About Our Faculties

Andrew England has over 30 years of banking experience having spent his entire career in this domain. Andrew brings with him his invaluable experience in running transaction banking for leading banks across the globe. The journey began with Lloyds Bank as anInternational trainee working in a number of roles across Spain. Portugal and France, where he spent almost ten years before joining Citibank in 1990. He went on to join Deutsche Bank In 1998. In his last role, he became one of five Global Transaction Banking Executive Members running the Transaction Bank responsible for Global Cash & Trade Products with a team of 200+ FTE. Andrew has also worked with the Uniaedit Group,based in Vienna. In early 2012 Andrew was back at Lloyds Bank, this time as Head of Transaction Banking, covering Cash Management. Trade & Supply Chain services, Balance Sheet management and Cards Acquiring,reporting to the Director of Corporate and Commercial Banking. He was also the Senior Advisor Transaction Banking for McKinsey Group.

Over 20 years of experience in the IT industry primarily dealing with large global banks. Passionate about building products, some of which have won global awards. Previously an Executive Director at J.P. Morgan, Ram has rich experience in providing enterprise wise solutions and delivering them on a global scale. He is also a proud alumnus of IIT Mumbai.

With an experience of over 29 years in the industry, Sudha Gopalakrishnan - Partner and Global Head - Enterprise Integration at Intellect Design Arena spearheads the process improvement initiatives of the organization spanning conceptualization, strategy for implementation, training, deployment and institutionalization. In her role, she manages diverse functions such as Methods and Tools, Governance and Compliance, Customer Satisfaction, Corporate Security as well as Corporate Initiatives. Her expertise in software process management and process improvements, project / program management and governance models, quality assurance and implementation of CMMI has enabled to define the process improvement roadmap for the organization. She has presented papers at international forums such as the Global SEPG conference and has been part of the International Standards definition group ofISO representing India.

With Life Architecting as his mission, Anbu has played a breakthrough role in coaching on the Design Mind, Engaging Learning Culture, Mindfulness Leadership Development and Transforming OD.

As Chief Design Officer in Intellect Design Arena, he is currently focusing on balancing eastern (mind) and western (brain) philosophy to leverage Design Thinking as a problem solving approach in all walks of life.

The Strength Philosophy coaching model that he has designed, complimented by his deep experience in both Project Delivery for U.S Department of Defense (DoD) and Academics, helps corporate leaders, managers, Faculty and teachers in focusing on lasting impact and creating a tribe within the teams to ensure delivery excellence. He is a co-founder of School of Design Thinking and has been instrumental in launching several initiatives for academics to change the self-image of students and faculties. The copyrighted Design The Thinking™ approach is the flagship program developed under his leadership.

With his strong research background in Artificial Intelligence, Anbu is passionate about understanding the evolving intricacies of Human Development. As Chief Mentor at Life Design Lab, he works closely with young adults and corporate adults in helping them understand the emotional aspects of relationships through Emotions Ladder and Collision Management, and appreciating values & culture. He also heads the training for Government e-Marketplace (GeM) – the breakthrough initiative of Hon’ble Prime Minister for faceless, paperless and transparent procurement needs of government buyers. Anbu is an invited speaker in several forums such as NASSCOM, CLO Summit, DT Conclave, Chennai Talks, NHRD and academic institutions.

John Alen is a corporate trainer with over 15 years of vast training experience in the creation and delivery of behavioural and soft skill training programs in the IT segment. He has a strong expertise in Communication (Verbal and Written), Soft Skill Development, Presentations, Business English, Interpersonal Effectiveness etc. He is known for his sound understanding of needed traits for workplace success and a strong ability to train employees in improving those characteristics. He also has extensive experience with making impactful presentations, facilitating seamless assessments, and identifying training needs through meaningful interventions.

With a total of 7 years of experience across different sectors, Benazir started her career as an SAP consultant after completion of her graduation. Having discovered her passion towards employee development she pursued her MBA in Human REsource Management from XIMB, which marked the beginning of her journey towards the HR world.

Benazir’s expertise lies in Talent Management, Performance Management and Employee Learning & Development. She is always eager to learn new things and keeps herself updated with the latest developments and trends in the HR domain.

She enjoys traveling to explore new places which helps her to gain a fresh perspective on life and work.

Vaishnavi Venkatesh is an experienced Human Resources Professional with a demonstrated history of working in Ed Tech, Engineering, IT industry. She is skilled in change management, performance, team management and driving transformational change within organizations through a number of strategic solutions.

