Everise CPO Sheena Ponnappan awarded ‘HR Leader of the Year 2020’

SINGAPORE, November 3, 2020 – Everise’s Chief People Officer, Sheena Ponnappan, has been lauded as the HR Leader of the Year at the Human Resources Excellence Awards. She was named for the award at a virtual ceremony that attracted over 500 HR professionals and leaders, who tuned in live this past Friday evening, 30 October 2020. The awards have become the de facto benchmark across industries for outstanding talent and leadership in Human Resources, and a recognition of individuals and teams who are resilient in pushing the boundaries of people strategies to achieve new heights in employee engagement, performance management and culture development.

“I am deeply honoured and humbled to be receiving this prestigious award. This year has been a rough one for all of us and I could not have achieved any of our successes without my amazing team. I thank the extraordinary HR professionals and the entire leadership team in Everise for the support and always going the extra mile to ensure our people come first," commented Ponnappan.

Ponnappan has worked with the next-generation BPO company, Everise, since its inception in 2016, where she established, and continues to push the barriers of its people-first strategies. A key instigator of the company’s “We Are Everise” strategy, she led the creation, migration and integration of critical HR operations after several acquisitions and led the digital transformation of the HR department, that paved the way for a seamless transition to remote work. When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, Ponnappan was instrumental in migrating 95% of Everise’s global employees to work-at-home in a mere two weeks after the crisis hit.

Nine months on, the majority of Everise’s global workforce are still working from home, and the dedicated teams and proven processes are testament that the program has become more than a business continuity plan, it is now part of a long term strategy to further the company's ability to provide customer experience (CX).

Everise projects a 25% revenue growth, supporting the employment of thousands of new employees globally. Through the transition and the growth, Everise has maintained an industry leading Glassdoor score of 4.6/5.

“Everise’s work-at-home program is no longer bound by geography. We will continue to innovate and elevate how we enable a high-performing, people-first culture virtually,” added Ponnappan.

As an equal opportunity employer, more than 1% of the Everise workforce consists of people-with-disabilities. Globally, the company has strong ethnic diversity, with 33% being Asian, 27% Hispanic or Latino, 24% Caucasian, 8% African American, and 8% consists of 47 other nationalities and ethnicities. Ponnappan has also improved gender diversity, as the company is powered by a 63% female workforce, 46% of whom are in leadership positions. She has also invested in a culture that promotes gender pay equality by creating a diverse, equitable and inclusive workplace.

Ponnappan, a passionate and hands-on Human Resources leader, has almost two decades of experience across diverse industries and countries. Her expertise lies in Performance Management, HR Consulting, Talent Acquisition, Compensation and Benefits, Business Process Outsourcing, and Customer Relationship Management. This is not her first such accolade, as she was also named Chief HR Officer of the Year by the Stevie Awards for Great Employers in 2019.

Ponnappan earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Science, majoring in Chemistry, from Christ University, Bangalore, and a Postgraduate Diploma in Human Resources and Personnel Management from Symbiosis Institute of Management Studies, Pune.

See other HR Excellence 2020 winners at https://humanresourcesonline.net/winners-hr-excellence-awards-2020-singapore