Celebrating Leadership Excellence: HONO at the Great Manager Awards 2025

The Great Manager Awards have long been regarded as one of India’s best benchmarks of managerial capability. Each year, People Business highlights leaders who demonstrate exceptional strength across five pillars of managerial excellence: people leadership, execution, collaboration, entrepreneurial mindset, and customer impact. The event celebrated Great Managers™, the Top 100 Great Managers™, and this year’s T. A. Pai Young HR Leaders, creating a powerful platform to recognise individuals and organisations shaping tomorrow’s workplaces. 

With more than 300+ senior HR leaders, CHROs, CEOs, and industry influencers in the room, the evening was a testament to the evolving importance of leadership and managerial excellence in driving business impact. 

At HONO, we’ve always believed that great managers build great organisations. Our entire philosophy of designing HR tech revolves around enabling leaders to create meaningful, measurable impact on their teams and businesses. 

Our participation this year was anchored in our commitment to the HR community, a commitment to listen, learn, collaborate and build solutions that help HR leaders shift from administrative complexity to strategic clarity.

Event Highlights and Key Takeaways

The evening was filled with energising conversations, insightful sessions, and inspiring stories from leaders who are driving real change in their organisations.

We had Rajesh Padmanabhan, Chairman of Board, HONO present a keynote on “How AI Is Redefining HR: Linking People Strategy to Business Impact”.

A powerful takeaway from his talk was his message that: “AI is not replacing HR — but elevating it. HR is giving leaders the power to make people decisions with the same precision and conviction as financial decisions.”

He emphasised that HR is transitioning from a process-driven function to a value-creation engine, where people strategy is tightly linked to business outcomes and measurable ROI.

Additionally, our leadership team took the stage to present key awards and celebrate managers across industries. Sumit Sabharwal, CBO – India & South Asia, HONO, presented the Great Managers 2025 awards and Raghav Datta, COO & HR Head, HONO, and Rajesh Padmanabhan, Chairman of the Board, HONO, jointly presented the T. A. Pai Young HR Leaders 2025 awards. 

Inspiring stories of managerial excellence

Throughout the evening, we met leaders whose stories of resilience, innovation, and people-centric thinking reaffirmed why platforms like this matter. From first-time managers stepping into leadership roles to seasoned leaders building next-generation talent cultures, every award winner expressed what it means to lead with purpose.

Community, conversations, and connection

With over 300+  leaders from across industries, the event offered a space for rich community-building and a place where ideas on the future of work were exchanged. Also, it was a space where fresh perspectives on HR transformation emerged and conversations around the challenges and expectations shaping HR in 2025 and beyond unfolded.

Further, our booth added an engaging and personal touch to the experience. It became a hub for leaders to explore how AI can elevate HR efficiency, how data-driven talent practices can be seamlessly integrated, and what next-generation HRMS platforms can bring on the table in terms of employee experience and measurable ROI. The energy at the booth allowed us to build new connections, strengthen existing ones, and deepen our commitment to building a future-ready HR community.

What’s Next for HONO

Stay tuned for updates on:

• HONO’s upcoming HR community initiatives
• New developments in AI-driven HR technology
• Opportunities to collaborate with us

If you’d like to connect with us, explore collaboration opportunities, or request a demo, we’d love to hear from you.

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