Dr Saundarya Rajesh is a social entrepreneur who has won several accolades and awards such as #100Women Achiever, #Web Wonder Women, Winds of Change 2019 Award, Women Transforming India Award, Golden Aviator Award, Asia’s most Innovative Diversity & Inclusive Leaders Award and so on. Dr Saundarya irrevocably changed the game for the Indian Women Professionals, by introducing the concept of “Career Intentionality” and “Career Re-entry” to Corporate India. Dr Saundarya’s work in the space of gender diversity & inclusion in the workplace, is unparalleled in India. An inspiring speaker, an author, and a very sought-after D&I strategist, Dr Saundarya’s vision is to see young girls from underprivileged families create empowering white-collar careers for themselves. This she influences through Project Puthri, an initiative that instils “Career Intentionality” in the minds of 10,000 under-privileged girl children. Her book, The 99 Day Diversity Challenge book published by SAGE has won several acclaims from industry leaders and has been designed to develop diversity and inclusion mind set in any organization or even individual within the proverbial 99 days. 

With over 23 years of experience in healthcare, Jayashri believes in building credible teams as well as building and establishing functions and capabilities and delivering strong results across industries like Pharmaceuticals, MedTech, Healthcare delivery and Healthcare consulting across various markets in Asia Pacific. Jayashri joined Johnson & Johnson in 2010 as the Director of Strategy Planning for India and went on to hold a variety of roles with increasing responsibilities, including leadership roles at a regional and country level. Prior to joining J&J, Jayashri was associated with Bayer Pharmaceutical as Head - Strategy & Corporate Development. Jayashri is a B.Pharm graduate from Institute of Chemical Technology and has completed her MBA. 

Ajay has over 16 years of experience, with expertise in business, strategy, marketing, sales, and team building in medical devices, healthcare, OTC and personal care. He has been associated with J&J for the past 14 years and has a strong track record in handling critical assignments across diverse roles, industries, and geographies. He has successfully revived J&J Surgical Care business in India, as well as helped build J&J Baby Products business both in India and Indonesia. In addition, he played a significant role in spearheading Johnson & Johnson India’s rural distribution push, delivering strong growth in central India.   

Amita has over 23 years of experience in the space of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. For the past 11 years, she has worked with Deloitte US India offices, where she led their DE&I efforts. Amita successfully positioned Deloitte among the top 10 Best Companies for Women in India. She has several years of experience leading and influencing all aspects of Inclusion and HR policies as they relate to talent acquisition, retention and advancement. Amita has rich experience contributing to Gender, Disability, cultural, generational, sexual orientation and holistic wellbeing. 

Anju leads Research based solutioning at Avtar. Working across the length and breadth of DEI metrics for companies. She leads Corporate India’s largest diversity analytics exercises – Working Mother & Avtar 100 Best Companies for Women in India and Most Inclusive Companies Index. In her career spanning 13 years, she has co-authored several papers on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion that have been published in Journals of National and International repute. 

Bhavani Balasubramanian is a Chartered Accountant by profession and Inclusion leader by passion. She is a former partner of Deloitte Haskins & Sells and Fraser & Ross Chartered Accountants. Throughout her career journey of over four decades as a woman leader, she has mentored women in finance to assume greater roles at the workplace, and worked towards developing allies who believe in the benefits of proportionate representation of women in leadership positions. She is currently engaged in transformative coaching with high potential mid-career professional women for leadership development   

Divya is a HR thought leader, Strategic HR Business partner, Dynamic HR professional with over 22+ years of experience in all disciplines of HR with a Global exposure. Her core capabilities are in assisting organizations in developing shared value strategies with employees & transforming organizations to evolve as best companies to work with. An ability to evolve, innovate & drive organizational initiatives from planning and designing to implementation stages. Built high performance teams who are business aligned, goal oriented with exceptional analytical skills. Strong operation excellence with proven ability & attitude to achieve strenuous targets. Passionate about empowering individuals to reach their full potential. Expert in handling global initiatives with good exposure to local markets & their best practices. Capability to make a high impact contribution to an organization’s growth and profitability. Entrepreneurial mindset 

Gayatri is a Senior Vice President in Consumer Banking and Core Engines division of DBS Asia Hub 2 in Hyderabad. As a Digital Transformation Lead, her role enables the unit to sprint ahead in the digital delivery journey. Gayatri has joined from PM Power Consulting where she has worked with several large financial corporates in accelerating their agile transformation journey. Prior to that, Gayatri was part of ThoughtWorks to incorporate clients’ digital transformation using DevOps and Design Thinking principles.? 

