Author: Liji Narayan | HRKatha

What does ‘grey beard’ mean? In HR, a ‘grey beard’  is more than an experienced employee approaching retirement. The term refers to professionals whose greatest value lies not in what they know but in what they have seen. They have lived through recessions, failed transformations, product recalls, leadership crises and market disruptions. They recognise patterns long before they appear in dashboards because they have encountered similar situations before. That judgement cannot be downloaded or taught in a training programme. It is built over decades of decisions, mistakes and consequences. Experience, in this sense, is not simply accumulated knowledge. It is…

After two years of heading HR for Kritunga Restaurants and Franchises, based out of Hyderabad, Vijayanand K has now joined Royaloak Incorporation as  chief human resources officer. Interestingly, Vijayanand spent the initial years of his career as a project in charge responsible for designing landscapes of buildings and development of projects. It was after a little less than five years that he joined Mphasis as a senior trainer, in November of 2002. Over three years into this role, he moved to Kotak Life Insurance as senior training manager in March of 2006. Over two years later, in 2008, Vijayanand joined…

After over two and a half years as human resources business partner- people experience technology at Amazon, Shaitan Singh Bishnoi has been elevated to senior HRBP. An alumnus of SVKM’s Narsee Monee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), this mechanical engineer interned with nibbleMATRIX and Haptik before joining Tata Housing Development Company as a CSR project trainee in 2015. He also interned with HCL Technologies, MotorZest and PeopleChoice Services. He worked for the Entrepreneurshi Cell, NMIMS Mumbai as head, events and logistics, in March of 2015. For over a year he was responsible for end-to-end management of all the events and…

IndiGo has announced the appointment of Kanwaljeet Singh Bakshi as its new chief human resources officer (CHRO), effective 20 July, 2026. He takes over from Sukhjit S Pasricha, who stepped down after serving in the role for more than eight years. Bakshi moves into the position from InterGlobe Enterprises, the parent company of IndiGo, where he was group head-HR and a member of the Executive Committee. This role saw him providing strategic and operational leadership across the group, integrating HR practices and driving organisational transformation. With a career spanning over 34 years, Bakshi brings wide-ranging experience across aviation, hospitality, telecom…

Pursuing a sense of purpose Niyathi Madasu did not enter HR because she was drawn to policies or processes. She was fascinated by people, behaviour and the way organisations functioned. An early influence was a professor who helped her see HR as far more than an administrative function. It was where business strategy and human behaviour intersected. Although she was initially more interested in organisational psychology, her curiosity about workplace dynamics, leadership and culture gradually drew her towards HR. Before long, what had begun as an academic interest evolved into a genuine sense of purpose. Today, as chief human resources…

The cybersecurity industry has spent years framing its workforce challenge as a talent shortage. The numbers support that view. Nearly half of cybersecurity positions globally remain unfilled and demand continues to outpace supply. The shortage, however, is becoming an increasingly incomplete explanation. Accenture’s analysis of more than 550,000 cybersecurity job postings and professional profiles suggests organisations are no longer struggling simply because there are too few cybersecurity professionals. They are struggling because the jobs themselves have changed faster than the talent pipeline designed to fill them. Almost six in ten cybersecurity vacancies now demand a combination of technical expertise, business…

What ‘humanocracy’ mean? Humanocracy is a management philosophy that argues organisations should be designed around people rather than bureaucracy. Instead of relying on hierarchy, layers of approval and rigid rules, it advocates giving employees greater autonomy, ownership and freedom to make decisions. The idea is simple: organisations should trust people to think, not merely execute. Its central argument is provocative. Most organisations are nowhere near as capable as the people who work inside them. The gap is created not by talent shortages but by bureaucracy. Humanocracy, therefore, calls for more than flatter structures or employee empowerment programmes. It questions the…

Oracle has initiated another round of layoffs in Romania, with about 500 employees reportedly affected. The move, which began on 25 June, marks the company’s second major workforce reduction in the country within a year. In late 2025, Oracle had already eliminated around 400 positions in Romania, followed by a large-scale downsizing of nearly 30,000 jobs across the US and India earlier in 2026. Romania is one of Oracle’s larger engineering and services hubs in Central and Eastern Europe, employing about 4,000 people. The latest cuts appear to span multiple business units, including Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, Database Technologies, One Oracle…

