Speakers
September 2022
Day 1: Inaugural Address
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Father Director K S Casimir
Director, XLRI-Delhi NCR
Dr Fr K.S. Casimir assumed the mantle of leadership as the Director of XLRI Delhi-NCR with effect from 14 August 2022.
He secured his Ph.D. from NIT Warangal. Having been in higher education for over two and a half decades, he brings his rich and varied experience both in academics and administration to his new role. He was the Principal, Secretary and Head of Loyola Academy Junior, Degree and PG Colleges, Secunderabad.
Communicative competence, servant leadership for transformation, education for the 21st century, personal and professional excellence, awakening in the spirit are his areas of interest and has conducted conferences and FDPs across the country in these areas.
He teaches management communication and constantly seeks to kindle in the students a sense of urgency to recognise their own depths to savour their inner joy and find personal and professional fulfilment.
On his appointment as the Director, he said, "We live in the most abundant time in the history of humanity. Our genius and ingenuity have dreamt up the most potent technology and tools to fashion an equitable, safe and happy future for one and all.
However, today our very planet seems to be teetering on the brink of annihilation brought on by our self-centred, narrow-minded, and short-sighted pursuits.
In order to survive and prosper as a species, we need to pivot. If we really want to help this world heal, our business education needs to exercise its moral and fiduciary responsibility in teaching students to expand their consciousness and training them on how to live in this world. We need to learn to care for the web of life of which we are just a strand and be a blessing to one another."
Day 1: Evoke
Pankajam Sridevi Managing Director, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, India
Pankajam Sridevi is the Managing Director of Commonwealth Bank of Australia in India.
She has over 34 years of rich experience in diverse segments ranging from Manufacturing to Technology to Banking Domains.
Pankajam is passionate about building a Learning and Innovative Organization through continual Improvement & Transformation where employees build their careers and provide exemplary Customer Service.
She was also instrumental in implementing Machine Learning into critical processes like Sanctions Screening, Payments etc. after Human Centered Design of processes. This has yielded productivity of 20-30% on output and Improved Customer Service.
Pankajam is passionate about diversity at work place and keen to get women, persons with disability and LGBTI persons in the workplace.
She has grown a team to 3000+ and built leadership in just 2.5 years at CBA India during pandemic through virtual hiring and on boarding.
A winner of many awards herself, Pankajam has been conferred with prestigious honours such as NCPEDP Helen Keller Award for making a difference to communities, she has recently won the Woman CEO of the Year Award from GISR foundation in 2020, Iconic Leaders Creating a Better World for All Award at Women Economic Forum (WEF) Bangalore 2020, India's Top 30 Emerging Tech Leaders at the Intelligent Automation India 2020 and the most recent recipient of Top 10 Tech Women Leaders Award 2022.
Debarati Sen
President - 3M Construction & Home Improvement Markets Divison
Debarati Sen was appointed as President of 3M Construction & Home Improvement Markets Division in April 2022. This $2.6 Billion business serves key retailers across Home Centers, General Merchandise, Paint and Automotive stores across the world with industry leading brands such as FiltreteTM Home Filtration, CommandTM Home organization products, ScotchBlueTM Painters Tape among others.
Prior to her current role Debarati was the President of 3M’s Abrasives Systems Division from June 2019 to March 2022 leading 3M’s global abrasives franchise serving diverse industrial companies and associated sectors. In the past Debarati also led as Managing Director, 3M’s public entity in India and India Region from 2016 to 2019. Prior roles included Director, Corporate Sales, US Atlantic & Pacific Branch Operations, and Director, Global Oil & Gas from 2012 to 2015. Her career with 3M started in 1996 in Bengaluru, India.
Under her leadership from 2016-19, 3M India gained nationwide recognition at prestigious forums. The company was voted 2017 Business Standard Star MNC, 2017 Forbes India Super 50, and also featured in Outlook magazine’s ‘Nation Builders’ edition. On a personal level, she was inducted into Fortune India’s listing of 50 Most Powerful Women in business, 2018.
Over 24 years of Debarati’s career have been in 3M, covering regions in Asia and US, in various global, regional and country roles, driving marketing, sales and customer engagement, product development, business development, strategy as well as mergers and acquisitions.
She has also held the position of Vice President of Global Marketing – Equipment Protection Business at Pentair, Inc.
She is a passionate advocate for women’s rights and volunteers her time in addressing multiple issues like gender and racial equity, poverty alleviation, education and women’s empowerment. She is the Treasurer and Member, Board of Trustees for Women’s Foundation of Minnesota and has also served on the national governing board of Jeremiah Program, a Minnesota based national charity and on the board of United Way Bengaluru in the recent past. In 3M, she has served on the board of the 3M A3CTION (Asian Employee Resource Network), as well as held the post of Executive Member of 3M’s Women’s Leadership Forum.
During her India assignment, Debarati was the Co-Chair of the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) National Committee on Technology, as well as a member of the Karnataka State Council of CII.
Aarti Parmar
Certified Brand Strategist + Coach
Aarti Parmar is an award winning brand strategist, personal performance coach and designer who loves to educates and empower businesses owners to mindfully define their brand and use it with intent, joy, and impact. Resulting in them building a valued and meaningful brand.
With over 18 years’ experience working with solopreneurs and SMEs both in the UK and overseas. Aarti has empowered hundreds of business owners to steer their brand to lead with purpose, communicate with certainty and enjoy commercial growth.
She believes if a brand isn’t clear on the inside, it will not be clear on the outside!
Aarti accolades:
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Selected as Enterprise Nations Top Brand Adviser 2021
-
Listed as one of the top 100 female business leaders across the UK 2020 for ƒ:entrepreneur #iAlso100
-
Finalist in the Best Business Women Awards for customer service
-
Featured in both Forbes and Marie Claire.
Linked In https://www.linkedin.com/in/aartiparmar/
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/aarti.parmar/
Free weekly Bitesize Brand Tips newsletter - https://bit.ly/BitesizeBrandTips
Day 2: Navigate
Vasanthi Srinivasan
Professor of OB and HRM, Chair for Digital Learning at IIM - Bangalore.
Vasanthi Srinivasan is a professor of OB and HRM, and the Chair for Digital Learning at IIM - Bangalore. She has completed multiple research projects in the areas of generational cohorts, barriers for mid-career advancement for men and women, future ready leadership competencies and business responsibility. She has also authored several papers in national and international journals.
Vasanthi is currently on the Advisory board of the National Human Resource Development Network, Bangalore Chapter. She is also a member of the India Leadership Team of Globethics.net and is on the Board of Directors of Enable India and Fourth Wave Foundation. She is an Executive Committee Member of the International Society of Business, Economics & Ethics (ISBEE). She is on the working group on Business and human rights constituted by National Human Rights Commission of India.
Vasanthi’s research interests are Women on Boards, Business and Human Rights, and HRM in rapid growth contexts. She was awarded as a ‘Distinguished Alumnae of XLRI Jamshedpur’. Her Massive Open Online Course titled “People Management” on the Edx platform was recognized among the top 20 courses for soft skills in 2018 by Business Insider and among the top ten HRM courses by digitaldefynd.com.
Before joining IIMB, Vasanthi worked at Wipro Limited and a boutique consulting firm. She was the ICCR Chair Professor of Corporate Responsibility and Governance at the HHL School of Management, Leipzig, Germany (2012-2013) and a British Council Visiting Scholar at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at the Nottingham University Business School (2007).
Vasanthi did her Post Graduate Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur, and a Fellow in Management (Ph. D equivalent) from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.