With close to 15 years of experience in journalism across beats in multiple mediums, Janani Sampath has been a keen believer in the need for gender parity across realms. As a journalist, she has explored stories that highlighted the need to end gender discrimination. At Avtar, she focuses on content that highlights the transformation Avtar is bringing about in the Indian milieu through its guidance and intervention in the workplaces across sectors

Jyoti is a management graduate in Finance but made a smooth segue to people’s function after being in the business functions. In her career spanning 18 years, she has held several leadership positions in the people’s development function. Jyoti has a hands-on experience in shaping high performing cultures in high growth environments. Given the expertise and experience on the business side Jyoti crafts strategies that meet both business goals and objectives.  

Kannan was Senior Director HR with PepsiCo for over 21 years till March 2018, including 8 years in Vietnam & APAC. Prior to PepsiCo, he had 12 years’ experience working in manufacturing, service and Indian MNC. Kannan is the recipient of the PepsiCo Harvey C Russell – Diversity and Inclusion Award in 2004 and 2014. Chairman’s Award for Corporate Social Responsibility in 2006 and Chairman’s Award for business performance in Vietnam in 2014. He is also a Marshall Goldsmith & Hogan Certified Coach. 

Dr. Kiranmai Dutt Pendyala is the Head of Human Resources at Western Digital, India. Kiranmai brings together a unique blend of keen academic focus and organizational experience. She has close to 3 decades of dynamic organizational design and development experience at national and international levels. She has been the Corporate Vice President, Human Resources at AMD with teams across 30+ countries. Kiranmai is also the Governing Body Member on several Higher Education Institutions/ Deemed Universities and the Hon. Chairperson on the Board of United Way, Hyderabad, a philanthropic organization. Dr. Kiranmai is also an Angel Investor and has been involved for more than a decade in the growth and development of the tech start up community ecosystem as an investor and mentor for various PE firms. 

Komal Taneja has over 15 years of experience in IT industry managing different domains of Infrastructure, Operations, Engineering, Project Management, etc. She joined Mastercard in the year 2018 and currently working as the Vice President managing Business Operations function for a set of products and solutions Mastercard offers. Komal also leads the PRIDE INDIA BRG in Mastercard which is a group of passionate enthusiasts thriving to make an impact across the organization and the LGBTQ+?community by spreading awareness, encouraging inclusion and promote diversity whilst aligning with our corporate values. I also spend a lot of time mentoring and coaching.  

Consulting leader with rich experience in business strategy, transformation, global operations and developing new age customer centric solutions. Keen interests include building new markets and next-gen leadership. Passionate philanthropist contributing towards education and old age care. 

Kunal joined Citi in 2004 as part of Citi IT Analyst Program and since then,  taken on different roles in the technology organization servicing Treasury and Compliance businesses. Over his career, Kunal  has led various key Treasury and Compliance initiatives such as rollout of Cash Management platform to Smith Barney branches, development of global liquidity and regulatory reporting solutions, Preferred Broker implementation in NAM and others.  In 2014, he moved to Pune as the Compliance Technology Site Head to build up strategic employee presence in Pune facilitating  development and delivery of strategic applications for global and regional businesses. He also is the global delivery lead for Case Management and Data Science functions as part of the Global Surveillance organization. 

With over 15 years of journalistic experiences in the print media, Lakshmi has worked in leading business dailies – Business Standard in Delhi and The Hindu Business Line in Chennai. At Avtar, she carefully curates the group’s media presence to align with the group’s over-arching vision on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion and increasing women’s workforce participation. She spearheads the Events function to conceptualize, form strategies and operationalize the events and conferences at Avtar.

In his career spanning 31 years, Mani has spent a large part of his life in sales and marketing out of which he has spent 23 years in Saint Gobain. In his current role, he  heads the Distribution Business of the Glass Business Pan India. Responsible for Topline and Bottom line goals set through an aggressive team of about 100 plus people across India. Responsible for rapid growth and business creations in " Shaping the Future of the Glass business" in India and specially the Trade business. 

Manya Punyani has 17+ years of experience in leading Digital Business Transformations across Consumer Products & Financial Services industries. Manya is currently driving the transformation agenda to deliver a best-in-class customer experience, driving six key shifts - focusing on customer outcomes, solving business problems, embracing the latest technologies, agile and iterative development, cross-functional teams, and keeping innovation at the centre.   

