Ved is a Social Development Entrepreneur & Author who has founded and developed multiple social development organisations which have been successfully working to transform rural livelihood opportunities and poverty alleviation among the poorest of the poor in India’s villages.
Laurence is a Coach and consultant with over twenty years of experience working in leadership and organisational development across a wide range of commercial sectors. He has extensive international experience and has worked in over 25 countries across Europe, India, Asia and the United States.
Manisha is an experienced professional with 25 years in marketing & advertising, strategy, innovation, digital channels, product management and customer experience across FMCG, Banking and Consumer Tech industries.
Dr. Anup Wadhawan, recently retired as an Indian Administrative Service officer from the position of Commerce Secretary to the Govt. of India. During a career spanning 36 years, Dr. Wadhawan served in many important ministries including Finance and Commerce.
Ved is a Social Development Entrepreneur & Author who has founded and developed multiple social development organisations which have been successfully working to transform rural livelihood opportunities and poverty alleviation among the poorest of the poor in India’s villages.
An aeronautics engineer from IIT – Kanpur and a management graduate from IIM-Ahmedabad, Ved left behind lucrative jobs from the corporate world in pursuit of solutions for eradicating poverty and providing livelihood opportunities for the rural poor of India.
Ved is the Founder and Former CEO of SRIJAN (Self-Reliant Initiatives through Joint Action) which features among the top non-profit organisations in India in the sustainable Rural Livelihood Management space and empowerment of rural women. In 2016 he founded the Buddha Fellowship Program, a unique platform offering a complete eco-system for young emerging leaders from India’s premier educational institutions such as IITs and IIMs an opportunity to build development enterprises. Ved is also the Founder and Managing Director of Srijan Infratech & Development Services (SIDS), which offers HR solutions and strategies to implement rural development programs of the Government of India.
Ved co-authored the book Human Resource Strategies to Build Pro-Poor Institutions (published by McGraw Hill Education), which has been very well received and circulated among the various Indian Ministries and Government bodies. Ved has also contributed articles and papers to the National Advisory Committee (NAC), The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Washington and The Overseas Development Institute (ODI), London.
Dr. Anup Wadhawan, recently retired as an Indian Administrative Service officer from the position of Commerce Secretary to the Govt. of India. During a career spanning 36 years, Dr. Wadhawan served in many important ministries including Finance and Commerce. Among other assignments, he was the Director General of Foreign Trade and represented India at the World Trade Organization. He played a critical role in the liberalization of foreign portfolio investment rules during his tenure in the Capital Markets Division of the Department of Economic Affairs.
Dr. Wadhawan has a distinguished academic record. He is a PhD in Economics from Duke University and obtained an MA in economics with a high rank from the prestigious Delhi School of Economics. Dr. Wadhawan has over 20 papers, including publications, to his name on various economic policy / developmental matters, including work done during a tenure at the World Bank.
Dr. Wadhawan is an authority on foreign trade promotion and trade negotiations, and has led many critical and highly contested multilateral, regional and bilateral trade negotiations on behalf of the Govt. of India. As a representative of the Ministry of Finance and as a Department of Commerce officer, he has addressed audiences across the globe on economic policy, foreign trade, capital markets, banking, insurance, and pensions sector issues, involving a wide array of stakeholders ranging from various state governments, multilateral / bilateral / regional forums, industry associations to export promotion councils etc.
Dr. Wadhawan has held Board level positions in many organizations including Government E-Marketplace, Chair-National Export Insurance Account in the Export Credit Guarantee Corporation, Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India, Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority, Agriculture Insurance Company of India, Bank of India, Natl. Financial Holdings Company Ltd / SUUTI, Hindustan Diamond Company Pvt Limited, and the Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council
Laurence is a Founding Director of Heresy Consulting, a psychodynamic leadership and organisational development consultancy. He also works as a Practicum Supervisor on the INSEAD Executive Masters in Change and is visiting faculty on the OD Certification Programme at the Tata Institute for Social Sciences. He has over 25 years’ of experience working in leadership and organizational development across a wide range of commercial sectors and international contexts. Prior to joining Heresy Consulting, he was the Director of Group Resourcing & Development for Prudential plc, where he was responsible for strengthening leadership capability and performance across the Group. He has been a board member and trustee of Regents University London.
