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S P Jain hosted its second annual HR Conclave 2012: Human Capital Powering Asia Growth, on 16th March 2012 in Singapore. The HR Conclave 2012 was designed around the experiences and expertise of best-in-class HR and business executives, and layered with S P Jain’s research on key issues of Human Capital practices in Asia, to provide a real-world Asian environment. Thought leaders, industry stalwarts and senior HR experts convened to explore best-practices in Human Capital Management (HCM). Panel discussions focused on what the best-in-class are doing currently to achieve success, the pitfalls they are avoiding and the technologies and services that are enabling their success.

Mr. Nitish Jain, President of S P Jain, in his welcome address stressed on the need for close partnership of Industry with Academia from B-schools in nurturing global business leaders to handle dramatic changes occurring in the Asian business environment.

Dr. Mark Crosby, Former Dean, Global MBA and Former Dean, Master of Global Business introduced S P Jain’s unique three-city model full time management programs. He stressed on the importance of decision-making skills in nurturing future business leaders and briefed on the efforts of S P Jain in making decision-making as an area of competence for its students. He also made reference to S P Jain’s unique Passport to Excellence (P2E) program that helps business students to improve communication and leadership skills.

Prof. Sundaram Rajagopalan, Dean of Executive Education at S P Jain as Conclave convener initiated the proceedings by introducing the theme of the conference “Human Capital Powering Asian Growth”. In setting the agenda he related to the drivers of Human Capital and the role that business leaders and HR professionals need to play in order to lead their companies to business excellence in ‘Asian century’ . He also outlined the key HR Challenges in Asia as war for talent, building leadership bench strength, managing multigenerational workforce, employee engagement and retention, talent retention and reinventing organization.

The Guest of Honor, Mr. Pradeep Pant, President of Asia Pacific at Kraft Foods delivered the Keynote address on “Driving Business Excellence in Asia through Human Capital”. Mr. Pant emphasized on the need to have right skills & capabilities, right enablers along with passion and engagement as the key to successful profitable organizations. He observed that organizations which will keep a ruthless focus of operating in areas where they excel will be the ones who will be able to survive. He emphasized on the need to provide employees with a good environment to work in and suggested flexible working hours, diversity of thoughts, gender and culture, DNA of innovation, experimentation and risk taking as enablers of good working environment for Asia.

S P Jain as a leading business school in the context of the theme of the conclave conducted a survey for understanding challenges of managing Human Capital in Asia. The objective of this survey was to gain participants’ perspective on drivers of business change. Prof. Veena Jadhav, Director of Industry Interface Projects at S P Jain presented the survey results which provided a good background to initiate the panel discussions on key drivers of human capital management in Asia.

Mr. Jerry Hanson, Talent Resource Manager of Asia Pacific at Gallup acted as a chairperson for panel discussions on the issue of managing emotional engagement with employees. Other panelists who joined the lively discussion included Mr. Manish Verma, Human Resources of Asia at Cargill, Ms. Melissa Bailey, Managing Director at Corporate Executive Board Asia Pte. Ltd. and Mr. Kumar Abhishek, Vice President of Human Resources at Bank of America Merrill lynch.

The second panel discussion following lunch highlighted the strategies to manage net generation. Mr. D. N. Prasad, Head of People Technology and Operations of Asia Pacific at Google acted as the chairperson of an illustrious panel comprising of Mr. David Heng, Head of Regional Learning and Capability Development at CIMB Group, Mr. David Lim, Senior Director of Staffing of Asia Markets (excluding Japan) at Quintiles East Asia and Mr. Simon Kelly, Head of Strategic Accounts of Asia Pacific at LinkedIn. The panel stressed that businesses need to create a vibrant ecosystem for encouraging talent by making opportunities transparent, encouraging networking and informal environment development and operationalizing and improving the internal transfer process.

The last panel discussion on HR Transformation process was chaired by Mr. Mark McCutcheon, General Manager of Singapore and Malaysia at Development Dimensions International. The panelists included Mr. Mario Ferraro, Director of Head Human Capital Consulting of S. E. Asia at Deloitte Consulting, Ms. Brinda Rani Raju, Deputy Head of HR & Organizational Development at Tata Consultancy Services in China and Mr. Virendra Shelar, Asst. General Manager of Regional Human Resources in Asia Pacific at Sony Electronics. The panel discussed ways to lead HR transformation process in Asia.

All three panel discussions evoked substantial interest from the audience with a very high level of participation in the Q&A session after each panel very effectively handled by respectively panel chairs.

The conclave concluded with the valedictory address by Guest of Honor Mdm. Ho Geok Choo, Chief Executive Officer at Human Capital Singapore (HCS). She concluded the HR Conclave on a positive note defining value add proposition as ready mindset, capacity development and adaptability. She stressed that Singapore’s economy has gone through a roller coaster and the fundamental levers to bring out change will be to change mindsets and enhance adaptability.

Click here to view more details of the conclave

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