Having stepped into the field of Learning & Development at Intellect Design Arena, she has trained over 150+ professionals on Prevention of Sexual Harassment at Workplace, Importance of Personal Branding and so on. Her personal interests include: content creation, dancing, cooking and listening to soothing music.

Sasireka Arunagiri is an emerging business HR professional with a proven track record of success in cross-functional team management and corporate initiatives. Over the past year and a half, she has consistently gone above and beyond her Key Responsibility Area, leveraging her expertise and experience to make complicated processes more efficient and effective. One of her key strengths is problem-solving ability, which she applies proactively to assist her colleagues whenever they approach her with queries or need assistance. In doing so, she has earned a reputation among her peers as a reliable and knowledgeable resource, always willing to go the extra mile to help others succeed. She has also distinguished herself by contributing to the automation of key business processes, leveraging her technical expertise to make important modifications to existing systems. Her expertise in this area has been critical in ensuring that her organisation remains at the forefront of innovation and efficiency. Beyond her work within her own organisation, her dedication to excellence and her ability to work collaboratively across teams make her a highly sought-after HR professional, with a bright future ahead of her in the field.

MN Prasad is an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) from the International Coaching Federation. His entire corporate life of over 35 plus years has been predominantly focussed on dealing with people, situations, behaviors and challenges. And, almost all of them had one thing in common - conversations that helped build trust. I believe that conversations involve both the head and the heart. Conversations help build culture, character, relationships , common purpose and shared success.

His approach to coaching is as a thinking partner and not as a Guru. He enables leaders to challenge assumptions and explore beliefs. He provides them with a safe space to have a conversation about fears, limiting beliefs, doubts, anger, hopes and other inner narratives. At times, he offers inputs and invites leaders to consider, if it can bridge the experience gap and expand perspectives.

His coaching methodology is brain-based on neuroscience and research. It enables and stimulates new thinking and long-term behavioral changes needed to create significant results in life and workplace. His clients – leaders, groups and teams create reasonable expectations for changing the status.

Typically, his coaching engagements start with defining a vision and two or three goals that will set the sail for the coaching engagement. There are times, when he has shadowed the leaders and teams through their day-to-day work, making mental notes of patterns and anti-patterns. This is followed by, creating an action plan with them with milestone measures of success.

His approach to team coaching is about facilitating shifting the mindset of team members from competitiveness towards engagement, inquiry, and mutual trust. Improve the team’s creative thinking abilities to develop long-term vision, goals and overcome team dysfunctions. As a coach he provides models, resources, and useful techniques as needed.

Total work Experience spans across:

• Pharmaceuticals (Alembic chemicals – Jan1973 to June 1989
• FMCG (TVS whirlpool- June 1989 to Dec 1989)
• TTK healthcare–Jan 1990-Nov 1995)
• Concept selling (Sterling group – Nov 1995 to Feb1999.)
• Telecom (RPG cellular Feb1999-March2001-)
• I.T (Polaris software – April 2001-May2010)

Certifications:

• Certified Storyteller from Academy of Storytelling affiliated to International storytelling centre, Tennessee USA. 2016.
• Former Prof of Organization Behavior & Human Resources Management at ICFAI Business School. Chennai. 1997-99.
• Certified Brain mapping practitioner from Prism international U K. 2011. Till date completed over 1000 Brain map analysis.
• Certified “Organizational Development professional” from National Training Laboratory USA. 2005- 2006.
• An accredited professional in Harrison Assessments International U S 2013.
• Inducted into the worldwide network of Creative & Constructive thinkers (Lateral Thinking) by Advanced Practical Thinking Training U S 2005.
• Certified Performance Management & Competency Development professional, from Carlton advanced Management institute U S .2005.
• Trained by Franklin Covey Associates, USA in “7 Habits of Highly effective people” prog 2003.
• A certified licensee in Thomas Personal Profile Analysis, from Thomas international U K. 2004.
• Awarded the MILT diploma by McGrath Institute of Leadership Training U S, for completing the MILT Leadership course. 2002.
• Certified Behavioral Analyst ( DISC) from Maximum Potential U S 2008
• Level 101 member, in Transactional Analysis.1980.

