#89 Talent Chat: Eric Westphal + Krishna Kumar - A Few Things - 33 Min

We discussed a number of things including:1. Eric and Krishna's corporate and entrepreneurial journey2. How Krishna started Quintrix and its collaborations with corporates  3. State of the tech talent landscape4. Challenges and opportunities ahead5. Future trendsEric is Associate Vice President, Global Workforce Strategy and Operations at Cognizant. As a senior member of the Global HR Operations team, he is responsible for strategic workforce planning, workforce analytics and intelligence, and economic development. Additionally, he is helping to enhance and protect the company's corporate brand and reputation through programs that drive measurable social change and business value. This includes leading strategic investments in workforce hiring and training programs, broadening the scope and investment in creating more opportunities for learners of all backgrounds to  access the education they need to pursue rewarding careers at Cognizant.Eric was responsible for developing and launching the Cognizant U.S. Foundation, a non-profit private foundation created and funded by Cognizant to support STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) education and skills initiatives for U.S. workers and students. Announced in February 2018 and launched in Charlotte, North Carolina, on May 1, 2018, the Foundation was established with an initial grant of $100 million from Cognizant. As Acting Managing Director of the Foundation, Eric successfully architected the award of over $12M in technology training program grants in 2018, establishing strong career pathways for over 7,000 veterans, women, and individuals from underserved communities.Prior to joining Cognizant, Eric was a Senior member of the workplace consulting and operations team at Deloitte, responsible for the operations management of over 800,000 sq. ft. of real estate and 300  employees within the Northeast Region.  Eric earned his bachelors degree in Business Management from Providence College and his MBA from Fordham University with a focus on International Business.-----Krishna is the Founder and Managing Director of Quintrix, a company that is transforming how enterprises hire, train, and retain early talent. After spending a decade in organizations like Goldman Sachs and State Street bank, Krishna learned that talent shortage, especially in tech, was hindering growth at these company.With a background in both business and technology, Krishna built a talent development model at Quintrix from ground up called ‘recruit-train-deploy’. This model has become the gold-standard for attracting, training, and retaining diverse talent.Krishna coaches CIOs, tech leaders and talent acquisition professionals on how to build a pro-active pipeline of talent that is a cultural fit, motivated, loyal and results driven.  Within 3 years of building this recruit-train-deploy model, Quintrix was acquired by one of the largest workforce solutions companies Mindlance. Krishna continues to lead Quintrix to address the growing need of tech talent for Fortune 1000 companies.Krishna is the recipient of the 40-under-40 award, resides in Jersey City and holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration.