What does the future hold for us, and how do we prepare for it? There will be new things to invent and learn and there will be things that just need to be discovered. They are already there, just not really in the public’s eye. The Leadership Next: SHRM India's Knowledge Summit was a small step in that direction- to showcase a few such ‘leaders’, who have led the pack, and created benchmarks. This included case studies on two very large government-owned organizations- one of the largest life insurers in the World, the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) and, one of the world’s largest rail networks, the Indian Railways that have shown sustained and impressive growth, in the face of popular perception that privately-managed companies perform better.
A comprehensive survey on the 'State of HR in India' was unveiled at the Summit. The survey, a pioneering effort in many ways, has been undertaken to determine the demographics of HR professionals in India; and their views on the current and emerging challenges facing HR. Further, while reporting on the CEO-CHRO dialogues held recently across the country, the Summit took a daring look at the future. This exploration is attempted to identify the ‘next’ paradigms for success of future businesses. The findings reveal slightly more than just the tip of the iceberg. The idea behind showcasing all these case studies and survey was simply to milestone SHRM India’s journey to share ‘best practices’. The way forward, clearly is to determine “next practices” and understand the best practices that have created business leadership to prepare and create successful and sustainable enterprises.
Leadership Next brought together business and HR leaders to discuss some of the current HR challenges and preparations to increase organizational capability, present possible solutions in India by studying industry practices in India as they happen, showcase significant achievements and impact of HR across the industry during 2009, highlight and underscore the role and influence that HR has in the Indian growth story.
The keynote speaker was Arun Nanda, Executive Director & President, Infrastructure Development Sector, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. He began illustrating with examples of how HR has evolved from earlier days -where it simply kept track of personal records, work hours and some legal compliance issues to being a strategic partner at the 125,000 employee Mahindra Group. Nanda dwelled on the fact that HR needs to arrest the attrition within the fraternity first so that it set the right example.
There were two sessions based on fishbowl discussion format: one on Women Redefining Leadership led by Poonam Barua, Director, PAMASIA Global Corporate Advisory and participation of a number of HR leaders including Jatinder Peters, Head Co-ordination and Management, ONGC; Aneeta Madhok, Director, Open Spaces, Dr Ritu Anand, VP & Deputy Global Head – HR Tata, Behroze Kamdin, Director, KPMG; Prasenjit Bhattacharya, CEO, Great Place To Work Institute India; Marcel Parker, Chairman, Ikya Global and Claudette Marie White, Grace Kennedy Ltd. Barua began with the emerging concepts of 'Strategic Workforce management' and 'Empowering Leaders' to commence the session on 'Women -Redefining Leadership' . After presenting the findings of a KPMG study on Women Leaders, the fishbowl dwelt on management styles of women – flexibility, focus on the job, greater customer focus initially. Up next came ideas like moving away from gender bias altogether; need for representation of at least 30% women in senior management; the need for women to snap out of their comfort zones; asking or negotiating when required.
The Next Wave Fishbowl was steered by Asheesh Gupta, Director & Founder, Nine Dot Nine Media, who began with a brief yet incisive presentation on SHRM India's Leadership Readiness Survey. The audience learnt how CEOs, other CXOs and CHROs themselves perceived HR as far as Board Readiness is concerned. This revealed an optimistic peer assessment - 22% of other CXOs believe that their organisation is ready to have the CHRO as part of the top leadership. The main Panel consisting of Emmanuel Mnyawami, Director, Emaron Company Ltd; Anish Shah, President & CEO, GE Capital; Christopher Doyle, Country Manager, India, Economist Intelligence Unit; Sundara Rajan, MD, Thomas Assessments India, Vijay Deshpande, VP-HR, Goodlas Nerolac Paints, Joan Grace Swenson, Chief HR Officer, Kettering Senior Network, Raman Madhok – Director, Open Spaces and Hans Mielants, Regional Director - Holcim deliberated on accountability of leadership; HR adding value through sensitivity to sustainability; how the CHRO needs to mentor the next level of leaders; CHRO being a proactive partner to the CEO as also being a “steel magnolia” – strong to the core, yet approachable.
