Author: Liji Narayan | HRKatha

What does ‘delayering’ mean? Delayering is the deliberate removal of levels from an organisational hierarchy, usually by reducing management positions between senior leadership and frontline employees. The appeal is easy to understand. Fewer layers should mean faster decisions, shorter communication chains, lower costs and greater autonomy for employees. Information can travel upwards without passing through multiple managers, while decisions can move downwards without becoming trapped in approval processes. On an organisation chart, the result looks cleaner. In practice, delayering changes considerably more than reporting lines. Managers who remain inherit broader spans of control. Employees receive greater autonomy but often less…

Samsung India has begun reducing staff in its television and home appliance divisions as part of a wider restructuring. Around 80–100 executives have been asked to leave in batches. Those affected include senior officials, team leads, branch managers, and area managers. Employees have reportedly been issued termination letters daily in small batches, sometimes without notice periods. Severance packages include three months’ salary plus an extra month’s pay for every year of service. The cuts reflect growing cost pressures and weak consumer demand. Memory chip prices have more than doubled, while the rupee has fallen nearly 10 per cent this financial…

After almost four successful years with EXL, Srijit Sen has joined Coforge as head – talent acquisition for Business Process Solutions. An alumnus of XLRI Jamshedpur began his career as a process associate at GECIS in June of 2003. Less than three years into this role, he switched to Genpact where he was part of the hiring team for over a year before being elevated to MT, hiring, Jharkhand/Bihar, in July of 2007. June of 2003 saw him promoted to assistant manager, HR/hiring, branch head-Jharkhand/Bihar. From 2009 to 2010 he served as assistant manager-hiring band4. After over seven successful years…

Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), owned by Tata Motors, plans to cut around 4,000 jobs in the UK over the next two years. The company has opened a voluntary redundancy programme for salaried and management employees as it tries to reduce costs and respond to difficult global market conditions. The job cuts are part of a wider plan to save about £1.7 billion (Rs 21,700 crore) over two years and lower the number of vehicles JLR needs to sell to break even to 300,000. Jaguar Land Rover employs around 34,000 people directly in the UK, across three sites in the West…

Listenlights, a mechanical, electrical and plumbing engineering (MEP) service provider in India, has appointed Shweta Joshi as head of people and culture, commercial corporate services. This is Joshi’s second stint with the company after a gap of about a year. From November 2024 to August 2025, she had served as assistant general manager, people and culture at the company, before starting out on her own, to play HR influencer and advisor. Joshi’s career began as an assistant manager-human resources with Career Shapers HR Consulting, in 2009. In less than two years she joined TeamLease as senior HR consultant. Almost three…

Nine employee associations at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) have written to Chairperson V Narayanan asking for official clarification on the government’s plan to shift manufacturing and operational functions to private companies. The letter, dated 4 September, highlights worries about ISRO’s future role, the impact on current staff, and implications for recruitment. The associations argue that while private participation in commercial activities can coexist with a strong public ISRO, reducing the agency to a limited research body while handing over launch vehicle production and infrastructure operations to private hands requires open debate. They point to comments made on 21…

The National HRD Network (NHRDN) has announced that Dhananjay Singh, director general, NHRDN has moved on from his role, while Nidhi Vashishth has been appointed executive director. Vashishth’s tryst with HR started way back in 2000 when she began as a humble HR executive  with Compucom Software. She became an assistant professor at Apex University and went on to serve in a similar capacity at Jai Narain Vyas University. She was associated with NIS Sparta as training effectiveness consultant for almost three years before she joined TV Rao Learning Systems as HRD consultant in 2007. After serving as consultant director…

After serving as vice president-human resources at HSBC for almost three years, Gunjan Kumar has now joined MongoDB as director-employee experience, India. Armed with a BTech in Electrical Engineering, Gunjan Kumar went on to complete a PGP in Human Resource Management from Management Development Institute in 2013. The initial few years of his career were spent as a manager-vendor development, at Tata Motors (from 2007 to 2011). He then interned with Tata Sons and SimplyHR Solutions before joining Indian Oil as human resources officer in 2013. Less than two years later he moved to Myntra.com where he served as human…

Chandrakala Kawle will now head human resources at Tachyon Technologies, a digital transformation consulting firm. She was earlier with Mondee, a travel technology company from June 2025 to February 2026. Armed with an MBA in Human Resource Management from Osmania University, Chandrakal Kawle began her career with CES in July of 2007. She handled business development and recruitments for a little less than two years before moving to Deloitte. She joined as an HR consultant in June of 2009 and by the time she moved on in 2019, after over a decade with the company, she had become  risk and…

