speakers

Devdutt Pattanaik writes on relevance of mythology in modern times, especially in areas of management, governance and leadership. Trained in medicine, he worked for 15 years in the healthcare and pharma industries before he focussed on his passion full time. He is author of 30 books and 600 columns, with bestsellers such as My Gita, Jaya, Sita, Business Sutra and the 7 Secret Series. He was a speaker at TEDIndia 2009 and spoke on Myths that Mystify, East versus West. His TV shows include Business Sutra on CNBC-TV18 and Devlok on Epic TV. He consults organisations on culture, diversity and leadership and also consults various television channels and filmmakers on storytelling.

Dr. Ganesh Natarajan, Vice Chairman & CEO of Zensar Technologies, President - HBS Club of India, Chairman - NASSCOM Foundation,Chairman - KM & Business Transformation & WR Skills Mission CII Chairman - Social Venture Partners Pune & Natarajan Education Society Board Member - RPG Group,Board Member - Global Talent Track.

Dr. Ganesh Natarajan is Vice Chairman & CEO of Zensar Technologies, a leading firm that optimises technology and processes for Fortune 500 companies. He is also a Founder and Board Member of Global Talent Track, a pioneer in Employability Skills Training in Asia.

Ganesh's industry responsibilities include leadership of the HBS Club of India, Chairman of the National Committee on Knowledge Management and Business Transformation and the Western Region Committee on Skills for the Confederation of Indian Industry. He was Chairman of NASSCOM in 2008 and is a member of the Chairmen's Council of NASSCOM. He is also a fellow of the Computer Society of India.

Ganesh is a Director of Social Venture Partners India and Convener of SVP Pune. He has been appointed the Chairman of NASSCOM Foundation for 2014-16.

Brillian S. K is  Head Human Resources at Times Centre for Learning, a Timesgroup company specialising in Education. He was the founding Director of Toastmasters International District 98.

Brillian comes with a rich experience in the Human Resources function spanning BFSI, Education and Logistics domains. He has been instrumental in Policy Making, Talent Engagement and Strategic Business Partnering.


Brillian  has been recognised for his volunteer services and Toastmasters International ranked  him among the world’s top 10 Best Leaders for the year 2015-2016 .  He is an academic advisor to a Business School in Mumbai and academic program advisor with the SNDT PV Polytechnic for Women, Mumbai. 

Brillian is a speaker, mentor and coach and has worked with Students, TEDx speakers and CXO’s. He volunteers for various causes  and was conferred the REX Karamveer Bronze Award in 2016 for his volunteering services. He is the Zonal President of the altiusZone of the NHRDN Mumbai.

Brillian is an active Social Media enthusiast,  who shares his learnings through BrillianTips #FridayKeFunday on his youtube channel.

Craig Preston is the Managing Director of IDG. Craig was previously a
consultant with IDG before moving to Aon, where he worked as a risk
consultant as well as leading one of Aon's large regional businesses. He
has a wealth of leadership experience from his roles with Aon, previously
with Coca-Cola and during his time as an army officer. Craig has been
closely involved with the design and delivery of leadership and
management training for several years. He was also appointed the Head
of People Development for the Rugby Football Union.

He worked with IDG as a leadership and team development consultant as well as delivering a variety of leadership talks, with clients from both the business and sporting world. They included UK Sport, Lloyds TSB, 3M, BMW, Northampton Saints Rugby Club, Hampshire Cricket and many more. Craig provides a perspective on graduate recruitment and development as both a developer and employer.

During his career as an army officer, he saw service in many environments throughout the world including Belize, Bosnia, Germany and Gibraltar. He spent four years in Northern Ireland where he was mentioned in Despatches in 1989. It is this powerful blend of commercial and military experience which enables Craig to talk with such authority on leadership principles and their application in the workplace.

Shankar Krishnamoorthy is a co-founder & CEO of Synergita.  He has 20+ years of experience in building software products.  With Synergita, he works closely with several customers on their Employee performance management initiatives.  Prior to Synergita, Shankar has co-founded Aspire Systems, a global software services company in Outsourced Product Development space that won several awards like Great Place to Work for, Deloitte’s Fast 50, etc.
His current mission is to make Synergita a leader in Employee Performance and Engagement space.  Under his leadership, Synergita has won multiple awards such as Microsoft Code for Honour, CODiE Finalist for Best Human Capital/Talent Management Software, Indian ISVAwards 2016, etc.

