe hotels which also includes critical experience like handling and negotiating with the unions. Ritu brings with her extensive HR expertise and has worked in diverse and administratively complex situations during her long career in the Industry.
Rohit Suri Rohit Suri is Chief HR and Talent Officer, South Asia, at GroupM. Mr. Suri is a business focused professional with over 18 years of experience in fast-paced consumer Internet, technology and media industries in India, Europe and Asia Pacific with the past 11 years spent in the leadership role leading change, rewards, restructuring, HR project management, business partnership and cultural integration. He has been involved in designing and running the leadership development program for Asia Pacific with modules in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Macau, Seoul and Mumbai. He has also been instrumental in M&A related integration in India and Sweden and change management due to acquisition. In his previous engagements he has worked as VP, HR at People Interactive for their matrimonial portal Shaadi.com, prior to which he served as VP, HR for One97 Communications enabling their eCommerce Unicorn Paytm. An MBA from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management, he started his career with The Indian Express group as a Marketing Executive in 1998.
Roopa Abraham Kochhar Roopa Abraham Kochhar is Director HR at Jardine Lloyd Thompson India Pvt.Ltd. She was Business Head Bajaj Allianz Staffing Solutions, where she worked for over a decade shouldering different roles of Human Resource climbing the corporate ladder passionately prior to joining JLT. She has single handedly taken the HR division from its nascent stage to a highly process driven function with her vision and execution. She has also got the uncanny knack of picking up the right people which has led to her building a strong team across the nation. As a person she is very energetic and structured. She possesses a unique quality of getting connected with her team in such a way that it forms a permanent bond. Roopa is a graduate in economics, political science, and sociology from Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune. She went on to complete her PGDHRD, Human Resources Development from Symbiosis Centre for Management and Human Resource Development, Pune.
Roopesh Mishra Roopesh Mishra is General Manager, HR at HCL Technologies Ltd. A Business Management professional with 16 years of experience in Human Resource including HR strategy, HR operations, employee engagement, talent acquisition and management and HR shared services in the IT/ ITES Industry, his USP is that he has diversified his competencies into all facets of the HR practice, which helps him work as a strategic business partner and play a crucial role in meeting the overall business plans and objectives of the organization. He is a graduate in Economics from the University of Allahabad and a Gold Medalist in MBA from BHU. He has received the HCL People Leader of the Year Award for his exceptional contribution in building the HR policies.
Ruchi Bhalla Ruchi Bhalla is Director and Head, HR for Pitney Bowes India. She ensures that talent and culture are key drivers for the business. Her charter includes leading change, building and enabling leadership, talent acquisition and management, organizational effectiveness and driving strategic interventions. Ruchi headed up the PB Software India HR Team and was instrumental in growing the headcount from 150 employees to 550 over the last three years. She has delivered an employer of choice technology brand and employee value proposition in India. She completed her Executive MBA (Experienced Managers Program, Business Administration and General Management) from Cornell University and has also had educational stints at leading institutes like the Indian School of Business.
Rupali Sharma Rupali’s work is to ensure redBus has the best of the employees needed to take the vision of organization to the next level. She is of course the Head of Recruitments at redBus.in. She is constantly on the lookout to connect with the best of the talent who can be a part of the redBus team. She ensured that the pride of redBus lies in the in-house talent of dynamic, intelligent, passionate individuals who come from various fields of expertise and together form redBus’s strength with its flexible HR practices. Rupali addresses her own team members as “Talent Detectives”, and lays her work mottos on famous sayings from leaders like Jim Collins and Roosevelt. With an electrifying personality, Rupali matches redBus.in’s growth chart.
Sachin Khurana Sachin Khurana is an HR leader and serves as Head HR at OSSCube India Information Technology and Services. He is responsible for the design, implementation, administration and operation of end to end human resources programs, practices and procedures with a primary focus on talent acquisition and management, capability development, employer branding and extended employee engagement. Sachin has more than 9 years of experience in MNCs and Indian Organizations like Citigroup, and Lodha Group. Sachin has demonstrated ability to consistently succeed in both structured and evolving environments. An excellent thinker with tremendous grasp of the business, he is a true co-creator of value.
Sagorika Kantharia Sagorika Kantharia is Chief People Officer at Radio City where she has been heading HR nationally for the last five years. She is an MBA in HR Management from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies and carries with her rich experience of two decades in the media industry. Prior to joining Radio City she was Chief Manager HR with Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd, where she handled the HR function for brands like The Times of India, The Economic Times, Mumbai Mirror, Maharashtra Times, and Navbharat Times. A few of her major contributions have been setting up of the corporate HR policies, pan-India job evaluation exercise, launch of Times Growth Club and setting up the 60 member team for Mumbai Mirror launch in 100 days.
Sailesh Shetty Sailesh Shetty is Vice President Human Resource and Services at Toyota Kirloskar Motors. In his last engagement, he was Assistant Manager at Tata Motors. He started his career as Sales Executive at TVS Suzuki Motorcycles Ltd. A Mechanical Engineer from University of Calicut Mr. Sailesh has a very pragmatic and level headed approach towards his work. He is a great team leader, setting examples for others by practice. His ability to see through problems and resolve them efficiently sets him apart. He has always pushed his abilities as a HR professional’ proving himself a utility towards business results which is a rare quality to find in hardcore HR professionals.
