Hey there fellow Humans! Greetings from Buzzgrad, the Bee.

As I flutter around this magnificent ed-tech marvel, I am truly inspired to find several passion-led leaders with a common mission. That mission is to make education accessible and affordable, resulting in creating career opportunities for more learners. As more and more people become aware of upGrad’s vision, this chronicle will detail the forces catalyzing that change. So, today, let me bring you the exclusive insider info about one such changemaker who is determined to bring affordable e-education accessibility into a pulsating reality.

You would want to Bee here to witness the change

Now, a significant chunk of the population across the globe can relate with the paralyzing pressure of student loans for higher education. The changemaker I chose today has personally undergone this mammoth challenge and is trying to minimize this very problem. Let’s see how…

Rohit Dhar, upGrad’s President of Product, Data, Design, Technology, Content (PDTC) 

Unlike the queen bee who dominates my hive and makes us work tirelessly, Rohit Dhar or RD, is a man who always strives to be the change he wants to see in this world. From a true leader to an amicable friend to a man with a mission; RD is truly the creme de la creme.

The Wavemaker

Rohit creates indelible legacies wherever he goes. His journey at upGrad is no different. Here, his mission is coming to its fruition as he plans to roll out the upGrad SuperApp and multiple offerings, such as:

• One-on-One Mentorship: Helps shape a learner’s career with personalised expert advice based on their future goals.
• upGrad Rise: Engages new learners to inculcate soft skills, both live and offline, by experts.
• Career Path Predictor: An intuitive system that will analyse learners’ career goals to suggest the ideal career choices.
• Shorts: upGrad’s freemium offering that helps everyday professionals upskill in less than 5 mins.

Each of these are designed to offer not just valuable educational content, but also help learners understand their career needs and instill crucial skills. While these skills are often ignored in mainstream education institutes, RD understands its necessity in the evolving job market today. Aside from these, RD also works to offer a seamless user journey and acts as a career buddy to – be it existing learners or a wanderer like me. 

Ask him what do you add to the table and pat comes the reply, “It’s my team who delivers. I am just a catalyst.” Being the bee that I am, I know that’s a humble leader speaking. Prod him more and he just smiles, “If it’s all working efficiently it’s a job well done, it’s when there is a lot of noise from cross functional teams and customers… that’s a siren for us, ‘coz we know something is broken somewhere. Since most of the things we do are not ‘seen’ by the customer but are ‘experienced’. I aspire for a smooth user journey rather than applause.”  I know all the conversation and mini celebrations around data that demonstrate the stance and the strategy.

The Visionary

Since we are not getting beyond the layers that are obvious, I will get a little philosophical. I believe the future of upGrad has an impact on the future of online education. However, with RD accelerating this ed-tech’s growth, I can already imagine more learners’ careers being upgraded. 

With upGrad soon to be a unicorn, Rohit, in the next two years, plans to open a new business avenue. This avenue is aligned towards boosting profit margins for the organization. RD plans to do this by creating bite-sized content on an unprecedented scale. It will directly increase the platform’s bandwidth and allow more users to access it. 

These will be made possible by RD’s teams who use AI, ML, Data Science, and other deep-technology variants to create a human-tech collaboration. These tech teams are upGrad’s secret sauce to success, bringing the human touch into the labyrinth of technology. 

Sounds exciting, right? 

The Leader

Coming to RD’s teams, it is 176 strong, consisting of personnel from Product, Data, Design, Technology, and Content. Together they form the heart of the Human Tech Collaboration.

Rohit makes sure these functions encompass an amazing work environment that is high on energy, integrity and passion; high salary packages, free Employee Education Programme, growth environment and more. Furthermore, inclusion is a crucial value of the upGrad family. This is why this ed-tech firm works to make itself a safe space where diversity is celebrated and empathy is cherished. The bundling of these perks makes being part of this team an overall spectacular experience. 

These are some of the major reasons why talents across the country are keen to be part of this revolution. But, that’s not all that is making working at upGrad so lucrative for them. 

With upGrad in its hyper-growth stage, Rohit plans to increase the size of his team by nearly 30% in the near future. He is on the lookout for talent that is proficient in multiple programming languages or are full-stack developers, iOS and android engineers. The engineers joining RD’s PDTC team will be working on: the technical roadmap to support acquisitions, learning experience, engagement, payments & revenue. RD’s mentorship propels the talent joining the PDTC team to get groomed as future leaders. 

Apart from Python, Java, Node & React, upGrad’s tech-stack includes widely used tools such as:

Mr. Popular

RD has unofficially acquired the title: Master of all. Given his vast experience and domain-knowledge, some of his team members break down the R and D. For them, R stands for ‘Revolutionary’ and D for ‘Doing it Right’. However, he credits his work-success to his entrepreneurial mindset; which is always open to learning more. 

When asked how he manages to don so many hats? He simply quotes his personal work mantra which is derived from Pareto’s rule: 

“If you have a heap of tasks to be completed, instead of taking on all of them all at once, choose 20% of the total workload that will offer 80% of the output, boosting your overall productivity.”

Aside from unwavering commitment towards his work, RD is also a great listener. Be it new ideas or a personal crisis of an employee. Especially with Work From Home being the new norm across industries, employees often need emotional support. RD is always ready to provide support to anyone who’s going through a bad time. 

RD’s team meetings are often accompanied by fun activities and online games that bring a smile to everyone’s e-meet screens. With monthly updates on each project, colloquial conversations pertaining to everyone’s well-being is quite common when you’re in a meeting with RD.

From working with his team, occasionally munching on Rasgullas to dancing with his team, I have seen it all!

Be a Part of upGrad’s Ed-Tech Revolution if you too have an ambitious dream. A promising career at upGrad sounds like a perfect opportunity for that, right?  

Helping launch careers in this fiercely competitive market. Plans to boost upGrad’s hyper-growth curve. A heap of benefits for upGrad employees.

I hope this story has inspired you to follow your mission and be the change you want to see. Now excuse me as I go implement some of these striving leadership standards in my hive. But I will be back soon with the success secrets of other equally impressive leaders at upGrad.