It's homecoming for P&G execs

MUMBAI: When Sumeet Vohra returned to India two years ago to head the crucial marketing function for Procter & Gamble India, after assignments in Philippines and Singapore, one couldn't have said for sure if he was setting a trend of sorts.
Last year, Deepak Acharya came back to P&G India from Singapore, as head of legal. Another senior level manager, Kurt Droeshout is now head of India customer business development function after experiences across the globe.
What started as a trickle is soon turning into a deluge.Function leaders for product supply and finance have returned to India from experiences in Japan and ASEAN, respectively. Couple of younger managers, only a few years in the organization, who started with Singapore-based roles, have moved to P&G India on challenging assignments to build brands here.
The latest to join the India team is Sonali Roychowdhury, who has come back after serving two years in Singapore and putting an equal number of years in Vietnam. She is set to take on the role of HR head at P&G India.
Roychowdhury, who started her career with P&G India in 1998, has earned the distinction of being the first woman to head HR at P&G India. She is also presumably the youngest head of HR at the company. Like other multinationals, P&G attracts entry-level talent from leading institutes, as it offers career development opportunities, which include global stints.
While such opportunities continue to lure management graduates, a fresh trend of the Indian subsidiary attracting global talent is clearly emerging. India's growth story, coupled with P&G India's own growth���which has trebled in the last four years���are being attributed as reasons for the inflow of global talent. Given its promote-from-within policy, the trend mainly includes home-coming for Indian managers across levels who had moved to global assignments as part of their career development plans.
Though there is no official count on how many managers across levels have come back to India after serving global stints, of the key functions in P&G India 80% are headed by people who have returned in the last couple of years. The trend, said Roychowdhury, is broadbased and can be seen in middle as well as junior management.
Roychowdhury said she has seen a change in the mindset of students aspiring for corporate assignments. "Fast-paced careers are preferred today. The challenge for HR is to keep pace with this change and offer career development opportunities to suit the young generation as well as those who have been with the organisation for long," she said.