Diversity & Inclusion Journal India

Editorial Board

Editor-in-chief - Prof. Vasanthi Srinivasan

Associate Professor, OB & HRM

IIM, Bangalore

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Prof. Vasanthi Srinivasan

Professor Vasanthi Srinivasan is a Professor in the Organisational Behaviour and Human Resource Management Area at IIM Bangalore. A Fellow Management (PhD equivalent) from IIM Bangalore, she has designed and delivered several sessions on leadership development and career management. She has also consulted extensively for both Indian and multinational companies in the field of leadership development. She has designed, developed, and delivered programmes to build the leadership pipeline for organizations. Prof. Vasanthi has worked with technology and R&D organizations to build their technical leadership talent. She has also designed and delivered “Tanmatra: Women in Leadership” – a leadership development programme exclusively for senior women leaders in business in collaboration with Catalyst India and IBM.

She was an Indian Council for Cultural Relations Chair Professor for Corporate responsibility at the HHL Graduate School of Management Leipzig, Germany for the period 2012-13 on deputation. She was also a British Council Visiting Scholar at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility at the Nottingham University Business School. Her research interests are in the field of Multi-generations in the Workplace, Women in Management and Boards, Ethics Teaching in Business Schools, HRM in Rapid Growth Organizations and Ethics, and CSR in Micro, Small and Mid-sized enterprises.

Managing Editor - Dr. Saundarya Rajesh

Founder – President

AVTAR Career Creators & FLEXI Careers India

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Dr. Saundarya Rajesh

Dr. Saundarya Rajesh, a Ph.D in Women’s workforce participation from SRM University, is the Founder-President of AVTAR Career Creators and FLEXI Careers India. She is an MBA from Central University Pondicherry and a gold medallist in English Literature from Madras University. Dr. Rajesh founded the AVTAR I-WIN (Interim Women-managers’ Interface Network) in 2005 which is India’s first service, providing Interim Women Professionals (women professionals on career breaks) part-time or flexi-time corporate career options.

She has authored several papers related to Diversity & Inclusion. Saundarya leads tripartite (community-organization-individual) engagements in engaging with diverse talents, Diversity training, Diversity Audits, Sensitization Training and Diversity Recruitment. Under her guidance and mentoring, India has seen the advent of formal Second Career programs for women, initiated by several large organizations. She also anchors research based consulting solutions for organizations in the areas of Flexidizing and Unbundling jobs, Diversity events and Skill building initiatives for women. She has been recognized by Industry, society and government, winning a slew of awards such as the Yuvashakthi Entrepreneur of the year award 2007, SCOPE Woman Exemplar award 2008, CavinKare’s Innovation Award 2011, TiE Stree Shakthi Woman entrepreneur of the year award 2011, India Today’s Business Wizards award 2011, the FICCI woman entrepreneur award 2012, NEST Entrepreneur of the Year award for 2013 and Naturals Extraordinary Woman Award 2014.

Saundarya is also frequently quoted in business papers and mainstream newspapers for her views on women’s workforce participation as also for the research she has spearheaded in creating a sustainable workplace of the future. She is a much sought after keynote speaker in events on women empowerment. Saundarya attributes all her work to the inspiration she derives from Goddess Abhirami of Thirukadayur.

Editorial Committee Members

Dr. PVR Murthy

We pay our respects to the Late Dr. PVR Murthy, who was instrumental in the design of the DIJI journal.

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Dr. PVR Murthy

We pay our respects to the Late Dr. PVR Murthy, who was instrumental in the design of the DIJI journal.

Dr. PVR Murthy, a product of Andhra University, IIT Kharagpur, and IIM Calcutta has close to three decades of experience in the Human Resources Development (HRD) space. He underwent advanced training in National Training Laboratories (USA), in Japan and in Europe. He was with the HRD function of GSK and the TVS group and was one of the first few in the country to carry the designation of HRD. He founded and currently runs an executive search firm. Has actively contributed to the field of HRD through serving on the boards and academic councils of a number of management schools and through forums like CII(Confederation of Indian Industry )both at regional and national level as also through his many articles. Dr. Murthy is currently on the National Committee of CII on Skills and HR for the second consecutive year and has previously served on the boards of Indian Society for Applied Behavioral Science (ISABS), and IIHMHR and was the immediate past national secretary of NHRD Network. As a founder editor of NHRDN Journal, he established the journal to global standards in HRD in a short span of time.

