upGrad, the edtech major has appointed Saurabh Deep Singla as the chief human resource officer (CHRO), with effect from 13 July. Singla moves from Ecom Express, where he was chief people officer for over four years, based out of Gurugram.
An alumnus of XLRI Jamshedpur, Singla has more than 20 years of experience across corporate and business HR roles.
From 2005 to 2008, Singla was senior manager (lead) – talent strategy at Bharti Airtel, where he handled the talent strategy during the inception of the Easy Day retail business in India.
For the next two years, he served as senior manager – corporate HR at Whirlpool, successfully essaying the role of COE leader for talent acquisition and campus management.
In 2010, he moved to Yum! Brands as head – staffing, where he was responsible for end-to-end management of staffing and HR automation for India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh.
By 2011, he was at Rio Tinto as head – global recruitment and talent operations, GBS, people services. Almost four years into this role, he moved to G4S.
As head (VP) HR & ER – India for MSS (guarding) and ESS (electronic security) business, head – HR shared services – India, he was responsible for driving HR, ER and compliance functions for 1,20,000+ employees, from 2015 to 2017.
It was in 2017 that he joined Ecom Express as chief people officer.
Known for his strong leadership and ‘never give up’ attitude, Singla will
be an asset for upGrad, where he will help create a strategic roadmap for upGrad and its divisions, while also addressing HR complexities across levels for driving sustainable growth.
Mayank Kumar, co-founder, and MD, upGrad has faith in Singla’s “proven track record of transforming cultures across organisations and a strong business acumen for driving HR-led initiatives and creating a strategic talent pipeline within the upGrad ecosystem”.
upGrad is looking forward to “leveraging his expertise for integrating operations while also strengthening upGrad’s stature as a people’s company.”
Singla himself is grateful for this “opportunity to collaborate with the leadership and create a workplace and culture that fosters trust, freedom, and growth for every employee and their families”.