Not a sudden calling For Sejal Haribhakti Mody, CHRO, Akasa Air, human resources was never a sudden calling. Her journey into the function was more instinctive than planned, shaped by curiosity and a willingness to follow opportunities that did not necessarily fit a predetermined career map. Her early choices were rooted in numbers, analysis and business problem-solving. She studied MIS and mathematics during her BBA, followed by finance during her MBA. After graduating from the Indian School of Business, she joined Accenture as part of its early Finance and Enterprise Performance consulting team. Then, quite by chance, while between active…

The architecture of workplace wellness is built largely around problems organisations know how to see. Physical health produces insurance claims, hospitalisation data and medical costs. Mental health increasingly appears through counselling utilisation, absenteeism and employee surveys. Engagement has its scores. Attrition has its dashboards. Financial stress is more elusive. A 2026 Employee Financial Wellness Survey by PwC, covering nearly 3,500 employees across the US, suggests that this may be a significant blind spot. Fifty-nine per cent of respondents say they are currently stressed about their finances. Among Gen Z employees, 85 per cent say financial stress affects their mental health…

Across India, employees working under the National Health Mission (NHM) and National Ayush Mission (NAM) have been voicing growing frustration over delayed salaries, uncertain contracts, and lack of clarity about their future. What began as scattered protests has now become a wider reflection of the challenges faced by thousands of contractual health workers who form the backbone of public healthcare delivery. In Kerala, the government’s decision to tighten norms for contract renewal has created anxiety among NHM and NAM staff. The new rules mean stricter evaluation and less job stability, raising questions about how these changes might affect continuity in…

Parle Biscuits, known for the popular Parle-G, Monaco, Hide & Seek and Melody, has roped in George Kovoor to play chief executive officer (CEO), effective 1 September, 2026. Kovoor is backed by over 38 years of experience, having begun his career as a humble area manager/trainee with Brooke Bonde India way back in 1988. After completing an MBM from the Asian Institute of Management in 1993, he joined PepsiCo as manager/GM finance operations. This was the beginning of a long and successful association with the food, beverages and snacks brand. Just over three years into this role, he was elevated…

After playing vice president of strategy, planning and portfolio at Stellantis, Netra Gowda has moved to Airbus as vice president-HR transformation, digital and AI. An engineering graduate, Netra Gowda worked as a research and development engineer at Daimler Chrysler from 2004 to 2006. She then went on to complete and MBA from Hochschule Esslingen – University of Applied Sciences, Germany, in 2006-2007, before joining Intel as strategic marketing manager from June of 2007 to September of 2008. Airbus Defence and Space roped her in for the role of employment marketing manager, based out of Bavaria, Germany in September of 2008.…

What is the Bradford Factor? The Bradford Factor attempts to turn employee absence into a number. The formula gives greater weight to frequent, short-term absences than to fewer, longer ones. It is usually expressed as B = S² × D, where S is the number of separate absence episodes and D is the total number of days absent over a defined period. The mathematics produces striking differences. An employee who is absent once for ten consecutive days scores 10. Someone who takes ten separate one-day absences scores 1,000. That difference is the entire point. The assumption behind the formula is…

Zomato has reportedly laid off about 240 employees as it shut down its customer-support operations in Hyderabad. The decision came after the company reviewed how its customer support is structured and decided to move more of the work to external partners. The remaining in house support team will now be consolidated in Gurugram, closer to Zomato’s product, technology and analytics teams. This restructuring is part of a larger shift in how Zomato manages customer service. Over the past year, the company has increased its use of artificial intelligence (AI) and automation, which has reduced the need for large in house…

After a decade with Cognizant, Sayan Guha has joined Capgemini as director – global AI & data science practice. An alumnus of Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, Sayan Guha began his career as a software engineer with Tech Mahindra (formerly Mahindra Satyam), in September 2006. He then moved to IBM in 2008 as a data integration (ETL)  consultant, working out of Kolkata. Guha’s next stop was Wipro Technologies as project leader-data integration and data modelling. In less than two years he was promoted to data architect-retail and consumer -United Kingdom, in June of 2013. This role saw him…

