CEO Insights Magazine

The expectations of a candidate from an organization have changed drastically in the past couple of years. The work needs to be challenging and organizations need to provide ample opportunities for employees to learn and grow while maintaining a healthy work life balance. Anthology understands and prioritizes this need and provides growth opportunities through training and peer-learning methods that cultivates an environment of healthy work life balance. The EdTech company solves problems of the higher education sector through technology and works in collaboration with educators to build innovative products.

Raj Mruthyunjayappa President and Managing Director, Anthology, India has over two decades of experience in strategizing and executing business operations. He is an evangelist on the use of customer experience management solutions across verticals and is often consulted and quoted by media across the globe for his expertise on customer experience management as well as technology adoption across higher education. CEO Insights engaged in an exclusive interview with Raj. Here are some highlights from the same.

How would you define Anthology as an organization and its position in the market?
Anthology is writing the next chapter in higher education. We are a global EdTech company, leading product innovation for over 30 years, with more than 150 million users in 80 countries. We are looking ahead to the future of higher education technology, providing integrated solutions to help learners faculty and administrators build better strategies for their institution. We value client success and the trust that’s been built over the years and plan to keep that trust by working directly alongside educators,institutions, and other higher education professionals.

What is the unique proposition that your organization offers to its employees?
Anthology is focused on continuing education and professional development to help our employees succeed. Specifically, we believe that 'Higher Order Thinking Skills' is the most important ingredient for our employees’success. It distinguishes critical thinking skills from low-order learning outcomes, such as those attained by rote memorization. HOTS include synthesizing, analyzing, reasoning, comprehending, application, and evaluation. Once we have the baseline established on the thinking skills, we then develop talent based

on skills and engage them through a skill-based community model. At Anthology, we have created a platform for 'like-skilled' communities, and we design specific engagement programs. The communities are mentored by experts who are senior internal mentors and coaches, who also act as career advisors.

In addition, to meet an employee’s career aspiration within the organization, we provide a career portal, which is a self-paced learning and development portal to assist employees through their career. We also follow a transparent Internal Job Posting (IJP) process that invites existing employees to take up challenging roles/higher responsibilities as a part of their career progression and succession planning. IJP prepares them for leadership positions. Such positions are advertised internally and interested employees apply for the same. Employees who are willing to take challenging assignments and demonstrate their capabilities to take up higher responsibilities are encouraged through suitable rewards and recognitions.

What is Anthology Academy? What led to its establishment and how it plays a role in the development of your employee?
Learning always comes along with development, which acts as a foundation for our motivation and growth desires. As we come across varied hurdles in our everyday work activities, skill development plays a meaningful role in building confidence and having faith in our own capabilities. Anthology Academy is aligned with the organization's vision of providing best-in-class client education through an online learning platform comprised of comprehensive video tutorials across the Anthology product suite that are interactive and engaging, carefully crafted cohort training events, and role-based learning programs, all of which are being delivered through subscription plans.The Academy also serves as a single online learning platform for both existing and newly on boarded employees, facilitating rampup, continuous learning, and upskilling activities to gain more insight on our products.

Apart from this, we provide our employees multiple options to upskill or reskill based on the need of the hour. We have direct access to the Microsoft learning platform, called Employee Skills Initiate (ESI), which helps our employees to login and earn training/ certifications on all new technologies. Some examples of training are on Cloud, DevOps, D365 et al.

Tell us about the exposure your company offers to its employees. Shed some light on the unique work culture of Anthology?
We understand employees' aspirations and there are ample opportunities for them within the organization to pursue these aspirations. Anthology in India is uniquely positioned to provide emp

loyees the opportunity to engage in projects that impact the complete product lifecycle. They get to learn from market, prospects, clients and then design & develop systems, implement them at client sites, and finally provide them with ongoing improvements. These employee experiences in engaging global clients are some of the key reasons they go on to achieve great heights. When you are engaged with clients, global travel for onsite work becomes part of the job for those who choose that path. Our work culture is about challenging each other and succeeding together. Our organization values are followed in true spirit, from the leadership team to every member.

We also believe in continuous learning. We are all life long learners. To this effect, educational reimbursements for those pursuing supplemental education, certifications are provided. I talked about Anthology Academy where employees can learn and excel in their careers. In addition, we encourage a safe space where employees with diverse experiences and perspectives can collaborate and coevolve. Also, we offer flexible working hours so that employees work according to their time patterns and maintain work life balance well.

You are a growing company. How do you ensure that you stay on the growth trajectory?
For a rapidly growing organization like ours that continues to increase its global footprint, it is critical to sustain this organic and inorganic growth. This makes it important to focus on both individual human potential and the collective team's potential. This way of working is honed and perfected over time, with employees being freely approachable across levels and specializations. And this model of working is formalized with our proactive Human Resources team that provides employees with opportunities for continuous improvement. To maximize human potential, we focus on internal readiness and client readiness, through a dedicated business unit called- Learning Center. This is an employee choice-based learning platform, 'My Career My Way', for upskilling and to advance in their career in a transparent way. This is unique to Anthology and was developed in-house as a one-stop solution for new employees and existing employees.

Raj Mruthyunjayappa, President & Managing Director India, Anthology
Raj is the President and Managing Director of Antholgy India, has over two decades of experience in strategizing and executing business operations. He is an evangelist on the use of customer experience management solutions across verticals and is often consulted and quoted by media across the globe for his expertise on customer experience management as well as technology adoption across higher education.