Akhil Saxena
Vice President of Customer Fulfilment Operations, APAC, MENA & LATAM, Amazon
Akhil Saxena is the Vice President of Customer Fulfilment Operations, APAC, MENA & LATAM, Amazon and recently expanded his leadership role to add World Wide Customer Service. He joined Amazon in July 2013 as the Director of Operations for India and was responsible for fulfilment centre (FC) operations. He was tasked with developing the fulfilment strategy, building the operations team and expanding the India FC network, which has remarkably grown today. This rapid expansion of the network under Akhil’s leadership has been at the core of Amazon’s business growth in India.
In July 2014, his responsibilities expanded to managing the supply chain in India and in January 2016, he was assigned the additional responsibility for the transportation operations in India, including middle mile and sortation operations, last-mile (LM) delivery and third party carriers. He also led the growth of the last-mile (LM) delivery channel using variable models like the Delivery Service Partner program and the ‘I Have Space’ program. In 2019, Akhil was entrusted with the responsibility for the Operations business in Japan. Soon after, in 2020, his leadership extended beyond APAC to lead the fulfilment and delivery teams in LATAM and MENA as critical emerging regions for Amazon.
Prior to joining Amazon, Akhil was associated with an Indian conglomerate, RPG Enterprises for over 3 years as Sr. VP, Supply Chain running the supply chain function for their flagship company, KEC International. In this role, he ran manufacturing operations in India, Mexico and Brazil and was instrumental in setting up the Wind Energy business vertical. Prior to this, he worked for 19 years with Unilever across South Asia, managing manufacturing facilities,engineeringprojects, corporate quality and new product innovation deployment, Akhil holds a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from University of Kashmir. He is an amateur gardener, enjoys watching movies and spending time with his family, bonding over food and travel.
Irina Ghose
Chief Operations Officer,
Microsoft India
Irina Ghose is the Chief Operating Officer of Microsoft India, with the responsibility to drive end-to-end operations. Irina focuses on the go-to-market strategy for Microsoft Customer and Partner Solutions in India to deliver on core business parameters and create new growth engines for the future.
A Microsoft veteran of over two decades, Irina has held a variety of Strategy and Sales leadership roles across Enterprise, Solution Sales, Partner Solutions, and Education segments, focusing on Business management, Operations, Partnerships and New business initiatives. In her previous role as the leader of Cloud Solutions in India, she was focused on empowering Cloud Transformation by engaging with customers and partners to envision and architect their digital growth strategy.
She is an Electrical Engineer from IIT BHU and an MBA from XLRI. A proponent of Women in Business and Technology, she is a recipient of the ‘Inspirational Women’s Award’ at Microsoft and 'Distinguished Alumnus Award' from IIT BHU. Besides being a marathon runner and a music lover, she’s a strong champion of Diversity & Inclusion in. She is the founder of ‘MyLittleBit’, a philanthropic foundation, focusing on education and jobs for underprivileged girls. She’s also actively engaged with startups with ‘Microsoft for Startups’ and as a Trustee of SonderConnect, a foundation for women entrepreneurs.
Prerana Issar
Former Chief People Officer, UK's National Health Service
For the last three years, Prerana Issar has been the Chief People Officer for the 1.4 million employees of the UK’s National Health Service.
She has 25 years of leadership experience across multiple sectors.
- in the private sector: 16 years at consumer goods giant Unilever
- in the multilateral and development sector : 6 years in the executive team of the (Nobel Peace Prize winning) United Nations World Food Programme, where she traveled to more than 40 countries affected by conflict and famine to support frontline staff.
- in the public and government sector: as the Chief People Officer of the NHS, one of the biggest and most complex people roles in Human Resources in any sector globally.
Prerana’s TedX talk on “The Power of Purpose” is one of the most widely viewed in healthcare. Prerana features as a case study in a book by Nick Craig (5 June 2018). “Leading from Purpose: Clarity and the confidence to act when it matters most.” Hachette Books.
Prerana interacted with over 110,000 people who work for the NHS during the pandemic in her role as the lead for the healthcare workforce response to COVID-19 for England. This has involved in person time with people in hospitals, clinics and vaccination centres, virtual listening and engagement events with staff, managers and leaders, and she regularly speaks at national events in the UK. She is the first ever leader from a minority ethnic background to be a national leader in the NHS since it’s inception.
Day 3: Amplify
Manisha Lath Gupta
Marketer, an Entrepreneur and a Sustainability/ Permaculture expert
Manisha runs ‘Aanandaa’ full time, managing the farm, doing workshops and building a home. She also spends a lot of time processing the food she grows into pickles and preserves!
Manisha’s career journey has been a truly unique one. She started her career with Unilever in India as a Management Trainee and spent 8 years (1997-2004) across different roles with the company. She then spent six years (2004-2010) across two different roles at Colgate Palmolive. In 2010, she transitioned to the banking industry as the EVP & Chief Marketing Officer at Axis Bank and repositioned the brand with the campaign Badhti ka Naam Zindagi based on the consumer insight of a ‘desire for continued growth’.
In 2014, Manisha took a year off to work with a political alternative which she believed the country needed badly. She continues to support their effort from behind the scenes, through fundraising, outreach and marketing strategy. In the same year, Manisha turned full time entrepreneur, with her start-up venture IndianArtCollectors.com an e-commerce portal for original Indian contemporary art, which she had founded in 2005. It continues to be the largest online platform for Indian contemporary art, now called Mojarto.
Manisha is passionate about investing back in our planet, building a natural habitat for ourselves & the community, and also being self-sufficient from a water and food perspective. Her organisation - ‘Aanandaa Permaculture’ aims to create awareness and impact on the planet through sustainable farming and healthier homes through earth architecture. Her journey of how she and her family transformed a degraded piece of land into a lush green food forest, is an inspirational one. Manisha is a certified Permaculture teacher and does regular workshops at her farm.
Manisha is an alumnus of IIM Bangalore (1997) and holds a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She likes to sing and takes singing classes every weekend. She is married to Agam, a career banker and they have two amazing daughters.
Shilpa Ajwani
Strategy Consultant & Leadership Advisor;
Founder and CEO - Unomantra
Shilpa Ajwani is the Founder & CEO of Unomantra, a Business Strategy Consulting & Leadership Advisory Firm that enables Consumer and Lifestyle Businesses to thrive by aligning strategy with purpose. She is passionate about creating iconic brands, leaders, communities and organisations using this unique “Purpositioning” approach.
She has also founded SHEmantra, a community of women Founders in the Coaching & Consulting domain.
Shilpa has had an illustrious career of over 25 years with reputed MNCs and has earned a rock-solid reputation as a transformative leader. Among the many accolades that she has won was CEO of the year 2017 confered by the Economic Times Polymer Awards while she was leading Tupperware India as the Managing Director.
She actively supports impact initiatives in creating inclusive workspaces, unleash entrepreneurial zeal especially in women and promote growth of communities that help to make our world a better place. She’s a much sought after Speaker, Panelist, Mentor and Advisory Board Member for Start-ups.
Madhura DasGupta
Founder
Aspire for Her
Madhura DasGupta is the Founder & CEO of Aspire For Her, a unique start-up to motivate young women to enter and stay in the workforce. Madhura has been a banker for the last 25 years – holding leadership positions in IDFC, Standard Chartered and ANZ Grindlays Bank, after an MBA from XLRI and Electrical Engineering from Jadavpur University. Madhura was one of the 12 women across India to be awarded the British Chevening Scholarship in 2003.
Since its birth on Women’s Day, 2020, the rapidly-growing community at Aspire For Her has become a movement for women, in India and across the world, getting together members, supporters and mentors to unleash the trillion dollar potential in the Indian economy. Madhura’s work has been covered widely in the media including CNBC, NDTV, BBC, The Times Of India, New Indian Express etc. Aspire For Her has been honoured by awards from UN Women and International Advertising Association.