Saloni Sharma Saloni Sharma is General Manager HR at Godrej Consumer Products Limited. She has seven years of work experience in large scale conglomerates operating in multiple sectors. She is heading business partnering for two large functions with over 300 employees. She is responsible for designing leadership and functional programs based on organization and functional priorities. Having significant experience in leading compensation and benefit functions for India and overseas operations, she is leading manpower planning, talent acquisition and management for Godrej. She has been instrumental in designing the HR policy framework. She started off her career as an intern in Aon Hewitt and later joined Essar Group as Manager, Compensation and Benefits where she worked on commission compensation survey, proposed increments to senior management and implemented increments and bonus payout for 14,000 employees, and managed global mobility for 180 expats across 17 countries.
Sanjay Wadhwani Sanjay Wadhwani is Deputy General Manager and Head HR at ONGC. He is in-charge of hiring, employee relations and welfare. A science graduate Mr. Wadhwani has completed his post graduation in management from XLRI Jamshedpur. A people’s manager, Mr. Wadhwani is known for his outstanding conduct in the HR fraternity and also for showcasing his proficiency in executing solutions for complex employee issues. Sanjay has excellent skills in the IR field and is a very effective IR manager too. He has held several key HR positions at ONGC and excelled at them. With a great sense of humour, he has the ability to handle difficult situations with consummate ease. He is a manager anybody would love to work with; his attention to detail, and focus is commendable.
Sanjeev Agrawal Sanjeev Agrawal is Vice President Operations and Human Empowerment at Impetus Technologies. With more than 22 years of rich industry experience, Sanjeev has envisioned, led and executed multiple initiatives around the areas of human empowerment, finance and infrastructure development at Impetus. Mr. Agarwal has spearheaded the formulation and implementation of financial models and HR strategies for organizational development, talent management and transformational culture. With a strong focus on operational efficiencies, governance and user experience, he has led the business through different developmental phases and has established strong liaising with external entities including state & central government departments and ministries. He has been at the centre of several key strategic transitions at Impetus and has played a pivotal role in setting up development centres across Indore, Noida and Bengaluru.
Sanjeev Kaushik Sanjeev Kaushik is Sr. Manager at TATA Power Delhi Distribution Limited. He is a professional with 15 years of experience in HR. An LLB, Faculty of Law, Delhi University, Mr. Kaushik went on to complete his MBA from Faculty of Management Studies, University of Delhi. Sanjeev is a keen follower of changing trends and couples his HR practices with new-age tools. He has been instrumental in automating many HR processes, including even processes like payment gateways and other account related software for payroll and performance management. He also has been an ardent believer of human connect with technology and has encouraged training programs and sessions. He is known for his readiness to help.
Seema Nair Seema Nair is Director and CHRO, Cisco, India and SAARC. She is a high-on-energy and insightful HR leader with a proven track record of helping grow multi-billion dollar businesses through strategic and operational HR partnership. She possesses an extensive knowledge of the Asia Pacific and India talent markets, particularly in the technology industry. She led a team of senior client facing HR professionals to support various business groups at Cisco India for an employee base that grew from 6000 to over 9000 in her tenure. Seema is a strategic thinker, and has an innate ability to grasp and solve business challenges. She is able to formulate strategies for complex projects within a short duration and find winning solutions.
Saugata Mitra Saugata Mitra is presently Chief People Officer and member of the apex management team at Mother Dairy, the largest dairy and food giant in Asia. A noted Human Resource professional, author and analyst, Saugata has over two decades of experience in Fortune 500 companies, having started his career with American transnational Union Carbide Corporation, followed by long stints in Japanese multinationals Sony and Sharp at the CXO level. At Mother Dairy, he is providing leadership and driving business and people agendas, including transformational interventions for organizational growth. He is a founding member of Sony India, set up the organization from its inception and provided leadership in driving people and business agenda from scratch; and as head of new business, brought in new lines of business and innovation with considerable positive impact on the bottom line. A Master of Sociology, Mr. Mitra has completed his MBA, Human Resource from Symbiosis International University.
Saurabh Nigam Saurabh Nigam is currently the Vice President Human Resources at Snapdeal. Saurabh holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations (PM&IR) from XLRI School of Business and Human Resources, Jamshedpur. He also holds the SPHR, GPHR and HRMP certifications from SHRM, USA – being the only Indian and one among the first 10 people globally to hold these three certifications simultaneously. He has been recognized as one of the Top 25 Future HR Leaders of the Country by People Matters and DDI International. He also received the “Young HR Manager of the Year Award” at IHRD National HR Conference, 2012. With a varied experience behind him and an ever increasing desire to add value to self and exceed organizational expectations, he has risen up the corporate ladder at a fairly young age. Saurabh is a regular speaker at numerous national and international conferences on topics like compensation and benefits, talent management and managing Gen Y.
Seema Arora Nambiar Seema Arora Nambiar is VP and Senior Director, People Resources & Business Excellence, at Hardcastle Restaurants (McDonald’s West and South India). With almost two decades of experience, Ms. Nambiar is responsible for identifying and creating a skilled workforce while ensuring an alignment of people strategies to company goals. She has been working towards making McDonald’s an ‘Employer of Opportunity’ and has been credited with introducing cutting edge technology tools to engage employees. A psychology and sociology graduate from Mumbai University, she has done a course on Communication across International Businesses from the University of California, Berkley and holds a certificate from Institute of Hotel Management and Catering Technology, Mumbai.