Ayaskant is Senior Vice President and Head of HR for Service Lines of Wipro Limited, providing HR Leadership to 80,000 employees, globally. He is based out of Bangalore. Ayaskant has spent 19 years in the field of Human Resources and brings with him significant experience on work force planning, talent acquisition, talent management, M&A, Compensation & Benefits and leadership coaching over the years globally. Additionally, he also leads HR Analytics for Wipro.
Prior to Wipro, Ayaskant has worked with GE, Infosys and L&T. Ayaskant joined Wipro in December 2012, after more than a decade stint in General Electric.
Ayaskant has done his engineering from NIT Surat and masters in Human Resources from Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneshwar

Mr. Chandel is currently the Member Corporate Steering Committee and CHRO, Tata Motors, India’s largest Automotive Company. He moved to Tata Motors in April 2014, from another Tata Group Company Tata AutoComp where he was the President & Group CHRO, Tata AutoComp Systems since 2005 where he was actively involved in its turnaround with responsibility of various strategic growth initiatives of the company, pioneered various HR practices which became industry benchmarks & the company’s revenue tripled during this period.
Prior to joining Tata Group, he worked with Siemens in India, Germany and USA for almost 13 years where he held various assignments, starting as Regional HR Manager (North) in 1992, then as Divisional HR Manager for the newly formed Telecom Div. In 1997 he moved to Company’s Headquarters as Corporate Head for Industrial Relations & then in 1999 took over as Head of Corporate Leadership and HR Development. From 2000 to 2003, he was based at Global Headquarters at Siemens AG, Munich, heading the Global Leadership Project & subsequently at Siemens USA on a Business Integration Project from 2003-2004. Returning to India he headed the Siemens One Project from 2004-2005 before joining Tata Group.
He was honoured with Leader of the Year award in 1997 by LMI Inc. USA.

Mr. Chandel loves photography, hiking & reading

Premlesh Machama has a dynamic career of over 2 decades that reflects pioneering experience and year-on-year success in achieving business growth objectives in well-established and growing organizations. He is currently associated with CareerBuilder India as Managing Director. Holds merit for successfully developing strong business for the organization in a very short span of time.

Premlesh has leveraged entrepreneurial ability and skills in translating corporate vision, overcoming complex business challenges and delivering on high-impact decisions. Garnered buy-in from stakeholders behind major initiatives while at the same time building credibility and delivering on customer confidence. He is endowed with strong business acumen and a superior record of delivering large scale, mission critical projects on time and within budgets. He has demonstrated deep passion, leadership, intelligence and determination to succeed in all hands-on product design & development projects.

Premlesh is known for building and motivating large cross functional teams that exceed corporate expectations. He has demonstrated abilities in mentoring and building a high performance operational team. He has used interactive and motivational leadership; acknowledged for recruiting and mentoring leaders with an equal desire to win.

Personality Traits:

• A self-motivated, highly passionate, result oriented energetic leader with great respect for people, process and innovation, have led by example; known for clear thinking, flawless execution and unyielding integrity.

• A go getter with a “Can Do” attitude, excellent analytical skills, and a great eye for detail.

Steve leads the Human Resource function at Diageo India and is part of its Executive Committee. At USL, he is responsible for building people and organizational capability aligned to deliver the corporate objective of building capable leaders and attracting right talent.
A veteran in Human Resources, Steve has over 30 years of experience spanning several sectors, many of which have been senior leadership roles. His diverse work portfolio ranges from global corporates like Vodafone and Hindustan Unilever Ltd, family led businesses like Reliance Jio, Modi Xerox, including varied industries like Pharmaceuticals, FMCG, Office Automation, Telecommunications and IT, and including an entrepreneurial stint as an Executive Coach.
Prior to joining Diageo India, Steve was the Chief Human Resource Officer at Reliance Jio where he led the People and Organization strategy for the company. He has also spent a decade with Vodafone India where he had the critical mandate of overseeing the M&A transition of the company and building out the pan India footprint. Steve also has global experience, having worked in senior leadership positions.
His passion for coaching led him to explore a brief stint in entrepreneurship, setting-up his own consulting firm, transforming businesses into sustainable high performing organisations though Change and Leadership Development.
Steve holds a post graduate degree from XLRI, Jamshedpur and a Bachelor’s degree in Law from South Calcutta Law College. He is also a certified coach and holds a PCC certification from the International Coaching Federation, USA. He has also completed a certificate program in Organisational Development from NTL Institute, USA and is an alumni of Leeds Business School and a Chevening Scholar.