Apurva Purohit
Co-Founder Aazol; Independent Director; Author - Lady, You're the Boss and Lady, You're not a Man
Apurva Purohit is an Indian Businesswoman with over three decades of experience in the corporate world where she formed significant partnerships with private equity firms and promoters to build and scale up a diverse set of businesses - from early stage fledgling businesses, to setting up new ventures and to supervising turnarounds in mature and declining organisations.
Apurva has recently launched Aazol Ventures Pvt Ltd, a consumer products company which aims to create a market for traditional food items made by self-help groups and micro entrepreneurs, by reconnecting Indian consumers with their roots and the local foods of their regions.
She is also an Independent director at Mindtree Ltd, L&T Technology services Ltd and Navin Fluorine International Ltd and Marico Limited.
Apurva has been a leading voice in the Indian business landscape advocating gender diversity, what ails it, and what organisations and leaders can do to improve this critical imperative. She is also the author of the two national bestselling books “Lady, You’re not a Man” – the Adventures of a Woman at Work and Lady, You’re the Boss! Through her books, Apurva aims to empower women and encourage them to achieve their full potential.
Over the years, Apurva has won multiple business awards and has been named as one of the Most Powerful Women in Business as per the India Today Group and Fortune India She was amongst LinkedIn’s Top Voices and YourStory’s Top 10 digital Influencers of 2020 and recently won the Distinguished Alumni award from her alma mater IIM Bangalore in 2022.
Apurva holds a bachelor’s degree in physics and completed her PGDM from IIM- Bangalore. She was a state-level hockey player and played for Tamil Nadu State and Tamil Nadu University.
Speakers
April-May 2022
Day 1: Evoke
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Renuka Ramnath
Founder, MD and CEO at Multiples Alternate Asset Management
Ms. Renuka Ramnath is the Founder, Managing Director and CEO of Multiples Alternate Asset Management, a private equity manager and advisor to funds of ~ USD 1.7 bn. She has over 30 years of experience in the Indian financial sector across private equity, investment banking and structured finance. For close to three decades in financial services, Renuka successfully built several businesses in the ICICI Group including Investment Banking, e-commerce and private equity. As the MD & CEO of ICICI Venture for close to a decade, she led that firm to become one of the largest private equity funds in India.
Renuka is an avid champion for the industry to open up alternate assets to both domestic and international investors. She draws motivation from the fact that supporting entrepreneurs to build sustainable businesses, has the potential to generate employment, to create ripple effects in the Indian economy and to facilitate the greater process of nation building. As a woman leader, she is also dedicated to promoting gender diversity.
Renuka is a Board member of GPCA, the global industry association for private capital. Renuka was the chairperson of the Executive Committee of Indian Venture Capital Association 2020-2022. Under her leadership, she led many critical engagements with the Government successfully, pioneered the Maximum India Conclave to focus on India as the PE/VC destination for international LPs and shone light on the power of capital beyond profits on areas such as gender diversity, jobs and impact.
Renuka has been featured in many prestigious listings, including the Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Business (Business Today, India); India's most Powerful CEO's (Economic Times), the Top 25 Non Bank Women in Finance (US Banker's global list), Asia's Women in the Mix: The Year's Top 50 for Achievement in Business (Forbes), Top 25 women in Asian asset management (Asian Investor) and has been awarded
the AVCJ Special Achievement Award, 2019.
Debarati Sen
President - 3M Construction & Home Improvement Markets Divison
Debarati Sen was appointed as President of 3M Construction & Home Improvement Markets Division in April 2022. This $2.6 Billion business serves key retailers across Home Centers, General Merchandise, Paint and Automotive stores across the world with industry leading brands such as FiltreteTM Home Filtration, CommandTM Home organization products, ScotchBlueTM Painters Tape among others.
Prior to her current role Debarati was the President of 3M’s Abrasives Systems Division from June 2019 to March 2022 leading 3M’s global abrasives franchise serving diverse industrial companies and associated sectors. In the past Debarati also led as Managing Director, 3M’s public entity in India and India Region from 2016 to 2019. Prior roles included Director, Corporate Sales, US Atlantic & Pacific Branch Operations, and Director, Global Oil & Gas from 2012 to 2015. Her career with 3M started in 1996 in Bengaluru, India.
Under her leadership from 2016-19, 3M India gained nationwide recognition at prestigious forums. The company was voted 2017 Business Standard Star MNC, 2017 Forbes India Super 50, and also featured in Outlook magazine’s ‘Nation Builders’ edition. On a personal level, she was inducted into Fortune India’s listing of 50 Most Powerful Women in business, 2018.
Over 24 years of Debarati’s career have been in 3M, covering regions in Asia and US, in various global, regional and country roles, driving marketing, sales and customer engagement, product development, business development, strategy as well as mergers and acquisitions.
She has also held the position of Vice President of Global Marketing – Equipment Protection Business at Pentair, Inc.
She is a passionate advocate for women’s rights and volunteers her time in addressing multiple issues like gender and racial equity, poverty alleviation, education and women’s empowerment. She is the Treasurer and Member, Board of Trustees for Women’s Foundation of Minnesota and has also served on the national governing board of Jeremiah Program, a Minnesota based national charity and on the board of United Way Bengaluru in the recent past. In 3M, she has served on the board of the 3M A3CTION (Asian Employee Resource Network), as well as held the post of Executive Member of 3M’s Women’s Leadership Forum.
During her India assignment, Debarati was the Co-Chair of the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) National Committee on Technology, as well as a member of the Karnataka State Council of CII.
Aarti Parmar
Certified Brand Strategist + Coach
Aarti Parmar is an award winning brand strategist, personal performance coach and designer who loves to educates and empower businesses owners to mindfully define their brand and use it with intent, joy, and impact. Resulting in them building a valued and meaningful brand.
With over 18 years’ experience working with solopreneurs and SMEs both in the UK and overseas. Aarti has empowered hundreds of business owners to steer their brand to lead with purpose, communicate with certainty and enjoy commercial growth.
She believes if a brand isn’t clear on the inside, it will not be clear on the outside!
Aarti accolades:
-
Selected as Enterprise Nations Top Brand Adviser 2021
-
Listed as one of the top 100 female business leaders across the UK 2020 for ƒ:entrepreneur #iAlso100
-
Finalist in the Best Business Women Awards for customer service
-
Featured in both Forbes and Marie Claire.
Linked In https://www.linkedin.com/in/aartiparmar/
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/aarti.parmar/
Free weekly Bitesize Brand Tips newsletter - https://bit.ly/BitesizeBrandTips
Day 2: Navigate
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Shalini Kapoor
IBM Fellow - AI Apps
CTO - Environment Intelligence Suite
Shalini is an IBM Fellow and CTO leading AI. Shalini is a technology strategist with 25 years of work experience and has led roles in client and partner facing organizations, software development labs & research labs resulting in significant business impacts and accomplished technical innovations. Currently she drives research, strategy, and development to maximize the infusion of AI across AI Applications solutions of supply chain, asset management, facilities management, climate risk, sustainability and engineering lifecycle.
Shalini is a widely acclaimed speaker at various industry forums and has received several awards including, Emerging Women Achiever's award from CII , Zinnov Technical Role Model award, Woman in Technology award from eMERG, , SPJIMR Alumni Award, AACSB Influential Leader 2022. She has 15 patents and you can catch her views on AI by listening to her podcast called ‘AI Infusion’ where she invites several guest speakers.
Suparna Mitra
Chief Executive Officer, Watches and Wearables Division, Titan Company Limited.
Suparna is the CEO of the Watches and Wearables Division of Titan Company Limited. She has extensive business experience, mainly in the lifestyle / retail marketing area.
