Shikha Bhatt: Driving Digital Transformation at Newgen

Steering the ship to success is no mean feat. It requires a visionary leader who never stops learning, growing, and nurturing the people along the way. One such leader who personifies resilience and integrity is Shikha Bhatt, Vice President and Head of Delivery (India) at Newgen Software.

Driven by her passion for innovation and excellence, this exemplary leader shattered the glass ceiling and brought about a transformation in the IT sector. With a career spanning over two decades, she has been at the forefront of driving digital success for the organization. The India delivery head and her team were involved in a $5 million project to develop a data warehouse that saved the company $500K through a customer information system redesign.

The Ladder to Success

A commitment to transform the way businesses operate has always inspired Shikha.  

The advanced Computer Science graduate, who became a part of Newgen’s journey when she joined the organization as a software engineer, got an opportunity to work on multiple enterprise-level implementations across various domains and geographies, including banking and insurance. Working on complex projects helped her push her limits.

“I had been highly passionate about learning new skills and developing codes during my graduation. The IT & IT services domain—an emerging opportunity around the same period—had a high demand for skilled professionals. It was an excellent opportunity to learn, grow, and deliver quality products,” she said.

Over the years, she climbed up the corporate ladder and delivered efficiency. She navigates the delivery unit of over 350 employees and more than 50 customers. As Head of Delivery for the digital transformation platform provider, she oversees critical aspects of project management, quality assurance, and client satisfaction. Globally, Shikha’s involvement has encouraged successful enterprises to rely on Newgen’s industry-recognized low-code application platform to develop and deploy complex, content-driven, and customer-engaging business applications on the cloud.

Unity In Diversity

For Shikha, an organization’s strength lies in its people. This belief helps her work with diverse teams, leveraging each member’s strengths to achieve collective success.

Known for her strategic vision, she knows the secret sauce behind aligning technological innovations with business requirements. Her focus on operational excellence has been instrumental to the company’s growth. “As a team, we continuously improve our processes to develop vertical solutions that enhance the quality of our deliveries. We have a degree of focus on building complex enterprise solutions using a low-code framework,” she said.

An advocate for diversity and inclusion, she mentors and encourages young professionals to embrace challenges and drive change. Even in the face of challenges, this zealous leader has bravely guided her teams, fostering growth and development. Her commitment to empowering women in technology is widely known throughout the organization. For her, diversity and inclusion are essential for any organization.

As an experienced professional, it is crucial to foster an inclusive culture where all individuals feel valued, respected, and empowered to contribute their unique perspectives and talents. There is a high focus within her teams to encourage open communication and create opportunities for all voices to be heard.

In 20 years, she has never shied away from building meaningful customer relationships. Her innate ability to understand and translate their specific needs into actionable strategies has been a hallmark of her success.

Balancing the Workplace Beam

No woman is a stranger to the workplace obstacles in leadership roles. Newgen’s India Delivery Head has also had her share of challenges. Despite her abilities, she has been at the receiving end of gender bias and stereotypes from external quarters in the male-dominated industry.

Limited access to mentorship, role models, and support networks made it more difficult for her to advance her career in the initial years. Furthermore, balancing her professional and personal responsibilities posed significant challenges, ultimately pushing her to adopt a healthy work-life balance. This was when Shikha decided to become a positive guiding force for her female colleagues at the organization. With determination and resilience, she was able to excel and inspire others along the way.

Despite several hiccups, she kept innovating and building complex enterprise systems, meeting tight project deadlines while ensuring high-quality delivery and optimal productivity from allocated resources. To make this possible, she invests sufficient time in learning, upskilling resources, and developing reusable and accelerator-based solutions with Newgen’s low-code framework to stay ahead and achieve desired productivity levels.

Journey Towards Excellence

Being committed to growth can help leaders stay ahead of their peers. Throughout her journey, Shikha followed the same mantra. She has been dedicated to learning continuously and staying updated with the latest developments. With an unwavering enthusiasm for work, she consistently sought opportunities to enhance her skills and knowledge. Her proactive approach, ability to adapt to new challenges, and willingness to embrace change helped her to maintain a competitive edge in a rapidly evolving industry.

Her passion for excellence extends beyond her personal growth. She leads by example, demonstrating the value of perseverance and continuous improvement. This is how the power of determination and lifelong learning can help achieve professional excellence.

Ensuring Scalability

For leaders, one of today’s most pressing challenges is ensuring their teams have experience in emerging technologies, such as complex enterprise solutions, low-code framework, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity. Shikha ensures product innovation and exploring new technologies stay the focus to gain a competitive edge.

Flexibility and adaptability are essential to designing these tools to create scalable solutions. A modular architecture, cloud-based infrastructure, and scalable databases can accommodate growth and changing needs. Building modular and flexible solutions can adapt to changing business needs. “Regular performance testing and monitoring can also help identify potential bottlenecks and optimize the system for scalability. Continuous monitoring and optimization practices are important to ensure that solutions remain scalable and perform well over time,” she added.

Understanding current infrastructure, business goals, and growth projections can help customers undergo digital transformation. By conducting a thorough assessment, a tailored roadmap can be developed to guide the customers through the transition process. Training and support to the customer’s team can also help them effectively utilize and maintain scalable solutions. “Continuous communication and collaboration are key to ensuring a smooth transition and successful implementation of scalable technology solutions,” she concluded.

A Quote to Live By

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” – African Proverb.

This quote encourages the importance of teamwork, collaboration, and shared vision in achieving long-term success and sustainability. “It fosters synergy, innovation, and collective growth. It underscores the importance of balancing individual initiative and collective effort in pursuing goals, ” says Shikha.

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