The Indian CEO: A Portrait of Excellence

Signe M Spencer is Senior Consultant at HayGroup, in the McClelland Center for Research and Innovation. A graduate in psychology from the University of Chicago, she also studied M.Ed. in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard. At HayGroup, Ms. Spencer has worked with clients such as IBM, Tyco, Standard and Poors, BAE Systems, Catholic Health Association, Huawei, Singapore Ministry of Education, Novelis, PepsiCo, Seton Hospitals, Delphi, and many others, developing leadership competency models, a range of implementation strategies and high-stakes assessments. Her work has included all aspects of competency research, including integrating competency findings across a wide variety of jobs and improving methods of competency research, designing and validating competency applications, and providing individual feedback and coaching to executives. In addition, she designs interactive on-line tutorials to teach HayGroup’s motivational and managerial concepts and to facilitate competency development. She is co-author of Competency Assessment Methods (1992) and Competence at Work (1993).

Tharuma Rajah is Partner and Regional Director, Asia, Hay Group. He has a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of London and is a member of the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn, UK.

S A Narayan is Director, Human Resources, at Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited. A graduate in science and law from Bombay University, he specialized in Personnel Management at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences in Mumbai. He is a member of the National Institute of Personnel Management and National HRD Network. He is a member of HR Committee of ASSOCHAM (Association Chamber of Commerce and Industry), New Delhi and the Academic Council of University of Petroleum and Energy Studies, Dehradun. 

He has over 33 years of work experience in HR, during which time his work has covered the entire gamut of HR practices in a large Fortune 500 company like BPCL. He oversees all people related policies and practices for over 14,000 employees of the Company. Besides, as a member of the Board of BPCL and two other Joint Ventures/Subsidiaries, he has in-depth knowledge of the overall workings of these companies and as well of the oil Industry.

Seetharaman Mohan is Executive Director, Human Resources, at Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited. He is a mechanical engineering graduate from the Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani, and MBA from the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore.

Mr. Mohan was trained in UK as a ‘Trainer’ in ‘Change Management’ at the Stanford University and has attended an Executive Development Programme at Kellogg. He has spoken at several international conferences in the UK, USA, Singapore and South East Asia. His work has included developing corporate strategies for attracting and retaining talent and implementing support systems to bring about a sharp focus on performance. Currently he is working on Talent Management process for BPCL. He is a member of the Executive Committee of Bombay Management Association (BMA) and Chairman of the Management Development Programme Committee of BMA. He is also a member of the Institution of Engineers as well as a member of the HRD-IR Committee of the Bombay Chamber of Commerce & Industry and Corporate Governance Committee of Indian Merchant Chamber. He is currently working on his Ph.D.

GAURAV LAHIRI is Director, Strategic Clients, at Hay Group, London. A mathematics graduate from the Delhi University, he specialized in Human Resources and Business Strategy at the Xaviers Labour Relations Institute in Jamshedpur.

He joined Hay Group in 2000 and works with clients to align their organizations with their strategic agenda―including decoding strategies, designing organization structures, implementing talent management programmes and formulating reward strategies to drive performance and motivation. Gaurav’s specialization is in Organization Effectiveness. He has helped his clients reorganize based on their strategies, re-engineered their processes to help save costs and worked with the executive teams to align their aspirations. He has also helped his clients research and develop competency models for outstanding performance. He managed a seminal global research project on identifying the competencies of an Indian CEO. Gaurav is also an experienced job evaluator and has conducted work measurement studies in several countries in Asia Pacific across various sectors.

Gaurav has authored several papers on Post Merger Integration, Change Management and has won several prizes and awards, including the McKinsey Best Management Paper of the year in 1999.