Suparna started her career as a management trainee in Hindustan Lever Limited. Subsequently she joined Titan where she worked on several roles in marketing, both International and Domestic. Her next stint was at Talisma Corp. as a Director – Product Marketing after which she moved on to become Business Head – Lee in Arvind Brands Ltd.
Suparna rejoined Titan and became the Global Marketing Head, where she was responsible for all marketing in India and international markets. Her next role was Regional Business Head - South in Titan, heading all businesses of the company including watches, jewellery and eyewear for the South region. Suparna’s previous assignment before she was promoted into her current role, was as the Chief Sales and Marketing Officer for the Watches and Wearables division.
Suparna is an electrical engineer from Jadavpur University and an MBA from IIM, Calcutta. She is married and has two daughters aged 22 and 15. Suparna is an avid reader and has a passion for travelling.
Sanjay Gupta
Country Manager and Vice President,
Google India
With a career spanning nearly three decades, Sanjay joined Google India as Country Manager
and Vice President earlier this year, and is responsible for driving sales and operations in India.
He joined Google from Star and Disney India where he was the Managing Director. During that
time, he played a pivotal role in Star becoming the largest media company in India. Sanjay
played an instrumental role in extending their traditional television content to digital consumers
through Hotstar. He is also widely credited for building their sports business via the acquisition
of marquee cricketing properties and launch of the hugely popular kabaddi and football leagues:
Pro Kabaddi League and Indian Super League.
Apart from his numerous strategic and business wins, Sanjay also has deep consumer
understanding and has used it to build strong brands. During his time at Hindustan Unilever he
led marketing for two of the company's critical segments: Oral and Home care. Then at Bharti
Airtel as Chief Marketing Officer for the mobile business, he spearheaded several successful
sales and marketing initiatives. Sanjay is a post graduate from the Indian Institute of
Management (IIM) Kolkata, and is an engineer from Delhi College of Engineering.
Vasanthi Srinivasan
Professor of OB and HRM, Chair for Digital Learning at IIM - Bangalore.
Vasanthi Srinivasan is a professor of OB and HRM, and the Chair for Digital Learning at IIM - Bangalore. She has completed multiple research projects in the areas of generational cohorts, barriers for mid-career advancement for men and women, future ready leadership competencies and business responsibility. She has also authored several papers in national and international journals.
Vasanthi is currently on the Advisory board of the National Human Resource Development Network, Bangalore Chapter. She is also a member of the India Leadership Team of Globethics.net and is on the Board of Directors of Enable India and Fourth Wave Foundation. She is an Executive Committee Member of the International Society of Business, Economics & Ethics (ISBEE). She is on the working group on Business and human rights constituted by National Human Rights Commission of India.
Vasanthi’s research interests are Women on Boards, Business and Human Rights, and HRM in rapid growth contexts. She was awarded as a ‘Distinguished Alumnae of XLRI Jamshedpur’. Her Massive Open Online Course titled “People Management” on the Edx platform was recognized among the top 20 courses for soft skills in 2018 by Business Insider and among the top ten HRM courses by digitaldefynd.com.
Before joining IIMB, Vasanthi worked at Wipro Limited and a boutique consulting firm. She was the ICCR Chair Professor of Corporate Responsibility and Governance at the HHL School of Management, Leipzig, Germany (2012-2013) and a British Council Visiting Scholar at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at the Nottingham University Business School (2007).
Vasanthi did her Post Graduate Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur, and a Fellow in Management (Ph. D equivalent) from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.
Pankajam Sridevi Managing Director, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, India
Pankajam Sridevi is the Managing Director of Commonwealth Bank of Australia in India.
She has over 34 years of rich experience in diverse segments ranging from Manufacturing to Technology to Banking Domains. Pankajam is passionate about building a Learning and Innovative Organization through continual Improvement & Transformation where employees build their careers and provide exemplary Customer Service.
She was also instrumental in implementing Machine Learning into critical processes like Sanctions Screening, Payments etc. after Human Centered Design of processes. This has yielded productivity of 20-30% on output and Improved Customer Service.
Pankajam is passionate about diversity at work place and keen to get women, persons with disability and LGBTQIA+ persons in the workplace. She has grown a team to 2500 and built leadership in just 2 years at CBA India during a pandemic through virtual hiring and on boarding.
A winner of many awards herself, Pankajam has been conferred with prestigious honours such as NCPEDP Helen Keller Award for making a difference to communities and she has recently won the Woman CEO of the Year from GISR foundation in 2020, Iconic Leaders Creating a Better World for All Award at the Women Economic Forum (WEF) Bangalore 2020 and the most recent recipient of India's Top 30 Emerging Tech Leaders at Intelligent Automation India 2020.
Day 3: Amplify
Bindu Vinodhan
Founder, TILLT & Mauna Dhwani Foundation
Bindu Vinodhan is an International Coach Federation certified executive coach and an HR professional with two decades of experience in Learning and Development. She was Global Head- Learning and Development, at WNS Global Services in her last assignment. In her previous assignments' she handled ‘Organizational Effectiveness and Change’ and ‘Organizational Learning and Development for companies like Vodafone, Hewlett Packard and Bank of America where she was instrumental in designing and developing capability solutions for next-generation leaders.
Bindu founded ‘TILLT’ (The Institute of Leadership Learning and Transformation) an organization that is aimed at bringing about high impact transformation in the corporate as well as social realms. In the corporate arena, she works closely with senior leadership teams to enable visioning and transformation for the future. Her core areas of consultation are in the area of senior leadership vision, leadership transformation, executive presence, business storytelling for sales, marketing and inspirational leaders, women leader empowerment and coaching on global leadership.
In the social sector Bindu designs and facilitates leadership transformation interventions for women survivors of trafficking, rape and domestic violence to provide them with entrepreneurial skills that enable them to integrate back into society.
Bindu holds a Bachelors Degree in Engineering, specializing in Electronics and Telecom; and a Masters Degree in Education, specializing in Learning Technology from Oxford University. She is trained and certified on high impact business presentation skills, executive presence and business storytelling from Cranfield University and in High Stake Negotiations from Harvard Law School. She also delivers guest lectures at Oxford on the subject ‘Applications of Learning Technology at the Workplace’ and has been doing that consecutively for the last 5 years.
Manisha Lath Gupta
Marketer, an Entrepreneur and a Sustainability/ Permaculture expert
Manisha runs ‘Aanandaa’ full time, managing the farm, doing workshops and building a home. She also spends a lot of time processing the food she grows into pickles and preserves!
Manisha’s career journey has been a truly unique one. She started her career with Unilever in India as a Management Trainee and spent 8 years (1997-2004) across different roles with the company. She then spent six years (2004-2010) across two different roles at Colgate Palmolive. In 2010, she transitioned to the banking industry as the EVP & Chief Marketing Officer at Axis Bank and repositioned the brand with the campaign Badhti ka Naam Zindagi based on the consumer insight of a ‘desire for continued growth’.
In 2014, Manisha took a year off to work with a political alternative which she believed the country needed badly. She continues to support their effort from behind the scenes, through fundraising, outreach and marketing strategy. In the same year, Manisha turned full time entrepreneur, with her start-up venture IndianArtCollectors.com an e-commerce portal for original Indian contemporary art, which she had founded in 2005. It continues to be the largest online platform for Indian contemporary art, now called Mojarto.
Manisha is passionate about investing back in our planet, building a natural habitat for ourselves & the community, and also being self-sufficient from a water and food perspective. Her organisation - ‘Aanandaa Permaculture’ aims to create awareness and impact on the planet through sustainable farming and healthier homes through earth architecture. Her journey of how she and her family transformed a degraded piece of land into a lush green food forest, is an inspirational one. Manisha is a certified Permaculture teacher and does regular workshops at her farm.