Senthil Gnanasekaran Senthil Gnanasekaran is the HR Director for Microsoft Global Delivery, India Global Technical Support and Research businesses in India. He is also responsible for HR deliverables across EMEA, LATAM and North Asia for the Global Delivery business. Senthil has been with Microsoft over the last 12 years and has held key leadership positions that contributed to the growth of various businesses. Senthil joined Microsoft from Infosys Technologies Limited, where he performed HR and staffing roles out of Dallas, USA. Prior to Infosys, he worked for Ramco Systems and NIIT Ltd. Overall, Senthil brings with him 18 years of experience across staffing and HR business partner roles, in both start up and stable business environments.
Shailesh Verma Shailesh Verma is Chief General Manager HR at State Bank of India. He was the Regional Head of Corporate Accounts Group of SBI in New Delhi. This group handled mainly the credit and project financing requirements of top Indian corporate houses. It was his responsibility to market, do risk assessment, and have supervisory control over a portfolio comprising of loans to these top corporates, mainly based in the North India region. He has served SBI for almost four decades with commitment and loyalty. Outside work, Mr. Verma has taken French classes and sitar lessons and is involved in social service and dramatics.
Shailja Singh Shailja Singh is VP, HR at The Oberoi Group. Shailja’s never-say-die attitude has seen her successfully take on some of the toughest challenges in operations and human resources management. Her unwavering commitment to the larger vision of the enterprise and her ability to inspire and carry every member in her team with her has earned her the respect and admiration of subordinates, colleagues and superiors alike. A natural HR professional, Ms. Singh has an aggressive nature, great commitment to her job and superb dedication towards her team members. She has carved her path from scratch to the top at Oberoi Group, working with them for over two decades and constantly rising up thanks to her passion and urge to bring in something better to the organization.
Shaleen Madan Shaleen Madan is an HR Professional with significant experience in HR leadership positions at the national, regional, and global HQ levels in India, France, Asia Pacific and Europe. His specialities are human resources, HR generalist, international and regional HR Management, people development, talent development, competency assessment, country HR management, union negotiations, staffing, sourcing, managing transition and change, and cross cultural working. He was Regional HR Director, Asia Pacific and Russia, at Sanofi-Aventis prior to joining the Lodha Group and has served as Country HR Director, India at Aventis India and as Regional HR Head, India and Middle East at Ranbaxy. Mr. Madan holds a master’s degree in personnel management and industrial relations from the University of Punjab, Chandigarh and has over 27 years of work experience in the function.
Shalini Naagar Shalini Naagar is Head Human Resources, India and South Asia at Marks and Spencer. Shalini’s career spans 19 years across various industries like IT, ITES, pharmaceuticals and retail. During this time, she has been successfully delivering results by contributing to the development and accomplishment of organizational business plans and objectives and playing the role of an HR business and strategic partner. Shalini is establishing HR business objectives to support the attainment of the overall strategic objectives. Acquiring an in-depth knowledge of the business and business models, Ms. Naagar is evolving and implementing the strategic HR initiatives like leadership development, talent management, succession planning, employee engagement, and change management. She is helping the HR Team transform into successful business partners, by exposing them to business thinking and making them accountable and responsible for cost and measurement of all HR programs and processes.
Sharad Verma Sharad Verma is Global Head, HR at Polaris Consulting and Services Ltd. An MBA from XLRI, Sharad has served as the head of HR for Berkadia (a Berkshire Hathaway company), Bank of New York Mellon, Monster and SCT Software, was HR Director at SunGard and served as VP, HR and Admin, India, Middle East, and South East Asia for Monster.com. Sharad has extensive experience in talent acquisition, talent management, compensation and benefits, talent analytics and strategy. He combines keen business acumen with an understanding of people issues and a drive to make things happen. In addition to HR, he has expertise in general management, operations, strategy, business development, communications, product development and solution selling.
Sheshav Gupta Sheshav Gupta is Head, Talent Acquisition Lifestyle at Landmark Group. Mr. Gupta is an HR Management professional with 14 years of experience across diverse organizational domains. He has demonstrated expertise in implementation of human resources strategies through establishment of department accountabilities. Sheshav is proficient in talent acquisition, benefits management, succession planning, employee relations and retention. He possesses an extensive experience in guiding and management of employees through research, and drafting, updating and implementing policies and procedures. He has excellent leadership skills and has also developed a skill to connect with colleagues across levels and functions.
Shishir Kumar Mr. Shishir Kumar is presently working as Head, Human Resources at Indian Oil Tanking AEC, where he has been serving for over a decade. He was previously engaged with The Bombay Dyeing and Mfg Co Ltd as Manager, Human Resources. He started his career as an HR Generalist with Reliance Infocomm Limited. Mr. Kumar is considered by his peers to be one of the most dedicated and hardworking managers with exceptional communication skills. He combines an extremely high professional work commitment with a great sense of humour and a great working relationship with his staff.
Shiva Sundar Shiva Sundar is Director, HR at Akamai Technologies India Pvt Ltd, responsible for recruitment, training & development, compensation & benefits, employee relations, and end to end HR operations. He has almost two decades of significant and deeply embedded experience. Before this, he was Head, HR at Samsung India Software Operations, Country HR Manager at NXP Semiconductors, and HR Manager at IBM India. A political science, economics, and sociology graduate, he did his MSW, PM & IR, from Mangalore University.