He holds an MSc in the Psychodynamics of Human Development (Jungian) from the British Psychotherapy Foundation & an MBA from Lancaster University. He trained as a coach & coach supervisor with the Tavistock Institute and has also completed the Foundation in Group Analysis at the Institute of Group Analysis. He also holds a Certificate in Ecopsychology from the Pacifica Graduate Institute.
He lives in Brighton in the UK.
Manisha is an experienced professional with 25 years in marketing & advertising, strategy, innovation, digital channels, product management and customer experience across FMCG, Banking and Consumer Tech industries. She has worked with big brands like Unilever, Colgate Palmolive, Axis Bank and Uber.
Manisha is also an entrepreneur and the founder of Mojarto (erstwhile IndianArtCollectors) which is India’s largest online platform for contemporary art.
Manisha is now a sustainability champion, a permaculture practitioner and teacher. She is the founder of Aanandaa Permaculture Project - a place of learning & inspiration from the natural world. Under this project, she has transformed 12 acres of degenerated land into a lush green permaculture food forest where she grows her own food, harvests over 40 million litres of water each year and has planted 7000+ trees. She conducts training & workshops for those interested in learning from nature & healing the planet both online & at her farm..
She is an alumnus of IIM Bangalore (1997) and holds a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged.
orem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged.
Rajesh is a General Management professional with over three decades of experience across industries and business functions. He was last Executive Director on the Board of Axis Bank Ltd responsible for multiple Governance functions under the Corporate Centre of the Bank.
Arvind Mehrotra is currently working as a Strategic Advisor, Board advisor, and Risk-Technology Advisor with multiple organizations in the startup and enterprise space. Arvind carries with himself 34 years’ experience. In the last role at NIIT Tech, Arvind was President & Global Head for IMS Service Line.
Karan is a banking industry veteran with over 33 years of experience across multiple banking domains with private sector, multinational and public sector banks. He was, till recently, the Chief Business Relations Officer (CBRO) of Axis Bank Ltd. and was responsible for forming and maintaining relationships with Central and State governments, regulatory bodies, and independent investigative agencies.
Reema has over 20 years experience in the Banking & Financial Services Industry having worked with large Indian and multi-national organisations. She has helped set-up and scale Global Capability Centres for large Banks like Royal Bank of Scotland, Bank of America, UBS, American Express & Macquarie out of India across a range of business functions spanning Operations, Technology, Finance & HR.
Rajesh is a General Management professional with over three decades of experience across industries and business functions. He was last Executive Director on the Board of Axis Bank Ltd responsible for multiple Governance functions under the Corporate Centre of the Bank.
Rajesh is presently Chairman of Axis Trustee Services Ltd and serves on the Board of Max Life Insurance. He is also a trustee of the Axis Bank Foundation. Previously, he has served on the Boards of Axis Finance Limited and Axis PE.
Rajesh serves on SES Governance ESG Advisory Board is also a Member of the CII Climate Change Council. He is on the advisory Council of Buddha Fellowship and the Museum of Solutions, Mumbai.
Prior to joining Axis Bank, Rajesh spent 20 years at Tata Group across group companies, starting with Rallis India Limited where he handled various responsibilities in Manufacturing, Human Resources, Supply Chain Management, Institutional Sales, and Exports functions. He went on to head Tata Administrative Services (TAS) for the Tata Group. He also worked with Tata Global Beverages responsible for integrating various global businesses and products of the company under a common supply chain.
Rajesh is married to Hema, a successful homemaker and together they are proud parents to Mallika, Arooshi and Anshul. He devotes his free time to road travels, poetry and collecting music on Vinyl.
