When Leena Nair told her father about her plan to switch from electronics and telecoms engineering to human resources, he made no attempt to hide his disappointment. “Who the hell cares about human resources?” he asked.
Fast forward nearly three decades and 51-year-old Nair has her answer: millions of us care, if not billions. The effects of the coronavirus pandemic, layered with the impact of digital revolution, have turned the world of work upside down and it is HR professionals like Nair who are tasked with stitching it back together.