Three Questions to Priyanka Venugopal

1. What do you like about your job?

What I like the most is that it helps me explore all the different sides of a person that I am. There are so many different avenues that you can explore, and it caters to all the different interests that I have. They have treated me as a whole person, as someone whose interests are evolving and as a person is also evolving, and it has given me at every step an option to try out multiple things. And I think my personality is such that I always want to do more than one thing at a time.

2. Which innovations and tech trends do you find particularly exciting?

My interest in AI started off four or five years ago when I was working with AI using social media analytics. So, let's say you launch some products and based on social media feedback, you can get the feedback of the product and not wait four months to say this product is a success or a failure. From there I realized that AI somehow encompasses every other technology trend. Whatever new thing that is coming up in terms of big data, in terms of cloud computing, in terms of blockchain, everything, it is based on data, and it is based on AI. So, for me, it has been AI since then.

3. What idea, product or thought leader has excited or inspired you lately? 

To be very honest, it has been Sindhu Gangadharan – the SVP & MD of SAP Labs India. The way she handled the whole pandemic in India was fantastic. I am really inspired by the way she does things and her positivity. What she has done and how she's addressing her people, how she's treating the company, there's a lot more empathy and there's a lot more flavor brought to it. I really like her sessions and I usually attend anything that she does. India was hugely affected by the second pandemic and how she took care of her people was fantastic.