03 January, 2023: Industry leaders Kriti Gutt and Aparna Sardar, guest speakers at the MPPO (Managing People and Performances in Organizations) course in IIMB, kept the audience riveted as they shared their views on how organizations have been forced to re-evaluate many aspects of work in light of the COVID-19 crisis, specifically, and the increasing influence of artificial intelligence and automation.

Ms Kriti Gutt is a Country HR with Hewlett Packard Enterprise for the R&D and Finance teams in India, while Ms Aparna Sardar is the Country HR Operations Leader at 3M for the India region.

With decades of industry experience behind them, these leaders held forth on the future of work in their respective industries. It’s no secret that the future of work will be shaped significantly by AI and automation, and existing trends were accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic. They spoke about how their organizations had upgraded HR practices to ensure employee well-being and engagement, while also discussing novel measures of performance management and hybrid working.

Employee sensitivity is increasingly in focus, and the duo reflected on how their respective organizations were managing diversity through their policies on leave, infrastructure design and sensitivity trainings.

It was an engaging and illuminating session for the students, who gleaned greater insight and felt the HR theories and practices outlined in the course came ‘alive’ through this interaction.