Sandhya Shekhar

Director - Asia Pacific Consulting in Gartner

Dr. Sandhya Shekhar works in the area of Knowledge and Innovation Strategies. Her work focuses on helping organizations manage the challenges of growth and global dispersion whilst leveraging market and innovation opportunities by extending organizational boundaries. She also works with educational institutions in India and abroad, both in an advisory capacity as well as a visiting faculty. Her competency areas include Information Systems and Strategies, Knowledge Management, Virtual Organizations, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, IT driven Business Strategy, Enterprise Solutions, Business Process Optimization, Software Engineering and E- learning. She has about three decades of professional experience, occupying various C-level positions in the last two decades She has worked at the confluence of industry and academic fraternities helping to build and scale a vibrant innovation ecosystem, in her former role as the founding CEO of IIT Madras Research Park, the first university research park in the country. She has extensive industry experience, having worked as Director, Asia Pacific Consulting – Gartner Inc.; CTO - BconnectB.com; Head, Knowledge Management Research - Aptech; and Group Consultant - NIIT. She did her management studies at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore. She earned her PhD from IIT Madras, with her dissertation winning the award for outstanding doctoral research from the European Foundation for Management Development and Emerald. A recipient of several awards like the Excellence Award at Gartner, outstanding achievement awards at Aptech and NIIT etc., she was felicitated as an Outstanding Woman Achiever during the 100th International Women’s Day. An author of several books, papers and articles, her book on Knowledge Management was the first Indian book on the subject. Her latest book titled ‘Managing the reality of virtual organizations’ published by Springer has received worldwide acclaim. She serves as an independent director on the Boards of Bimetal Bearings Ltd. and IP Rings Ltd. of the Amalgamations Group. She also serves on several advisory boards including Nasscom Foundation’s Indian Public Library Movement, Stella Maris College for the International MBA program in collaboration with Liverpool Hope University, U.K. and the Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science.