Arvind Mehrotra is currently working as a Strategic Advisor, Board advisor and Risk-Technology Advisor with multiple organizations in the startup and enterprise space. Arvind carries with himself 34 years’ experience. In the last role at NIIT Tech, Arvind was President & Global Head for IMS Service Line. Cloud Service Line & was responsible for automation strategy besides holding executive oversight of CISO, CIO, and GDPR functions. Prior to that he was President at NIIT Technologies Ltd (Now Coforge), where he led the Asia Pacific geography, including the middle east region.
He has worked with other firms like Business India Group, UDI Yellow Page, and United India Periodicals in various capacities.
Karan is a banking industry veteran with over 33 years of experience across multiple banking domains with private sector, multinational and public sector banks. He was, till recently, the Chief Business Relations Officer (CBRO) of Axis Bank Ltd. and was responsible for forming and maintaining relationships with Central and State governments, regulatory bodies, and independent investigative agencies.
Karan’s forte is his understanding of a client’s requirements and delivering tailored solutions that rise to changing technology and regulatory regimes. He is an alliance specialist and expertly forges long-term business relationships with all stakeholders in an ecosystem. He has leveraged these skills across the years, collaborating with organisations like UNIDO Cluster Development, Export Promotion Councils and MSME industry associations to disseminate knowledge of credit, Forex and digital products
Karan is a regular speaker at industry bodies, colleges, and trade associations. He conducts regular webinars/seminars for the National Productivity Council and the CII.
Karan is the founding partner of an MSME advisory and implementation firm. He is also an independent consultant with an EdTech start-up and an NGO.
Reema has over 20 years’ experience in the Banking & Financial Services Industry, having worked with both Indian and multinational organisations. She has helped set-up and scale Global Capability Centres (GCC’s) for large Banks like American Express, Bank of America, UBS, Macquarie & RBS out of India across a range of business functions spanning Operations, Technology, Finance & HR.
Reema has actively contributed to the growth story of organisations by leading & supporting business transformation, process excellence, transitions & change management, M&A support, risk management, pre-sales solutions, strategy, governance & client partnerships across a host of customer facing & business facing mandates.
A passionate Project Management Professional (PMP) , she has served as a jury member with PMP India. She is also a Certified Life Coach from Coaching Foundation of India and aspires to contribute to society by helping individuals develop meaningful relationships and life goals.
Mohindar Kumar has spent nearly 20 years with the Reserve Bank of India where he developed an expertise in all segments of the financial system, including rich experience in the regulations, processes and operating systems of
Sunil has over the last 25 years, worked in Consulting, FMCG and Manufacturing, with a significant part of his career in people consulting, working for a boutique consulting firm and later with one of the Big 4’s, in the areas of
Sujata Deshmukh is an expert in conceptualising, designing, implementing and sustaining innovative interventions in the areas of Institution Shaping, Culture Shaping and Leadership Shaping. Her ability to appreciate and
C Y Ajgaonkar has spent over 35 years working across industries and organisations, most of them with Eicher and RPG. Inspired by exposure to manufacturing excellence at the beginning of his career, Shekhar, as he is fondly
Mohindar Kumar has spent nearly 20 years with the Reserve Bank of India where he developed an expertise in all segments of the financial system, including rich experience in the regulations, processes and operating systems of Commercial Banks and Non-Banking Finance Companies (NBFCs).
Over the years, he has strengthened his understanding of financial systems in India and abroad, with a focus on understanding their approach towards developing prudential regulations, best governance practices and internal controls.
Mohindar Kumar has been part of various committees appointed by RBI and the Government of India (Ministry of Finance) aimed at integrating the regulations of NBFCs with the overall financial system, to enable them to perform a supplementary and complementary role to the banking system. He has also spent 3 years involved in the regulation and supervision of two large commercial banks under the Risk Based Supervision newly introduced by RBI, predominantly working on assessment and mitigation of Governance and Regulatory Risks.
