Published on March 19, 2021
The BE Heads Forum 2021 organised by Tata Business Excellence Group (TBExG) on March 18, 2021 brought together more than 100 participants, including Business Excellence Heads, team members of companies and Business Excellence Members. Considering the current situation, this Forum was conducted virtually, leveraging MS Teams.
The event began with an introduction and safety pause by Siddharth Bhatt, Deputy General Manager, TBExG. Then, Sanjeev Singh, Assistant Vice President, TBExG, in his context setting session, threw light on how TBExG has, during the past year of turmoil, made major changes to the processes and experimented to retain the effectiveness of the virtuous performance excellence cycle. Moving from Physical to digital delivery and thoughtful change management initiatives were a few of the key steps taken last year. He also shared some focus areas that will emerge in the coming few years, including customer & employee experience, digital maturity, sustainability, among others.
Next up was a session from Subhrajit Basu, Deputy General Manager, TBExG, on Business Excellence Assessments. Thanking the 10 BE Heads of companies that underwent Assessments in 2020, he also appreciated the support of the 40 companies that provided 151 assessors for the cycle. Mr. Basu mentioned that the BE Assessment process has evolved from Criteria-led to Business-led to Strategy-led; and today, the process has become Purpose-led. He also provided examples of collaboration with respective organisations during the BE Assessment process in 2020.
Devraj Chattaraj, Deputy General Manager, TBExG, then shared how best practices sharing and benchmarking are driving the business excellence agenda for Tata companies. Sharing that best practice implementations are increasingly adding value for Tata companies, he presented details of the implementation success story of Infiniti Retail, which has reaped benefits from the NPS best practice of other companies. Anirban Chatterjee, Senior Manager Business Excellence, Trent also presented how his company has benefited from open standard benchmarking with APQC in supply chain planning and logistics.
Next, Mr Bhatt threw light on how improvement interventions play a key role in the virtuous cycle of improvement and the focus areas of strategic importance. He took the participants through the newer focus areas introduced for interventions based on the evolving needs of the customers. He also talked about some of the interventions TBExG had completed in the the areas of Customer Centricity, Operations Excellence, Strategy Deployment, Safety and Human Resources.
An interesting panel discussion followed on the topic of ‘The Evolving Role of a BE Head’. Moderated by Monika Agarwal, Chief - Business Excellence, Risk and Ethics, Tata Steel Downstream Products (TSDPL), the panel included Reena Wahi, Human Resource Leader & Head - Business Excellence, Tata Realty; Santosh Singh, SVP & Global Head - Marketing, BE & Innovation, Tata Technologies; Aditya Mishra, Head - Business Excellence, Communication & Administration, Tata Consulting Engineers; Rashmikant, Head - Business Excellence, Tata Power; and Sajiv Madhavan, Head - Business Excellence, Tata Elxsi. Each panelist presented their current role and focus areas and participated in an interesting conversation on the evolving role of the BE Head. All the panelists agreed that their role is crucial for business transformation initiatives.
Post the stimulating panel discussion, a development session by Niket Karajagi, Founder and Lead Facilitator, Atyaasaa, took place, during which he spoke about the importance of transformation champions and how Business Excellence Heads naturally fit this role in the organisation. He also threw light on the challenges in the VUCA world and how transformation champions can support organisations. Mr Karajagi took the participants through the 4 dimension of transformational leadership model and Cohen Bradford’s influence model and how it can be practiced.
Anil Menghrajani, Assistant Vice President, TBExG, and Clare Meek, European Lead Relationship Manager, TBExG, then facilitated a Beyond Business session, during which the participants acknowledged the contribution of C Kamatchisundaram, BE Head, Voltas and Ernst Hoogenes, BE Head, Tata Steel Europe. The group wished them well in their future endeavours after they superannuate next year.
The Forum ended with an open house with S Padmanabhan, Executive Chairman, TBExG, during which participants posed some interesting questions to him.