Sriharsha Achar Sriharsha Achar is Chief People Officer at Apollo Munich Health Insurance Company Limited. Previously, he has worked with vKarma as CHRO, Xchanging Technolgies as Director HR, and also with America Online Pvt. Ltd and First Ring India Pvt. Ltd. An experienced HR specialist, he has extensive knowledge in training and development, recruitment and selection, career counseling, communication and performance management. He is an effective thinker, with proven strategic planning, business management, communication and presentation skills. Sriharsha has the ability to manage changes and achieve results. He is a natural leader, with a relaxed yet absolutely committed style to achieving set goals through the development and motivation of people.
SM Gupta SM Gupta is Global Chief People Officer at Aegis Limited, the services arm of Essar Group. He steers the People Management function in a multicultural, multi-lingual and socio-economically diverse 60,000 strong workforce. He brings with him over 25 years of HR experience across the IT, ITES, telecom, retail, oil and FMCG sectors. In his previous roles, he was associated with organizations such as Tata, Reliance, Kansai Nerolac Paints, Cadila Pharmaceuticals and Essar Oil. Through his strategic vision, astute decisionmaking and unmatched execution capabilities, he has enabled and inspired innovative people strategies, policies and programs across 13 countries. Under his leadership, Aegis was successful in integrating more than eight companies across six geographies.
Sonal Mehra Sonal Mehra is Head of Corporate HR at Micromax Informatics Ltd. Post a full time MBA in HR from MDI Gurgaon, Sonal gained 9 years of experience spanning the gamut of HR specializations. She also has a passion for project based assignments where she combines her strengths of analysis, problem solving and process design. She is looking after total rewards, performance management, talent management, and learning & development at Micromax. She was earlier Deputy General Manager HR at Godrej Consumer Products Ltd. Sonal comes across as an HR professional who is conceptually strong. She is a fast learner and grasps the nuances of any job assigned to her quite well. She is able to think sharply and present multiple scenarios backed by strong analysis enabling effective decision making. Sonal brings in a great combination of strengths – result orientation, creative thinking, highly evolved analytical skills, and ownership.
Shivi Rastogi Shivi Rastogi is VP, HR at Citifinancial Consumer Finance India Ltd. He has served in several leadership positions with GE Countrywide Consumer Financial Services Limited and Walchand Capital Limited. Mr. Rastogi is a professional with almost two decades of experience in diverse business verticals – sales, operations, underwriting, and HR. He possesses over eight years of leadership experience in HR centered on strategizing, organizational design & development, and leading teams and budgeting. Shivi is a rare combination of aggression, infectious energy and people orientation. As an HR person, his analytical skills, problem solving abilities and motivational skills are formidable.
Shyam Sharma Shyam Sharma is President, HRM & Corp Communications at Claris Lifesciences Limited, a sterile perenteral injectables company based at Ahmedabad, where he is looking after the HRM & Corporate Communication Function. The most endearing quality of Mr. Shyam, his peers comment, is his sincerity, his willingness to learn, which are the secrets of his success. He has served previously at Core Healthcare Limited as Senior Manager HRD. His article on “Winning Habits for HR Professionals” published in The Times of India gained industry recognition. An arts graduate, he has done the INSEAD Business Strategy for HR Leaders programme and Leadership Skills for Top Management program from ISB Hyderabad.
Somnath Baishya Somnath Baishya is Director & Head HR at Intuit India. Prior to joining Intuit, he was Director & Head HR – Adobe India. As an HR professional, he has experienced organization journeys through different phases such as start-up, scaling up across capabilities and geographies and transformations driven through changes in business strategy. Having built domain expertise in different areas of HR like workforce planning and recruitment, organization development, compensation & benefits, employee relations and communications, Mr. Baishya has been in leadership positions across organizations. Somnath has also invested in connections with academia such as Stanford, Harvard, Wharton, XLRI, and the IITs to name a few. He operates with both his head and heart, leading the people agenda even in the midst of huge changes and transformations. Approachable, personable and genuine, he is a valued partner to the leadership teams, his peers, subordinates and all stakeholders cutting across organizational and business group boundaries.
Sonal Raj Sonal Raj is Sr. General Manager HR at Indofil Industries Ltd. Before this, Ms. Sonal was General Manager HR at Hindustan Construction Co. (HCC) Ltd for more than a decade and a half, handling a varied set of responsibilities. She is very structured and detailed as a professional and very open minded as a leader. Sonal has an acute business acumen. A detail oriented person with a will to grow, her peers mention that she will do the best for any organization she is with. She is a qualified Masters in Human Resource Management, from L N Welingkar Institute of Management. At her work, she has always set an example of being a compassionate yet disciplined HR professional throughout her organisation.
Sonali Roychowdhury Sonali Roychowdhury is HR Director India/Middle East/Africa Distributor Operations, at Procter and Gamble. She has been a P&G employee since 1998, and has knowledge of all nuances of people and serves as a solution maker. She is an internationally experienced HR leader in the consumer goods industry, with demonstrated ability to deliver results and lead multicultural teams, across emerging markets. She has experience in high-impact senior leadership roles including business partnership, organization design, and talent strategy, change management, executive coaching, and building high performing teams. She was named the Young HR Professional of the Year in December 2010 by the National HRD Network.