Mohindar Kumar has served as a core member of the high level team of RBI top management for conceptualising the development-oriented regulations, where he has acquired a unique insight into the intent and perspective of each regulatory and supervisory practice, and its proven strengths.
He currently serves as an advisor to some of the most reputed RBI regulated entities, NBFCs and business houses for their in-house financial entities including Governance Audit.
Sunil has over the last 25 years, worked in Consulting, FMCG and Manufacturing, with a significant part of his career in people consulting, working for a boutique consulting firm and later with one of the Big 4’s, in the areas of Leadership, Talent, Culture and Change Management.
The experiences with client leaders and teams over a wide array of assignments and the personal conviction have defined the belief that lies at the heart of what he does. There are inherent positivity and deep reservoirs of energy waiting to be channelized and put to use. Pragyan is the venture which is committed to helping leaders discover their meaning and connect with their energy and humanness to make a difference.
In his previous role, Sunil was the Change Leader and Diversity & Inclusion Leader at PwC and a Partner with the Consulting SBU at PwC.
He loves reading about history, especially war, and deriving lessons for leadership and team effectiveness.
Sujata Deshmukh is an expert in conceptualising, designing, implementing and sustaining innovative interventions in the areas of Institution Shaping, Culture Shaping and Leadership Shaping. Her ability to appreciate and integrate business realities while approaching people related initiatives is unique. She coaches several CEOs and their top teams to create powerful visions, align on strategy, shape organization culture, build capabilities and lead their teams effectively. Her style is uniquely impactful, leveraging on expertise, insight, empathy and humor.
Over the past 25 years, Sujata has developed expertise in Articulating Vision & Values, Enhancing Top Team Effectiveness, Creating High Performing Teams, Designing Bespoke Leadership Development Journeys, Senior Leadership Assessment, Executive Coaching, Culture Transformation & HR Transformation.
Sujata has designed and led strategic leadership initiatives across diverse organisations, including the social sector. She has engaged with 200 clients across 17 sectors spanning Asia and Africa, assessed more than a 1000 managers herself and impacted more than 25,000 people in her consulting journey, both individually and as part of Tutul Consulting.
Sujata served as an Independent Director on the board of a public limited company for 2 years and was part of the National Executive Board of NHRDN, India’s largest HR network. She is associated with several academic institutions such as XLRI, TISS, NITIE, ISB and SP Jain and is a speaker/ curator at several seminars and a Tedx speaker. Sujata is committed to spending 15% of her time working pro bono with the social sector.
C Y Ajgaonkar has spent over 35 years working across industries and organisations, most of them with Eicher and RPG. Inspired by exposure to manufacturing excellence at the beginning of his career, Shekhar, as he is fondly known, developed an expertise in operational excellence and organizational transformation and spent a decade at Eicher Consultancy Services helping many manufacturing and service organizations achieve excellence.
For the past 15 years, C Y Ajgaonkar led the transformation journey at RPG group, particularly at CEAT, where his efforts won the Deming Prize for the entire company.
Prior to CEAT he led TQM journey at Eicher Tractor and successfully certified their plant in Alwar for TQM. As a consultant at Eicher Consultancy, CY Ajgaonkar helped many clients including L&T, Marico, Rallis, GCMF (Amul), Pidilite implement TQM. Today, he is regarded as an expert of Japanese manufacturing and management system.
Shekhar is trained and certified facilitator of LSIP by Kathleen Dann Miller, the innovator of the concept. He has worked closely with organisations like Deepak Fertilizer, Rallis India, Hindalco, Indus Tower and L&T in their journey of organisation transformation to develop and deploy their mission, vision, values, customer centric approach and business excellence as they worked towards the Deming Prize.
C Y Ajgaonkar is the Founder and Proprietor of QBM Associates, through which he helps many Indian companies achieve excellence and attain recognition globally. He is a senior member of Indian Society for Quality and member of Deming Advisory Committee of JUSE for Indian companies.
