Shivkumar Kalyanaraman

“I have known Shiv since early 2008 when he joined IBM Research - India. Shiv was a professor, so when I started teaming with him for research business development initiatives, I was pleasantly surprised to see him extremely enthusiastic in building client relationships, leveraging strong technical skills combined with deep business, strategic and execution abilities. It is indeed a rare quality among executive business leaders. During our joint meetings with IBM’s strategic customers, I observed that Shiv is a great listener who thinks “Client-in” to deeply understand the problems of clients and then appropriately positions technology to solve real business problems that creates economic value. This enables him to form valuable client and partner relationships across organizations. At the same time, he is savvy about strategy, business economics and negotiation. Shiv's DNA is learning, educating and inspiring people. He has this amazing talent to learn up new domains where he had little a priori knowledge and quickly be able to work with clients and world class experts to create value. His LinkedIn article series (and some youtube videos) on topics such as cleantech, e-mobility, finance, agriculture, industry 4.0 are excellent reads and blend technology with strategic business insights while simplifying complex concepts. Shiv is one of the very best partners I have worked with in my career. He would be a fantastic CXO executive leader.”

“I have known Shiv since 2012 when we collaborated on Smarter Energy initiatives in IBM Research, and then worked very closely together when he was my manager in 2017-18 in IBM Research, India. Throughout my time working with Shiv I found him to be excellent at a unique skill of combining highly innovative technical thinking with similarly highly innovative ideas on business models to bring together a research agenda that made substantial positive impact on IBM in both the Energy and Agriculture sectors. He is someone how can tie these ideas to execution and to corporate strategy very effectively. I saw him bring global executives and client leadership onboard with game changing ideas in agribusiness and then help IBM execute and deliver in the market with new offerings and with significant client value. Also, as a senior manager, being part of the senior leadership in IBM Research India, Shiv shaped the industry solutions strategy for our business unit and led from the front in helping the employee community find a common purpose around which to drive their own missions and develop their careers. Shiv continues to be an inspiring mentor to me even now after 2 years of leaving IBM.”