Nov 2023 – Present · 2 yrs 7 mos · Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Jun 2022 – Oct 2023 · 1 yr 4 mos · Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Mar 2023 – Present · 3 yrs 3 mos · Remote

• Contributing to building one of the most iconic & powerful community for People professionals across the country!

Jun 2022 – Oct 2023 · 1 yr 4 mos · Remote

• Leading all things People and Culture from hire to exit and thirving on the impact being created!
• Scaled the People Success function to deliver visible and measurable business impact. Partnered with senior leaders to identify high impact people initiaves that boost morale and productivity of employees. Drove org wide change management programs while ensuring that the core culture of the company remains intact. Worked closely with People Ops and TA teams to streamline processes and made the overall people functions more data driven.

Nov 2021 – Jun 2022 · 7 mos

• My roles and responsibilities increased along with the company size. New initiatives and steps were taken to cope with the increasing demands of the business, while bearing in mind cost Vs benefit implications:.
• Talent acquisition: Strategized efficiency of the process by single handedly conducting a recruitment drive to hire for multiple tech positions simultaneously and closed all of them within 1 month. Was able to convince some candidates with higher offers to join us by aligning them to the purpose of the company and their long term career goals. Built the Marketing and Presales functions. Proactively built a database of economical external vendors to cater to business needs. CES was maintained between 9 and 10 for all candidates interviewed.
• Org Culture: Started the Hackathon culture to promote organic interactions between team members, idea generation, cross functional interactions and group learning. Architected the Merit Based Career progression culture with openness to feedback. Performance Check-ins became more interactive with suggestions from People being used for continuous improvement. Organized many external talks on a wide range of topics. Got Glassdoor review score of 4.7/5 for the company (continuously taking measures to improve the same).
• New initiatives: Virtual Co-Working spaces, Appreciation Weeks, RnR programs, Focus Group Discussions, Talent sharing sessions, Case Study discussions, Culture Talks and Virtual Team Lunches.

Jul 2019 – Oct 2021 · 2 yrs 3 mos

• After setting up the initial building blocks of the People Services function, I helped build Syook in the following manners:
• Talent Acquisition - Recruited candidates with an entrepreneurial & learning mindset to build the Operations, Design and QA functions. Candidate experience score increased to between 9-10 out of 10 consistently during this period.
• Vision & Mission formation - Organized sessions to conceptualize these with the founders, and communicate the same to help align everyone.
• Leadership development - Conducted leadership & personality development sessions for the CXOs to help build empathy, respect for differences, compassion and emotional intelligence. Received appreciation and praise for the interactive and impactful sessions with customized actionables.
• Performance Management - Developed, disrupted, rebuilt & drove the process to promote meaningful conversations between managers & reportees. Coached managers & employees to take complete ownership for their team's/individual development.
• Statutory compliances - Took care of setting up the PF for all people, Group Medical Insurance, organizing PoSH workshops, setting up the PoSH Policy, Anti Harrassment Policy, etc.
• Culture building - Started the culture of unlimited leaves. Created the People Handbook, conducted Cross Team Connections sessions, Open Houses, Skip Level Meetings, leadership thought sharing sessions, etc. Architected the change from office culture to remote work. Took proactive measures like pay corrections, one-on-ones & course sponsorships to curb attrition during the pandemic.
• Organized ESOPs provisions for the people, while clearly explaining the policies, pros & cons of the same. Encouraged extreme transparency during these sessions to minimize any assumptions & build trust.
• In addition to the above I also handled coordination of legal requirements for the funding round during this time. Onboarded the right insurance for people by liaising with external partners.