Sowmya Santhosh Sowmya Santhosh is Vice President HR at CitiusTech, India Information Technology and Services. She has been a force to reckon with, having worked with organizations like Qwest Software Services, Professional Access India, and Adea Solutions. She has an amazing ability to analyze things and act on them quickly. Ramya also possess the knack to deliver in her role as an HR Business Partner brilliantly. Sowmya has earned respect from both employees and senior management as she skillfully sails through the dynamic business environment taking care of employee benefits by introducing periodic development sessions and keeping an open work environment for encouraging the most productive output from employees.
Sridhar R Sridhar R is an Executive Vice President HR at ITC Limited. He has served ITC for over three decades in the HR, ER, and IR functions, currently looking after HR for the cigarette business. He is concerned with employee relations management and organizational development areas such as sourcing, performance management, and employee engagement. A science graduate from Loyola College, Chennai, he joined ITC in 1982 after completing his post-graduation in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from XLRI, Jamshedpur, where he was awarded the gold medal for academic excellence. Prior to his current role, he was heading learning and development at Corporate Human Resources. Earlier in his career, Sridhar has handled senior HR assignments in the India tobacco division and the agri business division, apart from handling various other projects.
Srikanth Balachandran Srikanth Balachandran is Global Chief Human Resources Officer at Bharti Airtel. As the Global CHRO of the world’s third largest mobile operator, with more than 20,000 employees in 20 countries, Mr. Balachandran feels this to be the most exciting part of his career spanning over three decades. In 2008, he joined Bharti Airtel, and he took over the role of global CFO overseeing the financials in 2011. Prior to Airtel, Srikanth worked at Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) for 23 years at various positions including Vice President, Finance & Commercial and Head, Global Finance Transformation. His idea of the effective HR function is one that is closely connected to business and customers. Srikanth has a graduate degree in commerce from Madras University and is a qualified chartered accountant.
Sriram Rajagopal Sriram Rajagopal is Senior VP, HR at Cognizant Technology Solutions India and is responsible for managing the talent supply chain. In a career spanning more than a decade at Cognizant, Sriram has played several roles, which include stints in talent management, graduate hiring program, and school of behavioral learning, and immigration. He helped integrate Invensys, UBS ISC, CoreLogic into the larger Cognizant organization through a well coordinated post-merger integration plan. Before joining Cognizant, Sriram worked for Andersen Consulting on assignments across India, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. He started his career as Personnel Executive at Taj Hotels Resorts and Palaces. Sriram has been instrumental in implementing many internal channels of communication and collaboration. He focuses on leveraging enterprise social network platforms to increase collaboration, facilitating instant dissemination of information, giving immediate feedback and forging stronger relationships within the team.
Subhro Bhaduri Subhro Bhaduri is CHRO Financial Services at Aditya Birla Group. He is responsible for the HR strategy, policy and the program management for the financial services businesses of Aditya Birla Group. He has a rich experience of 27 years in the domains of HR and IR with focus on developing human capital best practices and building up enterprises with scale and quality in the manufacturing & financial services industries. He led the HR mandate during the growth and expansion phase of Kotak Mahindra Bank from 2005 onwards; he was instrumental in scaling up the operations of the Bank from 17 branches to over 500 branches. Subhro started his career with Shaw Wallace and Company Ltd as a Management Trainee and grew up to be the Head HR and IR for the firm. Subhro has a Bachelors degree in Commerce from Calcutta University and has completed his Post Graduation in Human Resources from Xavier Institute of Social Sciences.
Surender Mehta Surender Mehta is leading Vodafone India as an Executive Vice President & Head of HR Operations. He is an HR professional with over two decades of experience spanning a wide range of enterprises, MNCs to family businesses, and across industries like telecommunications & ITES, hospitality, international trading and textiles. Mr. Mehta has successfully led and executed strategic, specialist and generalist HR roles in blue chip companies at various business life cycle stages. He is responsible for building high performance culture through effective performance management processes, tools and leadership coaching culture. Prior to this he was with ITC Hotels as HR Manager and also worked as Deputy Manager – Personnel at Magnum International.
Sunil Kutty Sunil Kutty is Head HR at Ujjivan Financial Services. Mr. Kutty has more than 25 years of experience in managing HR and training functions for IT / ITES, BFSI and telecom companies. He has made significant contributions and led HR practices in the areas of OD, training interventions, performance systems design & development, leadership development and quality systems management. Mr. Kutty’s past leadership roles with organizations like Tata Capital Ltd, KPIT Cummins Ltd, Kale Consultants Ltd and Datapro Infoworld Ltd has provided him immense experience on profit centre management, change management, culture and ethics management, talent development and people engagement with hands-on involvement from the conceptualization to delivery stage.
Sumit Mitra Sumit Mitra is creating an inspiring place to work at Godrej Group since he joined the organization in 1997 as Management Trainee. He is leading world class Human Resource teams in Godrej Industries and associated companies. Mr. Mitra himself is passionate about building organizations and leading high performing teams. He is presently Head, Group HR and Corporate Services at Godrej Consumer Products Ltd. (GCPL) leading the Human Resources function for Godrej Consumer Products globally across Asia, Africa and Latin Americas. He leads the leadership development, due diligence, mergers and acquisitions and change management initiatives, which have formed a major part of the Group’s aggressive growth strategy. Sumit drives the Godrej Employer Brand that is built on the philosophy of tough love. He has been instrumental in making Godrej an inspiring workplace with an agile and high performance culture that attracts and retains the best global talent.