Internal data has revealed that some Microsoft employees are spending large amounts on AI usage, with one worker in the Customer and Partner Solutions division reportedly racking up $28,000 worth of tokens in just 28 days. The figures came from a voluntary spreadsheet where employees share details such as salaries, bonuses, and now monthly AI usage. As per Gadget Review, around 600 US employees reportedly contributed to the spreadsheet, with about 350 reporting AI consumption. While the median monthly spend was about $300, some departments showed much higher averages. CoreAI reported a median of $975, Security $526, Microsoft AI $490,…

The Odisha government has introduced a new rule to ensure divorced women and children receive court ordered maintenance payments on time. Under this directive, if a state government employee fails to pay alimony or child support as ordered by the court, the amount will be automatically deducted from their monthly salary and transferred directly to the bank accounts of those entitled to it. The decision was taken after repeated complaints reached the Chief Minister’s grievance cell, where officials noted that several employees were ignoring court instructions and not making the required payments. On average, two to three such cases were…

VTP Realty in Pune marked Raksha Bandhan by bringing more than 350 employees together for a workplace celebration. The initiative, now in its second year, was designed especially for employees who may not have siblings to celebrate the festival with, giving them the chance to experience the warmth of Raksha Bandhan alongside their colleagues. The event created a personal and inclusive space where women employees tied rakhis to male colleagues, symbolising care, respect, and togetherness. For some, the occasion carried deep emotional meaning. Employees who had never celebrated Raksha Bandhan with siblings were able to experience the tradition for the…

Akasa Air marked the second year of Airport Stars Day, an initiative started in 2025 to recognise the contributions of its airport services teams across India. The day is meant to highlight the people who work behind the scenes to keep air travel safe and smooth, often without being noticed by passengers. To mark the occasion, the airline released a short film showing the contrast between everyday morning routines and the demanding work of airport staff. The film featured employees from different functions including airport services, cabin appearance, cargo, and security. It aimed to show the teamwork and precision required…

Second Runner-Up | HRKatha Rising Star Leadership Award 2025 Long before Aaron Trevor Dsouza had a job title in HR, he had a habit that hinted at where he might eventually end up. He was curious about how people made a living: the margins of the local chai tapri owner, the way a taxi driver planned his day, why one roadside dhaba flourished while another struggled. What interested him was not merely the economics. It was the judgement behind it: how people organised limited resources, made decisions and found ways to produce an outcome. That curiosity about people and business,…

After successfully heading talent acquisition at SMEC for almost six years, Shubhra will now head people operations for India & International Business (Asia, Middle East & Africa), K&A Power, the global energy infrastructure company. Mittal began her professional journey with Resource Management Associates Group, as senior executive in 2008. She spent over two years there, based out of Delhi, learning to handle technical recruitments from executive level to senior level positions for infrastructure companies. She moved to New Era India as a senior executive-resourcing, in August of 2010. In less than a year, she was elevated to assistant manager-delivery. From…

Courageous keeper of secrets Terminations, performance issues, salary inequities, leadership failures, personal crises. Samarpita Banerjee has carried information about all of them, often alone. It was one of the first things about HR that surprised her. The confidentiality that makes the function trustworthy can also make it isolating in ways nobody quite warns you about. Initially, HR was largely about procedures, policies and talent management to her. Those things still matter. But she gradually realised there was far more to the profession than systems and processes. HR was equally about relationships, responsiveness and understanding how deeply people were connected to…

India’s workplace disengagement problem now comes with a formidable price tag. Gallup estimates that it costs the country $351 billion annually, approximately Rs 32.7 trillion, or nine per cent of GDP. The estimate, contained in Rebuilding Indian Workplaces for the Future 2026, produced with the Institute of Directors India, turns what is usually discussed as a people-and-culture problem into something closer to an economic one. The deterioration behind that number is equally striking. Employee engagement in India stood at 33 per cent in 2022. By 2025, it had fallen to 23 per cent. Over the same period, the share classified…

SanDisk, the memory chip company now valued at about $230 billion after a massive stock rally, has laid off dozens of employees at its development centres in Israel. The exact number of job losses has not been confirmed, but the cuts reportedly affect staff across several departments. The layoffs come as a surprise because the company is enjoying record demand for flash memory, driven by artificial intelligence and cloud data centres. SanDisk’s revenue for the last quarter reached nearly $9 billion, almost five times higher than a year earlier, with profits of $6.9 billion. It also reported a huge order…