 Vice President – Learning & Research, Avtar Group 

Nandini Murali, PhD is a certified life coach, a suicide prevention and mental health activist, author and a communications, and gender and diversity professional. She has a doctorate in Gender Studies, two postgraduate degrees each in English and Psychology, a diploma in journalism and advanced degrees in teaching English as a Foreign Language from the English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU), Hyderabad, India. She has written five books, including fiction and nonfiction and is currently working on two other books. Her collection of poetry on love, loss and longing can be found at www.wildlfowerpoetry.com. 

Neha is a result driven and seasoned HR professional with around 15 years of progressive HR experience in ITES, consulting & advisory, analytics and industrial software domain. She has been instrumental in driving complex change management interventions and has contributed extensively towards integration of cultures, policies & processes post-merger & acquisition. In her current role, Neha is country HR leader for AVEVA India and is responsible for driving people strategy. With strong belief in enhanced employee experience and continuous improvement, she advocates creativity and brings in innovation in People processes to improve overall engagement.  Neha is a Certified Human Resource Professional (SHRM-SCP) and a certified Insights Discovery Practitioner.   

A seasoned training professional and DEI consultant, Nisha leads and program manages the DEI Training and Development services as part of the Centre of Excellence team at Avtar. She specializes in designing, developing and facilitating training interventions on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion related topics. A women’s career evangelist, she comes with the unique experience of a consultant, learning facilitator and content designer. Her experience spans across various industries such as Hospitality, Education, Corporate Communications, PR and Human Resources. 

Preeti Naval Kumar has been an HR professional for over 12 years now. Currently she is working as the Global People Business Services Director at AB InBev. Preeti was recently recognized as Top 35 HR Leader in 2021 by Economic Times, People Business Consulting & Tampi in 2021 and Top HR 100 under 40 in 2020 by Jombay. She has mentored several youngsters on adaptation to changing trends and how to build your profile from Internal & External Market perspective. She started her career as a People Business Partner in Infosys for 6 years and formulated her journey in key interest area of Rewards & Recognition at HP and Xerox.    

Sailaja has 25+ years of work experience with close to two decades in Banking and Financial Services. She currently heads the Banking, Financial Services & Insurance Operations for Digital Business Operations at Cognizant. She has done a tremendous job of strengthening operations and expanding Retail Banking business. She also took over Hyderabad Center Head responsibilities for Cognizant in 2021. Sailaja is an avid D&I advocate, a fellow of International Women’s Leadership Program and has undertaken executive management courses at Harvard and INSEAD.  

Globally experienced HR leader with experience in Strategic HR & Transformational roles across Banking, Manufacturing and the IT/ITES sectors. Rich experience of proactively partnering with business in identifying HR opportunities and shaping high-performing cultures. Saji’s experience comprises employing human capital practices that attract and retain high-potential talent by integrating organizational goals with individual aspirations. Saji’s expertise is spread across a gamut of functions including business-partnership, leadership development, compensation & benefits, employee relations, performance and talent management, HR Transformation, setting up HR function from a scratch and Organization Design & Re-engineering.  

Soni Kaul has 25+ years of experience in the ICT industry in areas spanning R&D, 3GPP standardization, technology strategy, and software testing. After spending 15 years in Europe, she is currently working in India with Qualcomm as Senior Director, Engineering. Her?strength lies in leading world-class research and standardization teams for developing innovative solutions and driving best-in-class patent portfolios. Her off-the-clock pursuits include traveling, reading, and exploring different cuisines.   

As an HR professional, Susan has spent the last one decade in building, growing and inculcating practices that reflect the success of an organization. An incisive MBA professional, her experience in the HR domain has not only been qualitative and enriching but a relentless learning curve.? Throughout her career, Susan has experimented with various out-of-the-box methods, policies and programs to align my goals with organizational vision and succeeded. She strives for excellence and learn from every experience that comes her way both, personally and professionally. 

A dedicated and passionate Human Resources Leader with over 17 years of extensive experience in all facets of HR including Learning, Diversity, Compensation, Employee Benefits, Talent Management, Organizational Design across Retail and Semiconductor sectors. She has spent most of her career leading Total Rewards & Benefits and Strategic HR Business Partner teams. In her current capacity as a Director L&D, she leads Learning and Development as well as Diversity and Inclusion teams for Lowe’s India.