Vineet Nayar

Vineet Nayar (born 1962) is an Indian businessperson, author, and philanthropist. He served as the chief executive officer of HCL Technologies from 2007 to 2013 and is currently the founder and chairman of the Sampark Foundation, a non-profit organization he established in 2005. Nayar is also the author of the best-selling book, Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down, published by Harvard Business Review Press in 2010.

He was listed among the Thinkers50 influential management thinkers in 2011 and featured in Forbes Asias "Heroes of Philanthropy" list in both 2013 and 2016. Nayar implemented several policies and practices at Comnet that later influenced HCL Technologies' "Employees First, Customers Second" philosophy.

In 1998, Comnet merged with HCL Technologies, By 2005, he considered transitioning to social development and established the Sampark Foundation. However, he was asked by Shiv Nadar, co-founder of HCL Technologies, to continue leading the company. and became CEO two years later in 2007. In August 2008, he was appointed to the Board of Directors at HCL Technologies as a whole-time director. During his tenure, he increased the company's revenue sixfold to $4.7 billion annually.

Vineet Nayar is credited with transforming HCL Technologies into the fourth-largest IT company in India, with the workforce expanding from 30,000 to 90,000 during his tenure. Nayar was appointed Vice Chairman of HCL Technologies in November 2010. He received 12.50 lakh stock options in October 2010, and his remuneration was ₹8.43 crore in the 2012 fiscal year.

In June 2012, Nayar sold his entire stake in the company for ₹133.58 crore, which he directed towards the Sampark Foundation.

Published work He authored Employees First, Customers Second: Turning Conventional Management Upside Down, published by Harvard Business Review in 2010.

The book was ranked seventh on Amazon UK's list of the 'Best Business Books of 2010' and was also included in the 'Best Business Books of 2010' by the Library Journal in the United States.

Philanthropy Vineet Nayar co-founded the Sampark Foundation in 2005, a philanthropic organization that focuses on enhancing primary education for millions of school students in India. In 2013, Nayar took an active role in the organization, committing to invest $100 million into its initiatives. He applies the concept of frugal innovation in his work As of 2023, the Sampark Foundation has positively impacted approximately 10.49 million children and provided training for around 672,000 teachers in 123,000 government schools.

Nayar is also a senior advisor to the McKinsey Leadership Institute and mentors 18 technology start-ups. He is involved with the Million Learning Project led by former Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard

Awards and recognition In 2011, Vineet Nayar was ranked 40th on the Thinkers 50 list of the world's most influential management thinkers. That same year, he was honored with the 'Leader in the Digital Age' Award at CeBIT and the 'Business HR Champion Award' at the European HCM Excellence Awards. He was named in Fortune'''s 2011 "Executive Dream Team" list. He was ranked as the No. 2 HR Influencer in India by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) in 2011.

In 2012, he received the Lakshmipat Singhania – IIM Lucknow National Leadership Awards from IIM Lucknow. In 2013, he was named among Forbes magazines "48 Heroes of Philanthropy".

In 2016, Vineet Nayar was named in Foreign Policy''s "Top 100 Global Thinkers" and featured in the 'Moguls' category alongside his wife, Anupama, for their work with the Sampark Foundation. In 2018, he was ranked 20th by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) in its list of Top 30 Indian HR Influencers on Social Media.

Harvard Business School case studies Nayar's leadership and work at the Sampark Foundation and HCL Technologies have been the subject of multiple Harvard Business School case studies. One such study, "Vineet Nayar at HCL Unstructure 2008", published in 2009, examines his implementation of the "Employees First, Customers Second" philosophy. In 2017, Harvard Business School published "Sampark Foundation: Transforming Primary Education in India," which explores innovative and cost-effective strategies implemented by Vineet Nayar and Anupama Nayar to enhance primary education. Additionally, the case "Vineet Nayar and Sampark Foundation: Frugal Innovation at Scale" (2020) discusses his efforts to scale education in rural India. Another case, "HCL Technologies (A)" (2007), details his leadership at HCL Technologies. These studies have been authored by researchers Linda A. Hill, Tarun Khanna, Emily Stecker, Emily Tedards, V. Kasturi Rangan, and Shweta Bagai.