Photos and highlights: Talent Management Asia 2016, Singapore

Being able to adapt to changes in the workforce and workplace, to aim for innovative solutions when managing talent, and to let go of old biases are the three cornerstones for success for HR leaders today.

This was the recurring message highlighted at Asia's leading HR strategy conference, Talent Management Asia 2016 in Singapore.

Returning to the nation for the fourth year, the conference was held on the 30-31st of March, following two hugely successful runs in Hong Kong and Malaysia.

The event featured exciting keynote sessions, dynamic panel discussions and insightful case studies in attracting young talent and engagement from organisations such as Unilever and Singtel. Plus, it offered an immense number of opportunities for networking, and was supported graciously by a host of sponsors and partners.

Check out exclusive photos of the conference here

Day one featured an exclusive opening keynote Sydney Finkelstein, one of the world’s foremost thought leaders on leadership, strategy, and corporate governance.

Finkelstein presented a whole new way of thinking about HR and talent development, with insights from his newest book, Superbosses.

“A super boss helps people accomplish more than they ever thought possible. What do these bosses do that’s different from other people? They break a lot of rules, for example, look for unusual talent, and create a very high-performance organisation,” he said.

Another highlight of the day was an insightful panel which debated top ways to building an effective change management model.

Moderated by Aditi Sharma Kalra, the panel featured Jessica Tan, managing director, Microsoft, Ravi Bhogaraju, global HR leader, Archroma, Prithvi Shergill, chief human resources officer, HCL Technologies and Mira Gajraj Mohan, practice director, talent management and organisation alignment, APAC, Willis Towers Watson.

Here are some photos from the conference:

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The second half of the day was broken into three streams covering the topics of recruitment and retention, technology and talent management, and learning and development respectively.

All streams featured exclusive case studies and panel discussions on the latest trends and most pressing issues of their particular topics.

Peter Wood, vice-president, talent management, global human resources, Schneider Electric kick started day two of Talent Management Asia with a case study on how the firm develops its talent with the use of integrated talent management processes.

“Each review focuses on one level of the organisation at a time to ensure that potential assessments of managers are calibrated,” he said.

Tricia Duran, HR director, Unilever Asia also took the stage to shed light on driving employee engagement through talent management as well as how to bring out the best in your top talent.

“Creating a virtuous cycle of talent development sets a rhythm of potential in the firm, resulting in a talent powerhouse,” she observed.

The last panel of the conference featured Suresh Kalpathy, director and VP, ServiceDott, Srikanth Chandrashekhar, regional talent leader, APAC, Pall Corporation, Gaurav Sharma, human resources director, bottling investment group, Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei, Coca-Cola, and Eveline Noya, executive career management, VP, human resources, Essilor.

Moderated by Akankasha Dewan, senior journalist at Human Resources, the panel debated how HR and business leaders can alter their strategies to suit the new world of work.

"Social media is definitely a tool to help us attract talent. But, when you look at Coca Cola, we have a really big brand, so people come in expecting things to work very well, but the reality isn’t that. So we also have to let them know what they can really expect before they join the organisation," Gaurav Sharma explained.

The conference closed curtains after an exclusive roundtable discussion on topics such as succession planning, mobility, recruitment and retention, learning and development and employee engagement. These were led by moderators, who summarised the top 3 takeaways their respective groups had highlighted during the discussion.

The Human Resources team would like to thank all sponsors and partners:

Gold sponsors1. Cut-e2. DDI3. Knolskape4. PageUp5. Ramco6. Willis Towers Watson

Silver sponsors1. CareerBuilder2. HireRight3. ServiceDott

Exhibitors1. Crown World Mobility2. Glides Consulting Partners3. Sonru

Event partners1. British Council Singapore2. Pearson English Business Solutions3. Sirota4. Tsinghua-INSEAD Executive MBA Program5. TutorMing6. Workday

Knowledge partnerThe KPI Institute

Media partners1. Black Marketing2. Clocate3. Senior HR Forum