As Accenture’s Chief Learning Officer, Rahul Varma is responsible for global learning and talent development. He oversees an annual training budget of more than $840 million and leads teams around the world that deliver award-winning work to drive strategic learning, onboarding and integration, career development, career transitions and performance management for the company’s more than 370,000 people. Most recently, Rahul led Accenture’s development and launch of Performance Achievement – the company’s new, innovative approach, to revolutionizing performance management. Passionate about the role of Human Resources, Rahul relentlessly champions innovative solutions to unlocking human potential.

While serving as Accenture in India’s first HR director, from 1999 to 2007, the company grew from a niche management consulting firm of 200 to a multi-business organization with 37,000 employees, earning the company global recognition for HR thought leadership. In his previous role as Accenture’s senior director of HR Strategy and Enablement, Rahul led a three-year global HR transformation and innovation initiative, including industry-academic training programs for HR professionals across China, Europe, India, the Philippines and South Africa. Rahul first joined Accenture in 1994 on the India HR team.

Rahul is a frequent speaker at conferences across the Asia, Europe and the U.S. on a range of talent and development issues. His team has won dozens of learning awards, including top ranking on the CLO magazine’s prestigious LearningElite Award.

Rahul earned his Master’s degree in Personnel Management (MPM) from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management, Pune, and has a BA with honors in Economics from Kirori Mal College, University of Delhi. Rahul was recently appointed as a workgroup co-chair on the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) Training and Adult Education (TAE) Skills Council, which aims to transform the TAE sector of Singapore. Rahul recently relocated from Singapore to New York City with his wife and their dog, Kulfi.