Mukesh Batra has taken up the role of chief human resources officer at Technico Industries. He was earlier with RK Business Group as strategic HR leader/CHRO since February of 2025. Backed by over three decades of experience, Batra comes with a deep understanding of the business and the ability to orient HR strategy to suit the same. Way back in June of 1990, he joined NIIT Technologies as assistant manager-HR and operations. He then moved to BaaN Software as manager-HR and administration. He successfully managed HR across multiple technology delivery centres with operations in India and the US. He went…

Handling subtle bias with tact A leadership succession-planning review proved to be a lesson in tact for Sonia Kulkarni. Successors for a critical role were being discussed. One of the strong internal candidates was a woman who had consistently delivered results, built strong teams, and had great stakeholder feedback. However, as the discussion progressed, Kulkarni noticed a shift in tone. While the comments weren’t explicit, they sounded like: “She’s very capable, but does she have the presence for this role?”. The candidate’s ability to “handle some of the stronger personalities on the team” were questioned. What struck Kulkarni was that…

The global movement of highly-skilled professionals slowed dramatically in 2025. Cross border relocations fell from 3.7 million in 2024 to 3.3 million in 2025, a drop of 11.6 per cent, reveals BCG Top Talent Tracker, Q2 2026. Out of a pool of 221 million highly-skilled workers worldwide, only 1.5 per cent have moved internationally—about 4,30,000 fewer people than the year before. For HR leaders, this is not just a dip in numbers but a sign that global talent flows are entering a new phase. Why specialists are feeling the pinch The slowdown was most severe among specialist categories: While STEM…

What does sensemaking mean? In modern complex workplaces that are not just fast changing but also filled with competing priorities, leaders and employees often face situations where information is incomplete, ambiguous, or even contradictory. That is when sensemaking or the process of interpreting and giving meaning to events, data, and experiences becomes critical. As the term itself suggests, it is the process that helps individuals and organisations act with clarity. For HR professionals, sensemaking is not just a skill but a necessity for guiding people through uncertainty, change and conflict. It is all about creating shared understanding. It involves collecting…

Honasa Consumer has named Richa Gupta as senior vice president. The digital-first beauty and personal care company said she will head its ecommerce business and lead growth across marketplaces, quick commerce and emerging digital channels. In the new role, Gupta will focus on scaling Honasa’s online strategy, improving consumer engagement and finding new growth avenues for the company’s portfolio of brands. Richa Gupta brings over 20 years of experience in ecommerce, consumer businesses and category management. She has held senior positions at Amazon India, Nykaa and Ekart Logistics. In those roles, she worked on business expansion, category development, strategic partnerships…

Microsoft is shutting down or selling at least three Xbox studios—Ninja Theory, Double Fine, and Compulsion Games—as part of a restructuring under new CEO Asha Sharma. The move comes with layoffs across investment, operations, technology, and private credit roles, marking a major shift in the gaming division. Ninja Theory, known for ‘Hellblade’, was told it would close, though efforts are underway to find a buyer. This announcement came just a week after Microsoft showcased a new ‘Hellblade’ title planned for 2027, leaving its future uncertain. Double Fine, the studio behind ‘Psychonauts’, is exploring ways to buy itself back rather than…

From engineering to enabling people For years, Girija Kolagada led engineering and product teams. Yet, as she did, she found herself increasingly drawn to the people side of leadership: building teams, shaping culture, and enabling leaders to succeed. Over time, she came to a quiet realisation. The most complex and meaningful challenges she encountered were not technical. They were human. The more she led teams, the more she realised that technology problems were usually solvable. The harder questions involved motivation, trust, leadership and culture. Moving into HR business partnering felt like a natural extension of that journey, where she could…

Axis Max Life Insurance (formerly Max Life Insurance) has announced the appointment of Mrinal Sinha as chief people officer (CPO), effective 1 July, 2026. Sinha brings to the table over two decades of experience, having begun his professional journey way back in 2002, as a humble assistant manager-HR, at Polaris Software Labs. A year and ten months later, he moved to ICIC Bank, as chief manager-human resources. He was then zonal head-recruitments for a while before being elevated to zonal HR head-south zone. For over two years he successfully handled HR for the south zone with an employee base of…

Vedanta continues to progress towards its target of 35 per cent women’s representation, and how! Today, women make up 23 per cent of Vedanta’s workforce, which is way higher than the mining industry’s average of 6 per cent. That isn’t all, 13 per cent of these women are deployed across mines, plants, smelters, refineries and control centres, which are the most  challenging and underrepresented segments of the industry. The company’s focus on building a strong talent pipeline is reflected in its hiring outcomes, with women accounting for 50 per cent of overall campus hires in FY26 and 30 per cent…

