Did Isha Thatai just go from SOIL to Nestlé?!

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Isha Thatai’s story of growth at SOIL to impact at Nestlé!

24 Jan 2025
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Isha Thatai, a distinguished alumnus of the SOIL Institute of Management, embodies the essence of inspired leadership and innovative thinking. A proud graduate of the PGPM HR batch of 2017-2018, the Pathfinders.

Isha has carved an exceptional path in the field of human resources. Currently, Isha holds a leadership position at Nestle India Limited, and her exceptional knowledge of human resources is impacting her organization. Her expertise in the people experience approach focuses on placing employees at the heart of the organizational process.

Know how from her experience from this conversational interview blog!

Why did you choose the SOIL Institute of Management?

SOIL had a diverse curriculum. I really liked the fact they had something called SIP, which was the Social Innovation Program, and I got a chance to work at the grassroots level.

I had to go to COD, and I think the entire vibe of SOIL was about holistic development and value-based education, which basically resonated a lot with who I was and where I wanted to be. It was not just about building any sort of leaders; it was about building inspired leaders. All of this entailed a beautiful curriculum designed with amazing pedagogy.

All of that helped me zero in on SOIL.

How was your experience at SOIL?

I cannot just describe the experience in a few words. It was an amazing experience due to the holistic and industry-relevant curriculum. I was inducted 360° into how I can take my career in leaps and bounds to the next level. It was also about inculcating very few pointers and values within me so that I could create an impact, which is not just from profit but also from people and a cultural standpoint, which are very important elements for an HR professional.

What did your journey look like after graduating from SOIL?

After SOIL, I got a PO from Grofers, which is currently called Blinkit. It was an e-commerce organization, and it gave me the basics of supply and demand. I was working in Learning and Development and eventually grew my career into talent management within the same organization.

After Grofers, I joined a startup called LocoNav, which was into fleet management and dashcam software to track fleets. There, I was an HR business partner, a different role from a specialist to a generalist. Eventually, I landed up at Times Internet, which was my last organization prior to Nestlé. I was doing a couple of roles: one was employer branding, one was internal communications, and there was also employee engagement. I eventually got trained in Design Thinking and landed at Nestlé, which is my current role.

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How has your experience been at Nestlé?

Nestlé so far has been a different organization, considering that this was an FMCG industry, which I had not worked in before. I got to understand different facets of demand, supply, manufacturing, product design, research and development, and so on. It’s a very vast and diverse organization with a lot of departments working in unison. I’m still getting to know it. It’s only been about 11 months that I’ve been here. I’m trying to understand what Nestlé actually is, but what I know is that the 2-minute organization is doing a lot of good work in terms of making it a good food, good life company.

What are some of your most valuable takeaways from SOIL?

Two values that were very experiential for me were compassion and diversity. Compassion was also my house when I was in SOIL, but I think I really took it ahead when I went to COD in Sirdar. I did two stints within SBAR of actually going to people and getting their forms filled. It was a very inspirational and motivational time of my life. That is something I have still carried on because I experienced it here.

The second one would be diversity. I got a chance to interact with cultures and people that were so different from what I have been. That is a key takeaway – I learned to do things differently in ways I had not seen or experienced before. I can apply both of these values in my organization itself.

What are your suggestions/ two cents for the current students/ budding leaders at SOIL?

HR is generally looked upon as a people’s function. However, you should get your hands on some very key skills while you are here. Understand the basics of negotiation. Understand how to build a win-win partnership with your stakeholders. Understand the basics of getting a buy-in from the business and relating all your HR skills to a business case. All of these are very important. Besides just being the people function, you can also try your hands at understanding the basics of budgeting, the basics of benefits, and the total reward statements of organizations. Please try to understand finance very closely because that’s a function that works hand-in-hand with HR.

What are your thoughts about the PGPM program?

The one-year program of PGPM HR is designed to set you up for success. What I got to know from here is a plethora of case studies and examples that I could take away from the classroom to my organization. The idea is from campus to corporate – a bridge that you need to know how to mitigate and bridge this gap. At campus, you will get to learn from people coming from outside. There will be industry visits, your industry leadership program, and the ILC conference – all of these will help you build those key skills that you can take to your organization and show that you have done a few projects and experienced this while in the classroom.

What does a typical day being a people experience manager look like?

A typical day in the life of a people experience manager revolves around listening. Employee listening is a key metric or area, which you can accomplish through surveys, FGDs, etc. Once you have gathered those needs, you design programs or processes around those needs. The idea is to look into a process inside out, keep your employee at the center, and redesign the process to impact the business. That’s how my day looks as a people experience manager.

As a people experience manager, how do you encourage work-life balance?

Within the employee fraternity, the idea is to understand the well-being needs of my employees or the audience I’m looking at. Well-being needs are very specific to some people. For some, work-life integration is more important. For others, flexibility is important. Another set of employees may just want to cut short their time at 6 PM and not take any calls after that. It’s an integrated approach. It’s not a one-size-fits-all solution. We need to look at different personas of employees and groups with particular needs and then pitch them a solution that works for them.

Watch my full interview here!