Ravi Bhatia is the CEO of Gilbert Tweed India, an executive search firm with its home office in New York City and a significant presence across India. He is an active member of the American Chamber of Commerce and several other business roundtables. Prior to taking up the executive search profession a decade ago, Ravi was on the Board of Corp Health Products, a large Agro Chemicals Company and later was the India representative of Gaco Systems Ltd. Canada. He has over 30 years of managerial and professional experience in the chemical industry having worked with the Tata, Nitro Nobel and Dow Chemical companies. As part of his social responsibility, Ravi takes up the adoption of financially underprivileged children for their education and other needs. An early supporter of the Strategic Links initiative, he has accepted a key leadership role in India and is positioned to advance the movement in other countries as well.
Mirjam Dikken, a Dutch citizen, has twelve years of work experience with multinational companies, including roles as process engineer, manufacturing improvement engineer, training manager, executive recruiter and manager of human resources training and development. She has also set up a Human Resources Department for a manufacturing company, and has handled executive recruitment and selection while on the staff of a multinational HR firm. Mirjam, who has lived in India for three years, has served as a volunteer with Strategic Links India since mid 2006, developing the Job Links program, the role of Career Development Services Manager, and conducting research related to employment opportunities for foreigners living in India. She is currently developing the manual for starting additional chapters of Strategic Links. Mirjam holds a MS Degree in Chemical Engineering and a MA in Organizational Psychology.
Catarina Granryd has more than fifteen years of business experience, serving as a consultant and manager for several companies in Europe and Africa. A specialist in Supply Chain Management, she has worked with a wide variety of clients to identify and implement performance improvements with the help of information technology. Active in the Strategic Links initiative for more than two years, she completed her contract as the founding t Executive Director of Strategic Links India in December 2007. In this role she spearheaded the marketing campaign to recruit the initial set of organizational members and individual members and to manage the Delhi-based pilot program. She intends to continue to assist the new Executive Team with marketing and strategic planning activities, focused primarily in Delhi. A Swedish citizen, Catarina holds a MS Degree in Applied Mathematics, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm. She has lived in India for four years.
Barbara Barrett Foster is the President of Phoenix Initiatives, Inc., a US-based company that undertakes community and property development projects and provides a variety of consultative services. She is also the founder of the Strategic Links initiative. Educated as a sociologist with broad expertise in training and organizational development, she has lived and worked in Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Romania and India. Her experience has included more than 20 years working in the fields of housing and urban development - eight years with the US Agency for International Development and seven years with Technical Support Services, Inc., an international consultancy practice. She has also led five nonprofit organizations over the course of her career. In addition to serving as the Managing Trustee of Strategic Links Trust, she is an advisor to the Centre for Urban Governance, Administrative Staff College of India. She has lived in India for four years, previously in Delhi and now in Hyderabad.
Jerome Sauvage, UNDP India’s Deputy Director for Operations, is an international development professional with a dual practice in Crisis Prevention/Recovery and Human Resources Management. He has lived in India for four years. His postings with UNDP have also taken him and his family to Vietnam, Cambodia, Madagascar and UNDP’s headquarters in New York City. In the aftermath of the December 2004 tsumani, he established the first UN Tsumani Recovery Team in Chennai. Jerome is also responsible for supporting the UN Spouse Network (LESA). He believes that the traditional attempts to solve spouse employment challenges have been largely ineffective and that the Strategic Links initiative provides a creative way to respond to the career needs of UN spouses. As an HR professional, Jerome also believes that a successful program in India could have global implications and reach through collaboration with the UN’s network of offices around the world.
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Tony Chapman, Director, Public Information, is an Australian citizen who has lived, worked and travelled extensively throughout Asia over the past 20 years. Tony’s experience in media and broadcasting as state bureau chief for both the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), as media liaison officer for State governments in Australia, as well as various stints abroad in Japan and India has helped him develop great insights into packaging and communicating information to diverse target audiences.