Manisha is an alumnus of IIM Bangalore (1997) and holds a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She likes to sing and takes singing classes every weekend. She is married to Agam, a career banker and they have two amazing daughters.
Prerana Issar
Former Chief People Officer, UK's National Health Service
For the last three years, Prerana Issar has been the Chief People Officer for the 1.4 million employees of the UK’s National Health Service.
She has 25 years of leadership experience across multiple sectors.
- in the private sector: 16 years at consumer goods giant Unilever
- in the multilateral and development sector : 6 years in the executive team of the (Nobel Peace Prize winning) United Nations World Food Programme, where she traveled to more than 40 countries affected by conflict and famine to support frontline staff.
- in the public and government sector: as the Chief People Officer of the NHS, one of the biggest and most complex people roles in Human Resources in any sector globally.
Prerana’s TedX talk on “The Power of Purpose” is one of the most widely viewed in healthcare. Prerana features as a case study in a book by Nick Craig (5 June 2018). “Leading from Purpose: Clarity and the confidence to act when it matters most.” Hachette Books.
Prerana interacted with over 110,000 people who work for the NHS during the pandemic in her role as the lead for the healthcare workforce response to COVID-19 for England. This has involved in person time with people in hospitals, clinics and vaccination centres, virtual listening and engagement events with staff, managers and leaders, and she regularly speaks at national events in the UK. She is the first ever leader from a minority ethnic background to be a national leader in the NHS since it’s inception.
Arundathi Bhattacharya
Chairperson and CEO, Salesforce India Service
Arundhati Bhattacharya is the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer for Salesforce, India. In her role, Arundhati oversees the growth strategy of the company and plays an integral role in defining Salesforce’s relationship with the ecosystem of customers, partners and community across India.
Prior to Salesforce, Arundhati Bhattacharya was the first woman chairperson at the State Bank of India (SBI), where she was credited with ushering in the digital transformation era at the company. Under her leadership, SBI went on to be voted as one of India's top 3 Best Places to work in India.
With 40+ years of rich experience in India's financial sector working across varied roles and diverse national & international locations; Arundhati has also earned a string of accolades to her name, most notably -- "The World's 100 Most Powerful Women" by Forbes, “Top 50 globally most powerful women in business” and “World’s 50 Greatest Leaders" list by Fortune.
Speakers 2021
Day 1: Evoke
Leena Nair - Chief Human Resources Officer Unilever
Leena Nair is the first female, first Asian and youngest ever CHRO of Unilever
and member of the Unilever Leadership Executive (ULE). She bears overall responsibility for the 150,000-strong human capital of Unilever, which operates across multiple regulatory and labour environments spread over 190 countries.
Under her leadership Unilever has achieved a 50/50 gender balance across global leadership, through the design and implementation of progressive new working practices and models. She has continued to lead a pioneering agenda and play an instrumental role in launching Unilever’s new social commitments, which are focused on raising living standards across the value chain, creating opportunities through inclusivity, and preparing people for the future of work.
Leena began her Unilever career in Hindustan Unilever, where she was appointed as the first woman on the Unilever South Asia Leadership team. She has continued to redefine how big business can contribute to the environment and society, and has a reputation for putting the people at the heart of the business, driving growth and innovation to create better business and a better society.
Recognised by HRH Queen Elizabeth II as one of the accomplished Indian Business Leaders in the UK, Leena is a trustee for the Leverhulme Trust where her purpose is to “ignite the human spark for a better business and better world”. Leena also holds key external positions on committees and boards that aim to advance women’s issues and workplace equality. She was also voted Global Indian of the Year in The Economic Times (2020).
Leena’s husband Kumar runs his own financial services business in Mumbai and they have two teenage sons. Amidst her work and external engagements Leena makes time for her passions - cooking, running, cycling, theatre and Bollywood dancing!
Usha Uthup - Internationally Acclaimed Singer
For over 50 years now Usha Uthup (fondly called ‘Didi’) has spread a message of love and unity, peace and harmony, tolerance and integrity, and happiness - through music. From discotheques to concerts across India and the World, she has addressed the youth about the values of music that makes us human. She lives as she believes, presenting even the most contemporary songs dressed in traditional attire projecting the fact that India is a true melting pot of world cultures with its own distinctive cultural identity.
Usha’s career began in 1969 at a Chennai nightclub and since then she has recorded more than 100 albums. She sings in 17 Indian and 8 Foreign languages. Usha has served as a shining example for generations of young Indians and has been an unwavering ambassador for traditional Indian values. Her Kanjeevaram sarees, fresh flowers in her hair, and her beaming smile have won her many fans.
Usha's melody speaks a universal language and transcends religion, race, nationality, and caste. She has given people in far-flung cultures an unexpected image of an Indian woman: strong, independent, humorous, intelligent, and loaded with talent.
In addition to spreading joy and love through her music, Usha also gives back in multiple ways - through her contributions to bring together communities of the world, through music. Her compassion is visible in the many charities and women’s NGOs she supports and works with. Her work and her life touches and impacts many others - making her a quintessential role model for humanity, joy, peace, and love.
Debarati Sen - President, 3M Abrasives Systems Division
Debarati’s career with 3M started in 1996 in Bengaluru, India. During the last 25 years, she has served in a number of roles including the role of Managing Director, 3M India Region, leading 3M’s public entity in India and India Region. Under her leadership from 2016-19, 3M India gained nationwide recognition at prestigious forums. The company was voted 2017 Business Standard Star MNC, 2017 Forbes India Super 50, and also featured in Outlook magazine’s ‘Nation Builders’ edition. On a personal level, she was inducted into Fortune India’s listing of 50 Most Powerful Women in business, 2018.
Debarati is a passionate advocate for women’s rights and volunteers her time in addressing multiple issues like gender and racial equity, poverty alleviation, education, and women’s empowerment. In 3M, she has served on the board of the 3M A3CTION (Asian Employee Resource Network), as well as held the post of Executive Member of 3M’s Women’s Leadership Forum.
During her India assignment, Debarati was the Co-Chair of the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) National Committee on Technology, as well as a member of the Karnataka State Council of CII.
Debarati holds a BS/BE in Electronics Engineering, as well as an MBA in Marketing & Finance from XLRI, Jamshedpur.
Activity Facilitator
Chetana Pai - Design and Interactive Technology, Universiteit Twente
Chetana Pai works and most engages with movement, music, human interaction, art, and the potential that exists when combining these fields. In addition to this, she enjoys experimenting with and combining various creative mediums - visual, performance, musical, and otherwise.
Chetana is passionate about bringing together communities in order to visualize, articulate, and share their thoughts and reflections. She designs new and innovative ways to facilitate creative making for groups of people and has held multiple Zine Workshops. Her Zine workshops explore a variety of topics including Purpose, Growth, Personal Identity, Taking Up Space, and more. Her work finds space in conferences, student seminars, and community settings.
Chetana runs a monthly zine club for ‘Zinedabaad’, a zine collective that is currently based on Instagram (@zinedabaad) and aims to foster safe community spaces for zine-making together. Currently, she is working on a format called cha4os talks where different experts and researchers come in to present their work as inspiration for people to reflect on their lives, the connection to or lack of research, and the content they learn itself. All the zine workshops have no barrier to entry and are meant for anyone who wants to explore themselves and the world via a new medium.
Chetana is originally from Bangalore and did her Bachelor’s in Computer Science and Entrepreneurship at Ashoka University.
Anchors
Ajay MK - HR Director: Colgate Palmolive (APAC Region)
Ajay has over 22 years of experience and currently serves as the HR Director for Colgate Palmolive’s Asia Pacific region, leading HR across 22 countries, including China, India, Australia, New Zealand, and the ASEAN countries.