Mr. M.S. Venkatesh is a senior HR professional with 24 years of work experience, currently working as the Sr. Director - HR at P.D. Hinduja Hospital & Medical Research Centre. Building talent management processes across varied corporate cultures and aligning it to business deliverables has been an interesting journey that has engaged Mr. Venkatesh continuously. Having worked with various MNCs and large Indian corporations as HR Head, Mr. Venkatesh has garnered his expertise through hard-won experience across multiple sectors like FMCG, Heavy Engineering, Telecom, Education and Health Care. Mr. Venkatesh has had great opportunities of building Assessment & development centers, Processes & Practices that won the Best Employer Brand and also models of HR ROI in an entrepreneurial environment. His forte has been Talent Management and Management support in building & sustaining organizations across multiple Industry sectors. A post graduate from the University of Madras, Mr. Venkatesh is also a visiting faculty at Management Development Institute (MDI) and School of Inspired Leadership (SOIL), Gurgaon.
Education and Credentials
Masters in Social Work (MSW)Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from Madras University, Chennai , Mr. Venkatesh is also a Bachelor of Science majored in Physics from the same University.
He has garnered his expertise through hard-won experience across multiple sectors. In the manufacturing industry, he worked with Caterpillar, in FMCG with HUL & Coca Cola, India and in Telecom with Bharti Airtel, before getting into Education sector with Educomp Solutions Limited. Further, he had his own consulting firm - People Maths Consultancy Services and engaged with corporate organisations across Industrial sectors on Leadership Development, Transformation, Talent Management & Attrition Management before taking the current assignment as Sr.Director Human Resources with P.D.Hinduja Hospital & Medical Research Centre.
Under his HR leadership with various Organizations he has worked for, he has won many awards for having built an Employer Brand.
He has also been a start up specialist and has set up HR systems from grounds up for organizations like HUL (Walls Ice Cream Project), Coca Cola, India (South Zone – Bidadi in Karnataka, Palakkad in Kerala & Chennai) and Transition of JTM mobiles to Bharti after the acquisition by Bharti Mobile Karnataka.
In the formative years of his career, he had spent time in managing tough IR challenges handling multiple militant labour unions in Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu enhancing labour productivity through long term settlements with workmen.
Key Capabilities and Experience
He is a facilitator in Situational Leadership – Partnering for Performance, Balance Score Card, Out Bound Learning, besides being certified in Hays Job evaluation, Thomas Profiling and 360 degree feedback.
In his Consulting assignment he has worked with Top Management of various companies to consult on the matters of Talent Management, besides being a strategic consultant for reputed organizations in the Education sector. He is visiting faculty with Management Development Institute Gurgaon and School for Inspired Leadership Gurgaon (SOIL). He was also associated with Harvard Business Press as a Facilitator for leadership development of senior management across corporate organizations.
Over the years, he has handled assignments involving organization transformation, Leadership Training, Talent Management through designing and deploying people engaging processes and policies. He brings to the table the value of delivering ROI to the business by leveraging people resource through innovative and strategic HR processes.
He has also developed a proprietary HR tools for the K 12 education sector and an expert in developing innovative and strategic HR processes for Education sector

Won 100 Women Achievers Award by Ministry of Women and Child Development, India. Was invited and attended a lunch with the Honorable President of India

Kami Viswanathan is a Chennai-based entrepreneur, investor and mentor to early stage companies. In 2006, Kami founded Lumina Datamatics Ltd (formerly PreMedia Global Inc), a leading provider of educational and professional content and technology solutions to the US and European markets. With over 3000 employees across 7 locations in the US, Germany, Bosnia and India, Lumina partners with the largest educational publishers to help them stay at the cutting edge of the digital revolution.  Prior to co-founding Lumina, Kami headed Mergers & Acquisitions at OfficeTiger, where she was also responsible for service operations and project implementation.  Earlier, she worked at her family’s business group, where she conceptualized and executed several strategic initiatives.  Kami started her career with Arthur Andersen’s business advisory practice helping multinational companies negotiate joint ventures and set up operations in India. 

Post her exit from Lumina in August 2016, Kami has focused her attention on conceptualizing, seeding and mentoring ventures in education, learning and creativity, and health and fitness. 

Kami is a fellow of the Aspen Global Leadership Network and co-heads the S Viswanathan Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on primary education, healthcare and rural development.  She also serves on the Executive Committee of the Music Academy, Chennai and on the board of the Harvard Business School Club of India. 

Kami is a gold-medalist from the National Law School of India where she graduated with the BA, LLB (Hons.) degree, and also holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School.

Vibha Kagzi holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Science from Carnegie Mellon University. She has also pursued courses at the University of California, Berkeley, the London School of Economics and the Indian School of Business.

Her professional experience spans finance, fashion, media and public relations. She has worked in New York in asset management and helped establish a California-based hedge fund in India.

She is extremely passionate about education and believes that it is the ultimate social equalizer. Leveraging her personal experience at various academic and professional institutions, she hopes to provide holistic guidance to young individuals who aspire to reach leading universities.

Vibha has done a course in creative writing from Xavier’s Institute of Communications and has been featured in the Economic Times, the Indian Express and the Harbus (Harvard Business School’s publication). At Harvard, she co-wrote a case for the negotiations department that has been incorporated in the teaching curriculum at the school.
Vibha has completed a yoga teacher’s training course, is a certified open water diver, is fluent in French, having completed Level 3 at the Alliance Française and has travelled extensively, visiting over 55 countries across six continents.

Vibha is the Co-President of the Harvard Club of Mumbai and is on the Carnegie Mellon Admissions Council.

Vibha is an inspiring speaker and has been invited to speak and present at several prestigious forums in the past, including Citibank, IIT, YPO, NHRD, Teach For India, Indian Merchant Chambers, Top Colleges, Schools and Corporates across India, and other platforms globally.