Natacha Chapon, who arrived in India quite recently from her native France, has three years of professional experience as a technical advisor and trainer for potential entrepreneurs. In this role, she supported them to develop their business plans, facilitated fundraising through bank loans, and assisted with contacts with accountants and lawyers. She also offered skills training programs in accounting, finance, administration, legal issues and marketing. Natacha holds a Masters of Sciences Degree in Management from Ecole Superieure de Commerce de Montpellier; she is fluent in French and has a conversational knowledge of English and Spanish. Natacha will serve in the role of Job Links Programme Manager for Strategic Links India.
Helene de Clercq, Manager, Career Development Services, Chennai, is a nurse with more than ten years of experience in social nursing and preventive medicine. She has served on a team of psychologists, medics and social workers, whose role was to provide specialist assistance in the kindergarten and elementary school environments. A Belgian citizen, Helene has lived in India for a year and previously resided in Mexico. She is fluent in Dutch, English and French.
Rekha Bettina Gautam, a German national, comes to her role as Director of the Delhi Chapter after living and working abroad for the past 20 years. She has more than fifteen years’ experience in the retail sector, having filled positions with the Metro Group, the Cartoon & Triangle Group and PRADA. She also served as the Chief Operations Officer of a successful import house. Rekha holds an MBA degree from the Open University Business School, Milton Keynes, UK and a Diploma in Business and Systems Analysis from the Chamber of Industry and Commerce, Bonn Germany. Fluent in German, English and Hindi, Rekha brings her leadership and management experience and valuable technical skills to Strategic Links India to assist us in expanding and developing innovative ways to address the career development needs of our members.
Ninna-Marie Hogedal, Manager, Membership Services, Chennai, a native of Denmark, holds degrees in Education and Social Work and has 15 years of professional experience. She has worked with kindergarten and elementary school children and has also taught in the special needs field. Prior to coming to India in 2007, Ninna lived for 2 years in Spain. She speaks Danish as her mother tongue, but is also fluent in English.
Jennifer Moore, Director, Chennai Chapter, has lived in India for over seven years, first in Delhi and now Chennai. Her professional experience includes ten years in the automotive industry with a large multinational corporation, working with clients throughout Europe, in Asia, the Americas and South Africa. A founding member of Strategic Links India, she holds a MA in Engineering and an MBA. She is a British citizen, fluent in English and Italian, with a working knowledge of German, French and Hindi.
Shah Pedersoli, Director, Corporate Membership Development, is an attorney from the USA who has served as Adjunct Professor at Osmania University College of Law (Hyderabad) and at the City University (Bellevue, Washington, USA). As an Assistant State’s Attorney in Chicago, Illinois (USA), she had a wide range of experience in the areas of business and contract law, domestic violence and information technology. She has also been involved in corporate social responsibility and fund-raising.
Mieke Standaert, a native of Belgium who moved to India in 2008, is the new Manager of Membership Services for Strategic Links India. She has the responsibility of managing the individual and organisational membership records of the association. She holds an Educational Degree and a Masters of Administrative Sciences Hogeschool Gent. Prior to coming to India, Mieke had five years of professional experience - mainly in the Belgian public sector - where she was responsible for results measurement, performance management and the development of strategic management techniques. Mieke’s mother tongue is Dutch and she is also proficient in English and French.
Hannah Wanyoike, Manager, Membership Services, is a nutritionist by profession and comes from Kenya, where she worked in schools and in the health sector. Later on she moved to the US and Canada, where she worked in the sales and marketing field as well as in Social Services as a counsellor for children with developmental disabilities. Hannah speaks fluent English, Swahili and Kikuyu, and conversational French.
Zerlina White, a citizen of Singapore, moved to Delhi in October 2008. After several years with an advertising agency, where she worked with Proctor & Gamble, Wyeth Ayers, Reckitt and Coleman, Zerlina became active in the volunteer sector while living in South Korea, the UK, Hong Kong, Melbourne and Singapore. She holds a BA from the National University of Singapore and is fluent in English and Mandarin, apart from being conversant in several Chinese dialects, including Cantonese and Teschew. Zerlina has agreed to serve as Manager of Career Development for the Delhi Chapter. In this role she will draw upon her business background, as well as her work as the Advertising Manager of the Seoul International Woman’s Association, to bring an exciting new range of programmes to our members.
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