Aanisha Mahmood is an HR professional in Telco/digital industry. The business graduate from Institute of Business Administration (IBA), University of Dhaka, takes a keen interest in the synergy of Marketing with HR and looks forward to using her skills as a vehicle for economic development. She works to serve people and firmly believes that development goals are not passions secluded from creativity and business sales. Aanisha is currently Employer brand and culture manager and Grameenphone Limited.
While still a student in university, not completely sure of what direction she wanted to take, Aanisha knew this. That she was interested in human psychology and that would be something she wanted to work with. So in between classes and during semester breaks, she interned, worked and temped in a variety of backgrounds. During this process of exploration, she discovered a key piece of information. HR, in the simplest terms, is applied psychology.
Majoring in marketing gave her an advantage as she was already working with the right line of people and the right connections. In her many internships, she enjoyed the experience at Grameenphone (GP) the best. So when “Next Business Leader/ Next Digital Explorer”, a management training program came up, she applied immediately.
For 8 months, she worked in a rotation program around the organization, in classroom trainings learning about the different departments of GP. Afterwards, she joined GR working in Human Resources in Organisational Development Training (ODT). she currently has 3 years’ experience in employer branding and culture.
She now works to attract potential talents and some of the brightest minds of this generation to make GP’s brand as an employer stand out.
HR is a very up and coming field. Aanisha says that even in just the next few months, a lot of transformations are happening. We once had this notion of brand personification being something only for a product or something to sell you a service. But the internal culture of the organization is just as important for a brand’s identity. The internal culture reflects the people and internal environment of the organization and what it stands for.
Aanisha says she feels blessed working at GP; one of the top MNC’s in the world currently. When she speaks about the environment, she describes it as friendly and says it has one of the strongest HR support, new product innovation, digitization and development initiatives.
“You had this idea of a brand persona being only for different demographics, different markets, and analytics for mainly products or commercial roles. But these things are jelling into HR and in my career I would like to grow in this sector,” says Aanisha. “Where you would be doing this analytics not for organisations, but this for people.”
When asked about struggles Aanisha stumbled to find any as she says the work environment is very inclusive and friendly. A refreshing change of pace from the horror stories of workplace toxicity. The only problem she identified would be the transition from life as a student into the corporate world. “No one can teach you about real life managing, marketing and sales through text book,” says Aanisha, “You need collaboration between corporate and academia to make the best use of these 4 years.”
There are a lot of confused people among the youth who don’t know what they’re looking for in life yet. And that’s okay. Aanisha’s advice to those soul searchers would be to get more exposure to an organisation or areas even slightly in their field of interest. Exposure to real offices and the field gives you an idea of what that world is like, and an idea is a great place to start.
Writer
AMANA IFTEKHAR
