As a prelude to the conference, there were two webinars conducted on the future of work, a live twitter chat and a white paper competition held by AMCHAM. Many teams from member companies participated in this competition with two teams emerging as winners, both teams showcased a millennial’s perspective on the future of work. This conference was planned to be the first ever signature event of the HR Committee.

The Future of Work Conference 2017 was a full day event held at the Leela Palace, New Delhi on 10th April 2017. The opening remarks to this conference were given by Ms. Ranjana Khanna, Director General CEO, AMCHAM. She spoke about technology’s impact on our work and workforce. She thereafter introduced Mr. DP Singh, Chairman – HR Committee, AMCHAM and VP – HR (India/South Asia), IBM and Mr. George N. Sibley, Acting Deputy Chief of Mission and Minister Counselor for Economic, Environment, Science & Technology Affairs, U.S. Embassy, New Delhi.

The first session was conducted on ‘Future of Work’ with two speakers, Mr. Sarit Bose, Practice Head for Digital Transformation, Protiviti India and Mr. Debabrat Mishra, Partner Consulting, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu. This was followed by the second session on ‘Future of Worker’ with presentations given by Mr. Varun Aggarwal, Co-Founder, Aspiring Minds and Mr. Sarthak Raychaudhari, Vice President HR, Asia South, Whirlpool. A presentation was also given on ‘New Collar Skills’ by Ms. Joyeeta Das, IBM, explaining how skill training that begins in high school can help young adults get better jobs.

The next session was conducted on ‘Future of Workplace’ with a presentation by Mr. Arjun Ravi Kolady, Workplace, Facebook and Mr. Kamal Singhani, Vice President and Sales Leader, Global Business Services, IBM India. The fifth session was a panel discussion on ‘Future of Leadership’ moderated by Ms. Ester Martinez, Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief of People Matters Media. Panelists included Mr. Mohnish Sinha, Partner, Human Capital, Deloitte and Dr. Kiranmai Pendyala, Member of AMCHAM’s National Executive Board and Corporate Vice President – HR, EMEA & Greater Asia Region, AMD R&D Center.

The last session of the day was a panel discussion on ‘The Future of HR’ moderator by Mr. DP Singh. Panelists included Ms. Vishpala Reddy, Vice President & Head HR, American Express, Mr. Pritpal Kular, Vice President – HR, General Motors, Mr. Shaswat Kumar, HR Effectiveness, Aon Hewitt and Ms. Ira Gupta, HR Head, Microsoft.

The event concluded with a presentation and award ceremony, felicitating the winners and runners up team of the Future of Work White Paper Competition 2017. The prizes were awarded by one of jury members of the Future of Work White Paper Competition, Dr. Kiranmai Pendyala and the prizes were sponsored by Textron.

The event was very well attended and greatly appreciated by the audience. This event was sponsored by Aspiring Minds and IBM, with Deloitte as the knowledge partner.