Sunil Pathak Sunil Pathak is Director Human Resources at Cadence Design Systems, where he specializes in creating a winning work culture in the organization and providing an environment that is open, supportive and sets the stage for the employees and company to succeed. Prior to this, Mr. Pathak was HR Business Leader at Agilent Technologies and served as Senior Manager HR at HCL Perot Systems. One of the noteworthy changes he has introduced is the change in recruitment strategies, such as using social media and referral programs. Sunil is a techno savvy HR professional, believing social media has a big role in creating awareness about the organization and attracting the right people for positions within the company.
Suresh Tripathi Suresh Tripathi is Vice President Human Resource Management at Tata Steel. His role requires handling all aspects of HR Management for employees located at various locations and facilities. He has been working as an HR professional for the last three decades, having started his career as a Management Trainee with Steel Authority of India Ltd. and has worked in Public as well as Private Sectors across industries like IT, chemicals, and education. Mr. Tripathi has done his Masters in Physics from University of Delhi and Post Graduate Diploma in Social Work from University of Calcutta. An alumnus of Ashorne Hill Management College, U.K., he is trained in a number of fields in HR.
Suvamoy Roy Choudhury Suvamoy Roy Choudhury is Director of HR at Vodafone India. He is leading HR operations with over 400 million customers, present in 26 countries across 100 markets. Over the years, he has worked across organizations to build institutions that embrace a high performance culture, human capital productivity & superior workforces. At Vodafone, he is responsible for developing people strategies that compliment and support business initiatives, making front-end people investment & development decisions.
Tanvi Choksi Tanvi Choksi is HR Director J&J Medical India & Diabetes Care Asia Pacific. An HR professional with 11 years of experience across various industries like automobile, agriculture, pharmaceuticals and medical devices, Tanvi’s strengths are business partnering, organizational design & development, talent management, M&A, learning and development and organizational change. She has been instrumental in driving the talent management strategy to ensure robust plans for critical talent and benefit for J&J Medical. Tanvi has also facilitated talent deployment with board members to deliver on business and people agendas. Her ability to relate to people is commendable and she remains calm in all situations. She can collaborate well and manage multiple stakeholders with ease.
Tapan Mitra Tapan Mitra is Chief, Human Resources at Apollo Tyres Ltd and is responsible for developing robust human resource management systems. He has been instrumental in establishing a best-in-class performance management system, leadership development programmes, market-driven compensation structures and a host of employee welfare and engagement activities. People integration, especially in cases of mergers & acquisitions, is his area of excellence. Mr. Mitra began his career as a Management Trainee in HR with J K Papers in 1977, moving to Voltas Ltd and then to Ballarpur Industries Ltd where he served for over a decade. A Gold Medalist from the University of Delhi, and a National Scholarship holder, Tapan is a post graduate in Sociology from Delhi School of Economics.
Thiru A Thirunavukkarasu A Thirunavukkarasu, popularly known as A Thiru, is President, Corporate HR at JK Organization. Prior to joining JK, Thiru served Vedanta Resources Plc, as President, Corporate Development, and as their Global HR Head. Thiru considers his initial 5 years in English Electric as a strong foundation followed by 10 years at Hindustan Lever Ltd which helped him evolve into a zealous and forthright HR professional. Thiru enjoys interacting with students and has been visiting premier engineering and management schools, besides occasionally participating in panel discussions at national level HR summits like AIMA, Business World and Economic Times forums and HR Conclaves in leading institutes like IIMs. He has also been conferred with several accolades like Indira Super Achiever, Most Powerful HR Professionals of India, 30 Most Talented Global HR Leaders in Asia, HR Thought Leadership Award and 100 Most Influential HR Professionals Award.
Unmesh Rai Unmesh Rai is GM, Talent Acquisition (Group HR) at Reliance Industries Limited. Unmesh has experience across diverse facets of HR, from being an HR business partner, managing employee relations at factory level as well as working through the central corporate teams, setting up HR, admin and employee relations agenda in greenfield projects and joint ventures. He was Divisional Manager, Corporate HR (Talent Acquisition) Tata Motors before joining Reliance. He also facilitated talent acquisition for corporate functions across geographies, designed hiring strategies for ramp ups as well as for critical niche roles. A dynamic and innovative HR professional, Unmesh was instrumental in establishing HR processes in the recent greenfield projects of Tata Motors.
Anadi Sinha Anadi Sinha, a Post Graduate in Management and a Law Graduate from University of Allahabad, is President, Group HRM, UNO Minda. He has a varied experience of around three decades in diverse industries both in manufacturing & service. Mr. Sinha started his career with Kelvinator India Limited in 1985 and worked with companies like Lupin Limited, Bridgestone, ACC, Minda Group, Bharti Airtel, Future Group and Tata Motors. He successfully managed the entire spectrum of HR functions in multi-cultural, multi-divisional and multi-location high growth organizations. Mr. Sinha looks after the operations for UNO Minda which has 32 manufacturing plants in India, Indonesia and Vietnam; design centers in Taiwan and Japan; and sales offices in USA, Europe and Vietnam.