What does ‘navigating the grey’ mean? Navigating the grey refers to the ability to manage uncertainty, balance competing priorities, and make fair judgements when rules or precedents offer no clear answer. It is the opposite of black-and-white thinking. Workplaces rarely present problems with obvious solutions. Decisions involving people, culture, performance, ethics, or conduct often sit in territory where context matters as much as policy. A decision can be procedurally correct and still feel fundamentally unfair. Equally, a compassionate exception can create unintended consequences elsewhere. For HR professionals, navigating the grey means knowing when strict adherence to policy serves the organisation…

“After four unforgettable years” at Barclays, Aditi Mahadevan Nair, managing director and head of human resources, of the financial services institution has decided to move on. In her social media post, she says ‘it is time for me to turn the page on this chapter to write another one”, although she doesn’t reveal her next move. Nair, an alumna of Symbiosis Centre for Management and Human Resource Development, began her professional journey with Bharti Airtel, as assistant manager-HR, in 2002. By the time she moved on from there, she had become manager-HR. In February of 2005, she began a long…

Amit Abhay Brahme, a 48 year old IT engineer at Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) in Pune, died by suicide at his home on 2 June, 2026. Police reportedly recovered a two page note in which he accused two senior colleagues, Archana and Shashwati, of harassment, and a friend, Vinod Palicha, of filing false complaints to damage his reputation. In the note, Brahme claimed that good projects were taken away from him and replaced with extremely difficult tasks that could not be completed on time. He described repeated humiliation in front of colleagues and constant pressure to resign. The police have…

After over three and a half years of heading human resources for bio energy at Praj Industries, Ravi Prakash has now joined K Drive Mobility Solutions as director and head-human resources. This Physics graduate who went on to complete an MHRM in Human Resources from Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Mangement, began his professional journey as associate manager-Adani Power, in 2010. He spent almost eight years leading change initiatives among other responsibilities, and also managed the talent acquisition process. July of 2019 saw Ravi Prakash move to Imerys as India HR senior manager. Working out of Nagpur, he…

Phillips-Van Heusen has appointed Lisa Basumatari as head of HR for Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein in India. With 18-plus years in talent management, organisation development (OD), learning and development (L&D) and people strategy across retail, banking, media and consumer sectors, she will lead the people and culture agenda for both brands from Bengaluru. Her career graph reflects a steady climb through HR leadership roles. Basumatari started in 2007 as a consultant at The Learning Canvas, followed by stints as content specialist at Synergy Relationship Management and content-development executive at Training in Corporate, where she created training content and case…

Solving bias structurally One of the most defining moments in Preeti Ahuja’s career came when she worked with a business where the role of service technician had traditionally never been offered to women. Many leaders strongly believed women were not suited for these roles and would struggle with travel, field conditions and operational challenges. Instead of accepting that belief, Ahuja approached it as a systemic issue rather than a capability issue. “We worked closely with the business to redesign the entire ecosystem. We created inclusive job descriptions, strengthened infrastructure support, established clear safety and travel guidelines, and ensured the workplace…

Sunteck Realty has appointed Neha S Singh as HR cluster head for HR strategy, talent acquisition, and business partnering, adding a seasoned HR leader to its management team. In her new role, Singh will oversee Sunteck’s centre of excellence, talent acquisition, and HR business partnering functions. Among other things, she will focus on improving employee engagement and building talent pipelines. She will also work with business leaders to align workforce capabilities with the company’s growth goals. Singh joins Sunteck from Kalpataru, where she spent almost 11 years as senior human resources business partner (HRBP). At Kalpataru, she led HR transformation,…

Spice Money, an Indian rural fintech platform, has picked Nitin Sachdeva for the role of chief human resources officer (CHRO). Nitin Sachdeva brings to the table about two decades of experience having begun his professional journey way back in 2006. He had started off as a senior systems engineer with Infosys, based out of Chandigarh for a little less than four years. After completing a PGDM in Human Resources Management in 2012, he joined UCO Bank as a scale II officer, in August of 2012. Five months later, he moved to CNN-News 18, where he played deputy manager-HR for almost…

National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has elevated 34 executives to senior leadership roles, signalling a clear push to rely on internal talent for its next phase of growth. These  promotions are reportedly aimed at strengthening NTPC’s leadership pipeline and recognising executives who have grown within the organisation. The newly elevated leaders will take on higher responsibilities across NTPC’s operations, project execution and corporate functions. Company officials said the move reflects NTPC’s long-standing practice of nurturing talent internally and giving employees a clear career path. Thousands of engineers, managers, and technical staff are employed by NTPC across its plants and offices.…