Ashok Gopal

Human Resources Advisor at Centena Group

Speaker

Ashok is a senior HR leader, who works as an HR Advisor with the Centena Group in Dubai. He has spent the last 2 decades based out of Singapore and Dubai. Based in Dubai since 2011, he has extensive experience in consulting (as Subject Matter Expert with Gallup) and in a line roles. In 2021, he was listed as one of the 20 HR Leaders to follow in the Middle East.

As HR Advisor with the Centena Group, Ashok has worked on the creation of HR Strategy. Prior to that, as Head of OD at Mashreq Bank, Ashok was responsible for creating a world class Employee Engagement program – this program won the Gallup Great Workplace Award for 6 years in succession, and the Wellbeing program won multiple awards as the best Corporate Wellbeing program in the UAE. Subsequently Gartner developed a case study around dimensions of the Wellbeing program.

In 2016, Ashok led a team to develop the bank’s Mission, Vision and Values… As Global Head of L&D (part of the OD role), Ashok was responsible for creating and driving the L&D strategy of the bank.
During his time as an SME at Gallup, Ashok worked across the Asia Pacific and Middle East in a variety of industries; he partnered with leaders in manufacturing, healthcare, retail, FMCG, Telecom and financial services around Employee Engagement, Strengths based development, Customer Engagement among other areas.

He is a published author, thought leader and keynote speaker – he has articles published in the Harvard Business Review, in addition to a host of other prestigious publications. He works as an Executive coach to leaders.