IMA Insights

Perspectives from members of IMA’s India CHRO Forum.

India has seen an unexpectedly fierce second wave of Covid-19 infections – one that has touched almost every family, business and individual. Corporate leaders have had to work double-time not only to ensure business continuity and employee safety, but also to attend to their own personal challenges and emergencies. At recent sessions of the India CEO Forum, our members shared insights on how their businesses are faring and the lessons they have learned from the last 12-15 months of managing a near-continuous crisis. The podcast highlights some of the key takeaways.

In an article titled Mental Ailments published in 2018, I had highlighted the subject of depression at work. Far too many corporate workers suffer from some form of depression or the other and for many reasons these remain undetected and consequently untreated. Currently, due to Covid, there is some attention on this issue but even this is from the limited perspective of helping employees cope with social isolation and health-related anxieties. 

China’s recent animosity towards India does not, in some ways, seem reasonable. It is, after all, economically and militarily superior and its churlish attempts to intimidate India for small parcels of worthless land at the border hardly seem rational for a nation that clearly has larger ambitions for global domination. Some answers to this quandary are to be found in a historical understanding of India’s engagement with China, dating back to the opium wars of the 19th century.

The rise of China comes with geopolitical and security consequences. Its increasingly assertive nature, in the Indo-Pacific region, impacts the economic and defence considerations of several countries. With America's focus shifting away from the Middle East and Afghanistan, many expect it to play a more stabilising force in Asia. 

Over the years, workplaces and office layouts have undergone several changes to reflect management thinking and social norms. In the old days, offices had a feudal undertone with junior staff working in tightly spaced, open cubicles while senior executives got lavish private cabins. 

India’s financial technology (FinTech) sector remains on a high growth trajectory despite the pandemic. Propelling it forward are tailwinds such as strong consumer demand, an enabling regulatory environment, rich and diverse capital flows, a strong digital infrastructure backbone, and a large and relatively affordable tech talent pool. The sector’s high-velocity growth of the last five years is likely to continue over the next five as well.

The second wave of the pandemic caught the nation completely off guard. Within a matter of days, the healthcare infrastructure was overrun and, despite hectic efforts, the country is barely able to cope. Understandably, an angry and frustrated citizenry is demanding answers. 

Udaan Co-Founder Sujeet Kumar shared his learnings from building a successful B2B e-Commerce unicorn.

An IMA India research update on the dos and don’ts of succession planning at the top-management level.