Vibha Shukla Vibha Shukla is presently working as Director and Head Human Resources at SAP India Pvt Ltd. Before stepping into this role she was Head HR SAP GDC and HRBP Expert and HR PMO for SAP Labs. She has proved herself as an inspiring and growth centered HR lead in her tenure of almost over a decade with SAP. In her earlier work experience she was Associate Manager-HR with Satyam Computer Services Ltd. A Graduate from Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University where she Stood 1st in a batch of over 65 students, she has completed her Master’s Program from IMT, Ghaziabad and was ranked in the top 3 of the batch. Her personal touch to her professional endeavors makes her a people’s manager.
Vidhi Kapoor Vidhi Kapoor is HR Business Partner at GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare Pvt. Ltd. Previously she was working at Bharti Airtel Limited, Gurgaon, in their Learning and Organization Development function. There, she was responsible for managing development interventions and leading various change management initiatives across the organization. Vidhi started her career in HR consulting at Ernst & Young Pvt. Ltd. She worked as a Senior Consultant in the Performance Improvement Service Line at Ernst & Young in India. She has consulting experience across industries in multiple HR areas including Organization Structuring, Change Management, Grade Structuring, Manpower Planning, Performance Management System, HR Due Diligence, Compensation and Benefits, Incentive Design (Short Term & Long Term), Competency Modeling, and Design of other HR Processes and Policies. A Commerce graduate from Shri Ram College of Commerce (SRCC), she was awarded Gold Medal for ‘Best Student in Managerial Ethics’ among a batch of 193 students in XLRI Jamshedpur.
Vijay Choudhary Vijay Choudhary is Vice President Human Resources at Max Life Insurance. Mr. Vijay is a Human Resource professional with 14 years experience of devising & delivering HR systems and programs to diverse employee sets in equally diverse organizations like ABB, PepsiCo and Samsung. He has carried out the role of a Business Partner with a collaborative style honed over the years by working in complex environments & sectors necessarily requiring a deep business understanding, patience and maturity. His specialities are in Organization Design, Manpower Planning, Recruitment & Selection, Performance Management, Employee Engagement, Talent Management, Employee Relations, Designing & Implementation of HR policies. Vijay is a knowledgeable, capable and results oriented HR executive. His work on Rewards & Recognition has been exemplary and reflected in his acumen to translate ideas on paper into visible actions and results. He is very good with setting expectations in reference to project objectives and deadlines.
Vishalli Dongrie Vishalli Dongrie is Partner, Sr. Director, Human Capital Consulting at Deloitte India. She is heading all Service-lines in Human Capital Consulting, and manages talent and leadership, performance and reward, organizational design and development, and mergers and acquisitions with HR due-diligence, post merger integration and HR transformation. She has worked for companies like Hewitt Associates, ECS Private Limited and NIBM. She is a doctorate in HRD, with an JRF fellowship. She has authored a paper on “Compensation Trends Survey 2013-2014” that provided key insights on salary increments and variable pay trends. 155 companies participated in the survey and the highlights include sectoral analysis on compensation trends.
Vishpala Reddy Vishpala Reddy is VP and Head of Human Resources at American Express. As a member of the Amex India Leadership Team (ILT), she ensures that human capital is a key driver in enabling business success. She has been with Amex for a decade and has partnered with business leaders to drive the India business transformation which was featured as a best practice by the Asia HR Executive Board. She has championed diversity and inclusion, and led a successful, first of its kind D&I initiative in the market in collaboration with four large multinationals. Prior to joining American Express, Vishpala was a consultant with Hewitt Associates. She has also worked with Cognizant Technology Solutions as an HR generalist.
Vivek K. Tyagi Vivek K. Tyagi is Unit HR Head at Nestle India Limited. Earlier he was with Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages Pvt. Ltd. Prior to that he served Blue Star Limited where he set up a new project for them. A science graduate, he is a Masters of Personnel Management, Human Resources Management from the Institute of Management & Research, New Delhi. Mr. Tyagi takes strong ownership and drives for results. His sense of responsibility, his leadership, and his enthusiasm toward work are commendable. He is a thorough professional, committed and dedicated towards his job & role. With a tint of emotions he understands & cares for his team and utilizes their potential in achieving the professional goals.
Vivek Mukherjee Vivek Mukherjee is presently leading Benetton India Pvt Ltd as Head of Human Resources. His specialities are talent acquisition, project management, employee engagement, training & development, leadership development, performance management, change management, HR operations & automation. Prior to this, he was with Bharti Walmart and was responsible for people strategy and excellence at a pan India level. He has also worked with The Royal Bank of Scotland N.V. as Manager HR, looking after managing end to end HR delivery for North India. He was also associated with Eicher Engineering Solutions as Assistant Manager-Human Resource. His peers mention that Vivek has a well balanced perspective of business and people.
Vivek Ranjan Vivek Ranjan is presently serving as VP & Head HR at Ericsson India Global Services. In his prior engegements Mr.Ranjan was Head of HR Europe at NIIT Technologies Limited in London and HR Head Europe at Mastek UK Ltd. He also has worked at iGATE and HCL Technologies. Vivek has done an exceptional job in streamlining HR processes for iGATE Europe. He also worked well with external parties (legal, immigration, sub contractors) to help bring flexibility for growth of business. An arts graduate from Delhi University Vivek has an MBA in HR Management from XLRI Jamshedpur. Vivek is considered an extremely detail oriented professional with an eye for absolute perfection.