His earlier roles at Colgate included Executive Vice President – HR for India & South Asia, Global HR Director for IT and Business Services based in New York, and the HR Director for Colgate Palmolive Malaysia, Singapore & Brunei.
Ajay is also an award-winning poet and has been an invited writer at many national and international literary festivals. His works have been translated and published in Hindi, German, Polish, Hungarian, Greek, Slovakian, Russian, Vietnamese, and Serbian. He is also a certified trainer of Compassion-Based Resilience Training by the Nalanda Institute for Contemplative Science.
Ajay holds an M.A (Psychology) degree from Annamalai University and a Postgraduate Diploma in Personnel Management & Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur.
He is married to Lakshmi, who is also an XLer, and they have two lovely daughters.
Diya Kapur Misra -
Leadership Advisor, Facilitator, and Coach
Anchor for all 3 days
Diya Kapur Misra is a leadership advisor, facilitator, and coach, with over twenty years of rich consulting as well as business HR experience. For the past five years, she has worked as an independent professional and has also collaborated with other experts and boutique firms such as Dr. Linda Hill of Harvard Business School and Paradox Strategies, and The River Group LLC.
Before striving out on her own, Diya held a number of impactful roles across Hindustan Unilever, Hewitt, Cadbury/Kraft Foods, and Korn Ferry. This enables her to quickly get under the skin of the businesses she works with, to create high impact for client organizations and a transformational experience for leaders.
Diya advises businesses across industries on their leadership and talent priorities, and partners with their management teams to develop themselves. Her areas of expertise are executive development, top team effectiveness, succession, high potential identification and development, talent assessment, and talent management. Diya enjoys working with start-ups, founders, and leaders of small and medium enterprises, where she can make a significant impact. Her focus is to enable them to create innovative and scalable organizations by developing themselves as leaders and establishing an effective structure, the right culture, and a high-quality leadership pipeline.
In 2018, Diya led a research study with The River Group, on founder-led businesses in India, and co-authored a paper titled, ‘Multiply Yourself - how Indian founders learn to let go and grow their business'.
Diya is passionate about coaching individuals to realize their potential and has a special drive to support women leaders in their journey to develop themselves and enhance their impact. She has been the Program Lead on Up! SURGE, to inspire, prepare and support women leaders to reach the top.
Diya is a double gold medallist from XLRI Jamshedpur, and an Economics (honors) graduate from Delhi University. She is a budding writer, an avid singer, and a theatre and yoga, enthusiast. Diya is married to Punit, who is also an XLer, and they have two wonderful daughters, who are fourteen and seven.
Day 2: Navigate
Vasanthi Srinivasan -Professor, Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore
Vasanthi Srinivasan is a professor of OB and HRM, and the Chair for Digital Learning at IIM - Bangalore. She has completed multiple research projects in the areas of generational cohorts, barriers for mid-career advancement for men and women, future ready leadership competencies and business responsibility. She has also authored several papers in national and international journals.
Vasanthi is currently on the Advisory board of the National Human Resource Development Network, Bangalore Chapter. She is also a member of the India Leadership Team of Globethics.net and is on the Board of Directors of Enable India and Fourth Wave Foundation. She is an Executive Committee Member of the International Society of Business, Economics & Ethics (ISBEE). She is on the working group on Business and human rights constituted by National Human Rights Commission of India.
Vasanthi’s research interests are Women on Boards, Business and Human Rights, and HRM in rapid growth contexts. She was awarded as a ‘Distinguished Alumnae of XLRI Jamshedpur’. Her Massive Open Online Course titled “People Management” on the Edx platform was recognized among the top 20 courses for soft skills in 2018 by Business Insider and among the top ten HRM courses by digitaldefynd.com.
Before joining IIMB, Vasanthi worked at Wipro Limited and a boutique consulting firm. She was the ICCR Chair Professor of Corporate Responsibility and Governance at the HHL School of Management, Leipzig, Germany (2012-2013) and a British Council Visiting Scholar at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at the Nottingham University Business School (2007).
Vasanthi did her Post Graduate Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur, and a Fellow in Management (Ph. D equivalent) from the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.
Suparna Mitra
- CEO, Watches and Wearables Division, Titan Company Limited
Suparna is the CEO of the Watches and Wearables Division of Titan Company Limited. She has extensive business experience, mainly in the lifestyle / retail marketing area.
Suparna started her career as a management trainee in Hindustan Lever Limited. Subsequently she joined Titan where she worked on several roles in marketing, both International and Domestic. Her next stint was at Talisma Corp. as a Director – Product Marketing after which she moved on to become Business Head – Lee in Arvind Brands Ltd.
Suparna rejoined Titan and became the Global Marketing Head, where she was responsible for all marketing in India and international markets. Her next role was Regional Business Head - South in Titan, heading all businesses of the company including watches, jewellery and eyewear for the South region. Suparna’s previous assignment before she was promoted into her current role, was as the Chief Sales and Marketing Officer for the Watches and Wearables division.
Suparna is an electrical engineer from Jadavpur University and an MBA from IIM, Calcutta. She is married and has two daughters aged 22 and 15. Suparna is an avid reader and has a passion for travelling.
Shalini Kapoor
- IBM Fellow, Director: AI Applications, IBM India
As an IBM Fellow, Shalini Kapoor drives research, strategy, and development to maximize the infusion of AI. She is leading IBM’s AI market-leading capabilities, driving consistent, reusable implementation patterns, business transformation and value, thereby making AI accessible and useable to business users, and not only data scientists. Shalini leads innovative and engaging programs to enhance AI skills and adoption within Cognitive Applications and across the Indian Software Labs.
With 23+ years of experience, Shalini has worked with many clients, Global System Integrators, ecosystem partners, and Academia while incubating several next-gen solutions in Internet of Things and AI. She is the technical leader for large Cloud deals for the public sector in India/SA impacting millions of citizens.
Shalini is a torchbearer of Good tech projects in India focusing on STEM and AI for women and the underprivileged, working with schools, universities, government and industry leaders. She has 14 patents and is a prolific speaker in academia and various industry forums.
Shalini is passionate about yoga, and has been learning Kathak for the past two years! She lives in Bangalore with her husband, Rajeev. They have two teenage sons.
Samit Ghosh
- Founder, Ujjivan Small Finance Bank & Ujjivan Financial Services Ltd.
Samit Ghosh is the Founder of Ujjivan Small Finance Bank (UFSB). He served as the Bank’s Managing Director and CEO till his retirement in November 2019. Currently he is the Chairman of the Board of Ujjivan Financial Services Ltd., the holding company of UFSB. Samitg founded Ujjivan Financial Services Ltd. as a pioneering NBFC microfinance institution in 2005 and successfully launched Ujjivan Small Finance Bank in 2017. Ujjivan Bank serves over 5 million customers across 24 states & union territories through 570+ banking outlets with staff strength of over 18,000 employees.
Prior to Ujjivan, Samit was a career banker for over 30 years. He started his career with Citibank in 1975 and was part of the management team to set up retail banking in India in 1985. He worked for Arab Bank plc in Bahrain from 1980-85 in investment banking. He also led the launch of retail banking for Standard Chartered Bank in Middle East & South Asia and HDFC Bank. His last commercial banking assignment was as the Chief Executive of Bank Muscat in India.
Samit has played a very active role in the evolution of microfinance, development of Small Finance Banks and overall financial inclusion in India. He was on the board for eight years of Women’s World Banking (WWB) headquartered in New York (2011-19). Established in the 70s by outstanding women leaders like Ela Bhatt, the organization was built for promoting women empowerment & financial inclusion across the world. Samit’s association with WWB continues, and he is also an active board member of Parinaam Foundation. Samit is currently a Partner of Nudge Foundation and mentor to a number of high potential start-up NGOs in diverse fields of education, social emotional enterprise & leadership development.