Ms. Sandhya Vasudevan

Managing Director

Deutsche Bank Group

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Ms. Sandhya Vasudevan

Sandhya is the Managing Director & Chief Operating Officer for the Deutsche Bank Group in India. She has rich industry experience in the financial services sector, technology and off-shored services in different roles ranging from operations, technology, strategic development [capability build and looking at business development in rapidly developing markets], business engineering, process strategy & architecture, etc and has been involved with a number of integrations the last one being Thomson Reuters in India. She started her career in the TVS group and has since worked in organizations such as Guardian Royal Exchange / AXA, Thomson Reuters and now with Deutsche Bank.

Sandhya is an active industry leader and has been involved with NASSCOM, CII and other forums over the years. With NASSCOM she has been part of the national Executive Committee and the Regional Council and is currently a Trustee with NASSCOM Foundation. She is part of CII Committee on Integrity & Transparency in Governance & CII National Committee on Knowledge Management & Business Transformation Best Practices Sharing. She is actively involved with many Diversity and Inclusion forums including being a jury member for NASSCOM D&I awards. She is on the board of Swiss Re’s Shared Services and is a member of World President’s Organisation (YPO/ WPO).

Sandhya has an MBA in Marketing and an MA in History.

Dr. Kalpana Kosalram

Assistant Professor

SRM University

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Dr. Kalpana Kosalram

DR. B. KALPANA KOSALRAM is Assistant Professor, School of Public Health, SRM University, Chennai. A doctorate in Behavioral Sciences she has extensive academic experience in the area of Organisational Management and Human Resources. Over the last 25 years, she has worked with many premier institutes in India and abroad. She is also a trained counselor who has a rich experience in career guidance and career counseling. Dr. Kalpana is on the board of Personas Solutions Pvt Ltd and is a consultant to many corporates seeking behavioural solutions. She has published in several journals of national and international repute and is on the review committee of several journals in her area of expertise.

Mr. Girish A.S

Head – Human Resources & Administration

Apollo Tyres Ltd

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Mr. Girish A.S

Born to senior Government servants in the year 1956, Mr. A.S. Girish graduated in Chemistry and finished his MSW (Master of social Work) from Loyola College, Trivandrum as the gold Medalist from University of Kerala. He is additionally qualified in Law. Mr. Girish currently heads the HR function of Apollo Tyres Ltd, Kerala (two plants with a workforce of 5000 in a labour sensitive state like Kerala) with which he has been associated for the last 22 years, prior to which he was with the Thapar group afer a brief stint at a public sector enterprise.

He has been at the helm of various talent management programmes, employee engagement initiatives and CSR projects and has sound exposure to all HR and IR policies on Performance Management, Spiral Career, Organisational Restructuring, etc. He has also been successful in managing multiple trade unions and is a much sought after speaker with academic institutions.

Mr. Girish has had a long association with various professional bodies and is currently the National Vice President of National Institute of Personnel Management (NIPM), Convenor, HR & IR Panel of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Kerala State Council., National Council Member of Indian Society for Training & Development (ISTD) and a Managing Committee Member of Kerala Management Association (KMA). He was awarded the “Manager of the Year” by KMA in 2004 and “Fellow” of NIPM in 2008. He attributes his success to his family!

Prof. MJ Xavier

Executive Director

VIT Business School

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Prof. MJ Xavier

Prof. M J Xavier obtained his Doctorate in Management from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta in the year 1984. He has been a teacher, trainer and consultant for close to 30 years. He has authored three books and published more than 100 articles in Journals and Magazines in India and Abroad. His book `Marketing in the New Millennium’ won the DMA-Escorts Award for the Best Management Book of the Year 1999.