Kumar Gautham A strategic HR leader with broad international experience spanning India, China, Hong-Kong, Australia, and Europe, Kumar Gautham is Head HR at Whirlpool India. He has a track record of two significant cultural transformations which led to significant improvements in market share, productivity & engagement of workforce; making cost of operations more viable. He deployed HR functions for sales force effectiveness, retail management with conceptualization and execution of a strong employer brand. His skilled HR practices are ensuring high quality talent & leadership have Whirlpool as their first choice during the business growth period of the firm.
Yashwant Mahandik Yashwant Mahandik is a seasoned global HR professional with over 26 years of experience across industries and geographies in top-class companies like Crompton Greaves, Colgate Palmolive, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Royal Philips, and is currently the Global CHRO of SunPharma and all its subsidiary companies. He has established a track record in industries including technology, consumer and healthcare and geographies like India, UK, Japan, USA, ASEAN and Europe. His strengths and areas of expertise include strategy in business, HR and business transformation, leadership development, organization and culture building, workforce design & planning, talent management and succession planning, merger/acquisition integration and executive coaching. He has previously led transformation programs and initiatives at J&J and Philips at the enterprise level. A commerce graduate, he an earned an MBA from The University of Sheffield in International HR.
Yogesh Kotian Yogesh Kotian is Head Talent Management & Talent Acquisition at DHL. Mr. Kotian conveys a quiet air of excitement about his work and life in general. And he’s always willing to share his vast knowledge in the HR arena. He encourages the people in his team to excel. A commerce graduate and accounts specialist, Mr. Yogesh is an MBA, Human Resources Management and Services from Institute of Management Technology. His focus areas include recruitment, competency mapping, performance management, compensation and rewards management. He has introduced many distinct HR policies to innovate the way HR operations are handled at DHL. It has worked hand in hand with employee satisfaction and business growth. He has always been the choice to head any new projects at DHL.
Yogi Sriram Yogi Sriram is Senior Vice President Corporate HR at Larsen & Toubro. His areas of interest are team coaching, talent management and change management, having successfully contributed to the architecture and execution in these areas in leadership roles, in very large and diverse organizations. Mr. Yogi has published papers in journals of international repute and built a reputation as a successful thought leader and implementer, having laid the foundation for most of L&T’s signature leadership programmes. His goal is to position HR to create significant value and impact. He is responsible for senior leadership level talent acquisition for succession planning and growth for the company. Yogi is an Arts graduate from Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University, and went on to Tata Institute of Social Sciences for his Masters in HR. A natural learner, he has done his LLB from Delhi University and MBA from FMS,Delhi University.
Yuvaraj Srivastava Yuvaraj Srivastava is Chief Human Resource Officer at MakeMyTrip. com. Mr. Srivastava has over 17 years of Corporate HR experience and also has had five and a half years of experience with Indian armed forces as a commissioned officer. He has been in HR Leadership roles for almost 12 years, which includes exposure to the entire gamut of HR, with a strong exposure to HR strategy, talent strategy, workforce planning, organisational capability plans etc. Previously, he worked with Asian Paints Ltd for around 9 years in different roles across levels. He also worked for three years with The Oberoi, New Delhi as Director HR. Mr. Yuvaraj joined PepsiCo India in the year 2010 as VPHR for West Market, later moved to PepsiCo Foods business as Head of HR for All India Sales and Organisational Capability building. Presently, he is responsible for makemytrip.com’s HR strategy and business partnering for the company and all its overseas subsidiaries. By qualification, he is MBA in HR from IMT Ghaziabad and graduate in Industrial Psychology from University of Allahabad.
Zenobia Madon Zenobia Madon is currently the Director HR, Business Partner for the Philips Personal Health (Consumer goods) business in the Indian Sub-continent. She is responsible for leading the People & Talent Strategy for the business in India, Sri Lanka & Bangladesh. Over these years, Zenobia has gained diverse experience in Human Resources, having undertaken various roles spanning the areas of Talent Acquisition, HR Business Partnering, Mergers & Acquisitions, Talent Management and HR Transformations. Her past experience has taken her across other varied industries. Prior to Philips, Ms. Madon has worked with leading organizations like Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca in India. She has also undergone a few stints working overseas in US & Singapore. Zenobia is a Lady Shri Ram College of Arts graduate from Delhi University. She has completed her MBA in Human Resources from the International School Of Business and Media. She has also undergone a short term programme at ISB Hyderabad.
Zach Cherian Zach Cherian is Director HR- India & Australia, Keysight Technologies. Zach believes that he is enabling the business, like a partner, and not as a support function. Zach has headed and overseen various exciting projects in the Human Resource, Leadership Development & Organization Development space. These include business restructuring, ramp-ups, divestitures, acquisitions & integration, company split, and even office moves. His forte is in learning, leadership development and coaching, but he also thoroughly enjoys culture building, communication, and designing & executing HR strategies. As mentioned earlier, he doesn’t believe HR is a support function, nor does he think HR should limit itself to traditional HR services. Zach believes in giving value through engagement, clarity, speed & decisiveness. His perseverance and willingness to take up new challenges and strive for excellence in everything he does, makes him a successful professional. He is a great team player who strives for team success first than individual.
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