Samit completed his BA from Jadavpur University, Kolkata in 1970. He graduated with an MBA in Finance from The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania in 1974.
Anjali Singh -
MD, Corporate Bank Operations, Deutsche Bank
Anjali Singh has been with Deutsche Bank for the past 18 months and heads Corporate Banking Operations. She has more than 25 years of work experience, mostly in Financial Services, spanning different roles in Operations, Account Management, Strategy and Business.
Prior to joining DB she was the Global COO for Banking and Capital Markets at Genpact. She managed a global portfolio for all delivery across Business Processes, Analytics and Digital Services. She was responsible for all banking clients and led a team of 20,000 people spread across the global delivery centers of Genpact. Prior to this, Anjali has worked for American Express and FIS.
Anjali has an inherent passion for developing and sponsoring women leaders and promoting gender diversity. She is part of many Women Leadership forums and organizations and an active participant in this domain. She mentors women both in and outside the companies she has worked for. She is also the National President for the Banking & Credit Council of Womens Indian Chamber of Industry and Commerce (WICCI). The Banking Council drives many programs to enable financial empowerment and independence of women across Investment Advice, Lending and Funding.
Anjali is a post graduate from Delhi University and enjoys reading, writing and traveling in her free time. She is married and has a 22 year old son who also works in Financial Services. Her biggest motto in life is to keep challenging oneself, stay curious and keep learning. Anjali shares her thoughts on her Wordpress blog - “welivenwelearn”.
Pankajam Sridevi - Managing Director, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (India)
Pankajam Sridevi is the Managing Director of Commonwealth Bank of Australia in India.
She has over 34 years of rich experience in diverse segments ranging from Manufacturing to Technology to Banking Domains. Pankajam is passionate about building a Learning and Innovative Organization through continual Improvement & Transformation where employees build their careers and provide exemplary Customer Service.
She was also instrumental in implementing Machine Learning into critical processes like Sanctions Screening, Payments etc. after Human Centered Design of processes. This has yielded productivity of 20-30% on output and Improved Customer Service.
Pankajam is passionate about diversity at work place and keen to get women, persons with disability and LGBTQIA+ persons in the workplace. She has grown a team to 1000 and built leadership in just 1 year at CBA India during a pandemic through virutal hiring and on boarding.
A winner of many awards herself, Pankajam has been conferred with prestigious honours such as NCPEDP Helen Keller Award for making a difference to communities and she has recently won the Woman CEO of the Year from GISR foundation in 2020, Iconic Leaders Creating a Better World for All Award at the Women Economic Forum (WEF) Bangalore 2020 and the most recent recipient of India's Top 30 Emerging Tech Leaders at Intelligent Automation India 2020.
Anchors
Harish Devarajan -
Leadership Coach and Organisation Consultant
Harish is a Leadership Coach and Organisation Consultant. He also recently served as an Independent Director on the Board of Bank of India, and he is the Author of a top selling book "HR Here and Now" along with two others.
In 2008, Harish started his own company, People Unlimited, to focus on Leadership Development at an individual level in the form of Executive Coaching, and at a team level through Top Team Effectiveness Coaching.
He is also a member of Statutory and Advisory Boards of companies, and through his consulting and coaching work, and board memberships, he seeks to help organisations enhance their performance.
Prior to becoming an independent professional, Harish was a part of the HR teams at Sundaram Fasteners and then at Unilever. In 2004, he became the Head of HR at Hindustan Unilever Ltd.
Harish’s work included design, review, development and launching of HR Systems and organisational interventions, to enhance business performance. He also mentored and coached many leaders including young HR professionals to be more effective in their roles.
Harish’s specialties are Leadership Coaching, Organisation Transformation and HR Mentorship. He has a Postgraduate Diploma in Personnel Management & Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur and a B.Com from Madras University.
Refer to profile in day #1
Diya Kapur Misra -
Leadership Advisor, Facilitator, and Coach
Day 3: Amplify
Anita Mithra - Theatre-based Trainer and Facilitator
Anita Mithra combines a 30 year career in Sales, Marketing and Communication with experience in running a business with her corporate skills training offerings. With overseas work experience in marketing and training she brings a world view and skills to bridge gaps in language and comprehension across cultures and disciplines.
A graduate in Mass Communication, Anita has worked in marketing and training throughout a range of corporate and media environments. An experienced actress, Anita discovered the value in using role-playing as a training tool and has utilized this in her corporate training work and used it over many years in conjunction with various international training organisations such as Peers and Players (Australia) and Bi-Jingo (U.K.)
Currently engaged in delivering a training program for team leads at Cisco, Anita uses role play with facilitation to help participants bring resolution and empathy to their feedback skills.
She is also engaged in up-skilling women returning to work after a hiatus by using theatre in the delivery of the training program, working with conversational skills, use of language and non verbal communication. This is in conjunction with the JobsForHer Foundation.
She has also worked on delivering programs for BlackRock, ANZ, E&Y in best hiring practices, pitching for profit, communication for confidence and cascading communication.
Sales and Marketing has been the focus for training sales persons on the floor by creating real time scenarios to equip them with better customer service skills and sales pitches.
Anita delivered a three month program at HP to help call centres deliver better customer satisfaction scores. A one month research effort, working on the floor and helping the employees to have better conversations, ask the right question and deliver a more focused solution to their customers was a resounding success.
At Lexis Nexis, a six session module took a scattered new team from a hostile non collaborative mode to enabling teamwork and a great sense of camaraderie through a series of theatre based interventions, customised for them.
More recently she has conducted a self love workshop for women at Infosys using theatre and other methods to deep dive into their own strengths and weaknesses and better appreciate themselves.
Shiv Shivakumar - Group Executive President for Strategy and Business Development, Aditya Birla Group
Shiv joined the ABG group in January 2018 to head strategy and business development. Prior to this, he was the Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo for four years. Before PepsiCo, Shiv was with Nokia, first as CEO for India, and later for the Emerging markets for nearly a decade.
Shiv has been a CEO for half his career and was one of the youngest CEOS in India. He was in Marketing in Hindustan Unilever Limited for a number of years, has worked on over 50 brands in his career, and seen many business transformations. Shiv has been awarded many times in his career – Best CEO, Best Brand Builder, awards for Leadership, Turnaround et al. He is one of only twenty people in India to have been awarded distinguished Alumnus awards from both IIT (Madras) and IIM (Calcutta).
Shiv writes and teaches regularly at leading business schools across the world, on Innovation, Leadership, Followership, Business Models and Digitization. Shiv is a believer in giving back to society and is currently on the board of XLRI and IIM Udaipur.
Shiv is an avid sports watcher, both football and tennis. He is married to Hamsini, who runs her own brand, innovation and semiotics consulting company. Shiv is also the best selling author of THE RIGHT CHOICE, a book on career dilemmas.
Radhika Jha - Secretary – Education and Industries, Uttarakhand
Radhika Jha is an officer in the Indian Administrative Services, Uttarakhand Cadre (batch of 2002). She is currently serving as Secretary for Department of Energy & Renewable Energy and Chairperson - Power Generation, Transmission & Distribution Corporations of Uttarakhand.
Her role includes promoting renewable energy sources and green economy solutions to manage the Energy sector, and under her guidance, Uttarakhand has bagged first position in the sustainable development goal (SDG). Radhika is the only woman in the Indian Power Sector to be the chairperson for all three State Power corporations, in addition to being the Secretary (Energy and Renewable Energy Department). In her current role she leads an organisation of over 15,000 employees with an annual turnover of INR 8500 crores. Radhika has implemented processes and policies to ensure power supply improvements and reduction in losses over her tenure.