Experience

• Human Resources Consultant
  Self Employed
  Jun 2010 - Present · 11 yrs 10 mos
  Chennai Area, India
• Asst Vice President
  Over nine years in IT (Polaris software lab ltd). From April 2001 to till 31st May
  2010.
  Apr 2001 - May 2010 · 9 yrs 2 mos
  Chennai Area, India

Swaroopa is a hands-on solution architect and designer with over 15+ years of experience in banking software product development and solution delivery. Throughout her career, she has been a proficient contributor in developing softwares using Java-based back-end and Modern Web and Mobile front-end technologies. She has led the development and delivery of award-winning innovative cloud-native applications in the Financial domain (Banking and  NBFC) that focus on hyper automation / cognitive process automation using micro-services and API  first architecture. Swaroopa currently heads the engineering & product delivery for iTurmeric platform and pioneers in continuous innovation in the areas of hyper-automation, low code, composable technologies

Vishesh has about 5 years of experience working as an HR professional across multiple verticals and industries. His journey began with Vedanta, where he joined as a Management Trainee and within a span of 18 months; he was leading Talent Acquisition for India's largest and World's second largest Zinc - Lead miner, Hindustan Zinc Limited. During his 30 months tenure at Vedanta, he has also program managed some of the key Talent Management interventions for the organization.

In his last role as Deputy Head HR at Aliens Group, he was accountable for all the HR functions for their Interior Design division. During this tenure, he was working very closely with the MD and HR Head in devising and delivering strategic HR interventions.

Over the last couple of years, at Intellect, he has been responsible for devising and executing sustainable Talent Development & Management interventions. He has successfully anchored multiple high priority and critical work packets. In his current role, he is program managing the FinTech Engineer Development Program, ensuring execution of all the touch points as per the design.

His primary interest has been solving problems with everyday tools. When he is not working, he is either improving an old recipe or watching re-runs of FRIENDS.

Ashok Thiyagarajan is a Techno-Functional person, with experience across multiple domains, spanning two plus decades. His experience includes working with Architecture, Design and Development across banking, telecom and industrial verticals. During this time he has worked with some of the marquee brands like GE, HP and Oracle. He brings with him work skills that cut across R&D, Enterprise Architecture Governance, Independent Consulting, Solutions, Pre-sales, Technology Evangelist and Innovation. Recently he has moved to Learning & Development to pursue is passion for coaching and mentoring young talent.

Vinoth Murugesan is a Techno-Functional person with experience across multiple Mailing and Collaboration Tools which includes Google Workspace & IBM Domino. Also implemented various collaboration tools which includes all Google Apps and third party Applications like MIRO (visual platform to collaborate), PEXIP (Video Technology Platform) and integration of Google Apps with multiple products.

Having experience in migration of on premise messaging platforms to a cloud based SAAS platform. Also supporting all digital virtual events in Intellect, Ullas and Mission Samriddhi with many new tools.

Having 18 Years of experience in messaging & Collaboration, Nagesh is currently working on Messaging & Collaboration platforms like Google Workspace & IBM Domino.  With extended experience in IT Infrastructure implementation for New Offices & Capacity Additions, he explored & implemented various Collaborative Platform tools like MIRO, GMeet with Pexip, Jamboard and other Google Apps. He has also Converted the Tradition Legacy messaging platform to a Cloud based Messaging Platform. He has lead various IT roles like Network Security, Compliance & Digital Events & Support.

Sathianathan in his current role of Senior Manager @ Intellect Design Arena promotes the Design Thinking Culture in the Organization by conducting Design Thinking workshops thereby enhancing the self-image of the participants where their insights are connected and the blindspots are unearthed.

He is also passionate in conducting an awareness program on health using Laughter as a modality where eight to eighty years old have been participated across different parts in India. He believes that a nation could become strong by the happy citizens of that nation and for that magic to happen he deploys Laughter as a creative tool. He is known for his laughter programs and hence called as modern 'Laughing Buddha'.

He equips himself by reading & attending a wide variety of training programs on MindPower, Hypnosis, NLP, Experiential learning and other Psychology related areas. His teaching style emerges from mixing the right ingredients taken from the above knowledge clusters.

He is also avid in computer programming where a piece of software that he has written earlier in his career in ISRO has become a part of PSLV-C2 rocket series of ISRO, Sriharikota. Because of his interest in programming, he also teaches computer programming in a creative and fun way which is the first of its kind.

Experience

Design Thinker
School of Design Thinking
Aug 2017 - Present 4 years 8 months
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Senior Manager
Intellect Design Arena Ltd
May 2014 - Present 7 years 11 months
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Project Lead
Polaris Software Labs Ltd
Sep 2000 - May 201413 years 9 months
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Software Trainee
ISRO - Indian Space Research Organization ( ISRO )
Nov 1998 - Nov 1999 1 year 1 month
Sriharikota, India

Education

KSOU
Master's degree Information Technology

From marketing communication to military history, Ramakrishnan is fascinated by the dimensions of human interaction. Starting his career as a journalist with the New Indian Express he has experience in strategizing communication and content for various purposes - media, corporate communication, marketing and learning.