Mar 2019 – Jun 2019 · 3 mos

• I joined as part of the initial team, which meant that a lot of processes needed setting up from scratch. I enjoyed juggling a variety of tasks that were and were not part of my role.
• Some of the People related tasks I handled were:
• Setting up the People Operations function to ensure that all the people data were collected and stored in an organized manner.
• Took ownership for payroll and coordinated seamlessly with the finance team to ensure timely payments to all stakeholders
• Set up talent acquisition processes to ensure a smooth candidate experience. The CES generally ranged between 7 to 8 out of 10 during this time.
• Set up the office space to ensure that employees had their own personal spaces which they could decorate as per their needs
• Conducted fun at work initiatives like weekly sessions, birthday celebrations and office outings
• Apart from the People Experience related work, I also worked on the following based on my stint as a Product Manager:
• Handled presentations to be made to clients/investors
• Ensured that the legal documentations for NDAs and Partner Agreements were accurate
• Posted content for the company on LinkedIn on a regular basis to improve visibility
• Contributed to organizing Product ideation sessions to help brainstorm and generate more ideas

Dec 2017 – May 2018 · 5 mos · Bengaluru Area, India

• Was responsible for the fulfillment, engagement and productivity of 300+ people. Developed excellent relationships with employees at all levels from freshers to the leadership team. The work and efforts contributed to:
• Increasing the Human Capital Business Partnering team score by 1500% within one quarter at the Bangalore office. I was one of the key POC for employee engagement and people matters. Addressing them proactively, effectively and with complete transparency is what enabled us to achieve this.
• Handled skip level meetings and ensured specific feedback to improve managerial capacities. This feed back was used to conduct leadership sessions that had higher impact.
• Handled the complete Performance Management process for large accounts, while infusing the idea of having genuine discussions that are empathetic, fair and with clear actionables for both parties involved.
• Took up fun-at-work initiatives such as off-sites and internal sports leagues.
• Owned the Human Capital dashboard for the leadership team with key metrics and performance indicators with specific inputs for better people leadership.
• Owned the smooth organization of employee on-boarding and inductions, as well as maintenance of the training MIS.

Feb 2016 – May 2017 · 1 yr 3 mos · Bangalore

• Over 3,000 schools have benefited from Vidyartha, having helped 2,00,000 students improve their scores and find their calling. We believe every student is unique and have got a customised learning guidance platform that helps schools cater to their distinct learning needs and bring out their full potential. This works in 3 steps: Identify. Evaluate. Excel.
• I was brought on board to build the team from scratch and manage the entire product (interests, aptitudes & personality assessments) from market requirements to delivery, and engagement
• I carried out market research to understand customer expectations/market requirements to establish the different features needed in the product
• I built the entire team of 30+ people including the product development team, counselling team and the team of subject matter experts for the content development
• I created and maintained the product plan (strategy and roadmap definition), as well as designed the product features while setting the priorities clearly
• I enjoyed driving product development across teams (primarily Technology, then Customer Support & Sales), through PRDs, requirement clarifications and finalizations, scope definitions, and coordination between teams
• I provided the sales team with the necessary technical expertise to sell the product – which involved both printed and electronic documentation & product training.
• I have handled clients – both overseas and in India, from implementation to feedback
• I used learning analytics insights to develop algorithms for product enhancement and used the existing data to personalize the product

Jul 2009 – Nov 2014 · 5 yrs 4 mos · Chennai Area, India

• I did my Ph.D. in the area of holistic Employee Experience and Work-Family Balance. This is an area that drew my interest, since I wanted to gain a strong, deep understanding of what it take to create meaningful and impactful people experiences, which would improve performance, retention and overall satisfaction with work.
• My research suggests that an interplay of personal and social support factors are crucial in enabling the employee to realize a great Work-Family Balance and Quality of Work-Life. The study used data from customer-facing employees in the banking and hotel industries (where attrition rates are extremely high). Based on a number of one-on-one conversations with employees and employers alike, I understood the kind of effort and commitment required from both sides to ensure a great work experience for people.
• My Ph.D. is a proof of my keen interest in both research work and statistical analysis. I thoroughly enjoy crunching numbers to discover meaningful patterns and understand why such patterns even emerge in the first place.

Jun 2008 – Jun 2009 · 1 yr · Chennai

• Aiding the development of psychometric tools to be used for ethnographic research in the Indian villages.
• Data collection and analysis of personal narratives
• Developing assessment tools for recruitment of Kshetriya Gramin Financial Service officers'
• Helping with employee engagement activities like offsite, fun at work, etc.