Amongst her many accomplishments and achievements, Radhika has received the highest State-level award for Excellence in Good Governance in 2020 and has been recognised as one of the top 50 effective Indian bureaucrats for creating new benchmarks of performance in Public Service by Fame Magazine. She is passionate about women’s causes and serves as a role model to many young women officers in the IAS.
Radhika has a Masters in Organizational Behaviour from Delhi University and a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology & Economics from Lady Shri Ram College for Women, Delhi. She lives in Dehradun with her husband, who is also an IAS officer. They have two children.
Manisha Lath Gupta - Successful corporate leader, founder: Aanandaa Permaculture
Manisha runs ‘Aanandaa’ full time, managing the farm, doing workshops and building a home. She also spends a lot of time processing the food she grows into pickles and preserves!
Manisha’s career journey has been a truly unique one. She started her career with Unilever in India as a Management Trainee and spent 8 years (1997-2004) across different roles with the company. She then spent six years (2004-2010) across two different roles at Colgate Palmolive. In 2010, she transitioned to the banking industry as the EVP & Chief Marketing Officer at Axis Bank and repositioned the brand with the campaign Badhti ka Naam Zindagi based on the consumer insight of a ‘desire for continued growth’.
In 2014, Manisha took a year off to work with a political alternative which she believed the country needed badly. She continues to support their effort from behind the scenes, through fundraising, outreach and marketing strategy. In the same year, Manisha turned full time entrepreneur, with her start-up venture IndianArtCollectors.com an e-commerce portal for original Indian contemporary art, which she had founded in 2005. It continues to be the largest online platform for Indian contemporary art, now called Mojarto.
Manisha is passionate about investing back in our planet, building a natural habitat for ourselves & the community, and also being self-sufficient from a water and food perspective. Her organisation - ‘Aanandaa Permaculture’ aims to create awareness and impact on the planet through sustainable farming and healthier homes through earth architecture. Her journey of how she and her family transformed a degraded piece of land into a lush green food forest, is an inspirational one. Manisha is a certified Permaculture teacher and does regular workshops at her farm.
Manisha is an alumnus of IIM Bangalore (1997) and holds a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She likes to sing and takes singing classes every weekend. She is married to Agam, a career banker and they have two amazing daughters.
Alankrita Shrivastav
- Award-winning film director and screenwriter
Alankrita Shrivastava is an award-winning feature film director and screenwriter from Mumbai, India with a penchant for telling women’s stories. She likes to explore the interior world of women through her films. Most recently Alankrita Shrivastava created, wrote, directed and executive produced a drama series for Netflix, called BOMBAY BEGUMS, featuring Pooja Bhatt. It released in March 20121 to critical acclaim and popular success. DOLLY KITTY AUR WOH CHAMAKTE SITARE, Alankrita’s third feature film as writer-director, featuring Bhumi Pednekar and Konkona Sensharma, premiered at the Busan International Film Festival (2019), and released as a Netflix Original in September 2020.
Alankrita has co-written the critically acclaimed, award winning and hugely popular Amazon Prime Original series MADE IN HEAVEN (2018), and directed two of the episodes. The series has been a watershed for the portrayal of LGBQT characters and exposing the deep patriarchy that lies just beneath the surface of Indian society. Alankrita’s second feature film as writer-director, LIPSTICK UNDER MY BURKHA released in India in July 2017, and was a critical and commercial success.
The film created a huge conversation across the media, social media and film watchers about what is the real freedom of expression allowed for women, in a country that is the world’s largest democracy.
Acclaimed critically in India and internationally, Lipstick Under My Burkha has travelled to over 80 international film festivals. It has won 18 international awardsas well as awards at Cines del Sur, Granada, Spain, Cinemasia Amsterdam and the New York Indian Film Festival. It also won the inaugural TVE Global Sustainability Award for Film in London, for its contribution to gender equality.
Alankrita Shrivastava was named one of the 50 Most Influential Young Indians by GQ magazine in 2017. She has previously written and directed her debut feature film - Turning 30 (2011).
Alankrita has also written and directed a fiction short Open Doors, a documentary and a music video. She has worked on many Indian feature films in different capacities, including being the Associate Director on Raajneeti and the Executive Producer on Khoya Khoya Chand.
Alankrita Shrivastava read Journalism at Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University (2000), and Mass Communication at Jamia Milia Islamia (2003). She went to Welham Girls’ School, Dehradun (1997).
Bindu Vinodhan - Founder, TILLT & Mauna Dhwani Foundation
Bindu Vinodhan is an International Coach Federation certified executive coach and an HR professional with two decades of experience in Learning and Development. She was Global Head- Learning and Development, at WNS Global Services in her last assignment. In her previous assignments' she handled ‘Organizational Effectiveness and Change’ and ‘Organizational Learning and Development for companies like Vodafone, Hewlett Packard and Bank of America where she was instrumental in designing and developing capability solutions for next-generation leaders.
Bindu founded ‘TILLT’ (The Institute of Leadership Learning and Transformation) an organization that is aimed at bringing about high impact transformation in the corporate as well as social realms. In the corporate arena, she works closely with senior leadership teams to enable visioning and transformation for the future. Her core areas of consultation are in the area of senior leadership vision, leadership transformation, executive presence, business storytelling for sales, marketing and inspirational leaders, women leader empowerment and coaching on global leadership.
In the social sector Bindu designs and facilitates leadership transformation interventions for women survivors of trafficking, rape and domestic violence to provide them with entrepreneurial skills that enable them to integrate back into society.
Bindu holds a Bachelors Degree in Engineering, specializing in Electronics and Telecom; and a Masters Degree in Education, specializing in Learning Technology from Oxford University. She is trained and certified on high impact business presentation skills, executive presence and business storytelling from Cranfield University and in High Stake Negotiations from Harvard Law School. She also delivers guest lectures at Oxford on the subject ‘Applications of Learning Technology at the Workplace’ and has been doing that consecutively for the last 5 years.
Anchors
Pavan Bhatia
- Founder GenWE Inc.
Anchor and Panel Moderator for day #3
Pavan founded GenWE Inc. in March 2020, with the mission of bringing the world closer. He aims to create a more inclusive world by pairing teenagers from different backgrounds to enable dialogue and develop future leadership skills.
Prior to his shift to entrepreneurship, from 2016 to 2020, Pavan was Senior Vice President & CHRO for PepsiCo. in Asia, Middle East and Africa, based out of Dubai. He was responsible for developing the long term HR strategy and talent pipeline for PepsiCo’s businesses in 70 countries and also a key member of the global HR leadership team.
Prior to Dubai, Pavan was the SVP Global Talent Acquisition & Deployment for PepsiCo, based in Purchase, New York and was part of the global HR leadership team. He was responsible for developing a senior leadership pipeline and a diversity talent pool, and for building bench-strength for the top 100 roles.
Pavan has worked in India, China, Thailand and USA in his 25-year PepsiCo career. He has received several internal and external recognitions for his thought leadership and innovation in HR practices. He is passionate about Talent Management, Inclusion and Culture.
Pavan holds a bachelor’s degree in Commerce from Delhi University and a Postgraduate Diploma in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from XLRI Jamshedpur.
Pavan loves sports and is normally seen supporting the team that is tagged as the underdog! He is married, and his wife, Archana is a coach and leadership trainer. Their daughter, Tarini, is 15 years old, and enjoys volleyball and playing the cello.
Refer to profile in day #1
Diya Kapur Misra -
Leadership Advisor, Facilitator, and Coach