He has taught in premier Institutions like IIM Bangalore, XLRI Jamshedpur, IFMR Chennai, Great Lakes Institute of Management Chennai and IIM Ranchi. He has served as Visiting Faculty to a number of business schools in India and abroad including The University of Buckingham, U.K., Post Graduate Institute of Management, Sri Lanka, American university of Armenia in Armenia, The Texas Christian University, U.S.A., California Polytechnic State University, U.S.A. and S P Jain Institute of Management, Singapore and Dubai. He is currently serving as the Executive Director at VIT University. His research interests include CRM, market analytics, strategic marketing and spirituality. He is a recipient of more than 10 awards for academic excellence & leadership.

Mr. Karthik Ekambaram

VP – Consulting Services

FLEXI Careers India

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Mr. Karthik Ekambaram

Karthik is an MBA with 18 years of experience in business analysis and consulting. Starting his career in IT business consulting, Karthik moved into HR consulting handling recruitment for a number of IT companies.

A deep and abiding interest in business consulting has prompted him to look at Diversity & Inclusion as a business driver for organizations by employing it as a talent, CSR and business strategy tool. He has carried out Job Analysis, Time and Motion studies at several client sites for the purpose of Flexidizing and Unbundling of jobs to create flexi-career tracks in organizations interested in implementing flexible working options for their employees.

Karthik has worked on many research studies on Diversity & Inclusion, Second career women, Generations in the workforce, Flexible working and Work-life balance. He has conducted Diversity & Inclusion audits for a number of organisations. Karthik has also co-authored several papers that have been published in Journals of national and international repute.

Dr. Asha Bhandarker

Professor, Organizational Behaviour

IMI, Delhi

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Dr. Asha Bhandarker

Dr Asha Bhandarker is well known in the field of HR and Leadership Studies in India as a scholar, consultant and researcher. Prior to her current assignment at IMI-Delhi, she was the Raman Munjal Chair Professor of Leadership Studies as well as Dean Research and Consulting at MDI-Gurgaon. Dr Bhandarker has also had stints as faculty at Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad and the Institute of Public Enterprise in Hyderabad. She has worked very actively training, researching as well as consulting in the corporate world for the last 30 years and is one of a handful of management professors who has worked closely with the corporate sector (both public and private sectors) for decades in the areas of training, organization development and capability building. She has the distinction of being one of the very few professors working with Board levels and Top management teams of many organizations like Maruti, Du Pont, Bayer, Corporation Bank, SAIL on issues of Culture Building, Leadership Development and Organizational Vision Building. She is a recognized HR expert and has been invited on many board level HR committees some of them being Bank of Baroda, Corporation Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Punjab National Bank, and Dena Bank. She is a member of the Internal Complaints Committee of Fluor Daniels India. She is passionate about women at the workplace and has organized roundtables in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore to bring out practices in the corporate sector to issues of sexual harassment. She is currently pursuing research on the theme Leadership Beyond Gender.

Dr Bhandarker is actively associated with professional bodies and has addressed participants of national and international conferences organized by CII, NHRDN, ISTD, IFTDO, NIPM and AIMA.

She has had the honor of being awarded the highly coveted Senior Fulbright Fellowship for research in the USA, where she studied the best business schools and their practices and pedagogies.

She has published 7 books and 40 research papers in peer reviewed, national and international journals. She has received accolades and awards including the Senior Fulbright Fellowship for research, Best Paper award, Best Case award and the Best Teacher award.

She has widely travelled across USA, Europe and Asia and has rich experience of Teaching and Consulting in India and abroad in places like Italy, France, USA, Egypt, Mauritius and Sri Lanka.

She has an M.A. in Psychology and PhD in Business Administration from Osmania University Hyderabad; and has acquired Advanced Behavioral Science Training from leading centres like NTL in USA, Tavistock Institute in London and Centre for Transpersonal Psychology, London.