Recommendations and Testimonials

We are pleased to provide a snapshop of some recommendations we have received from a selection of our friends, colleagues and client representatives on matters we were previously involved with.

Mr Sharad Agrawal, our director and practice head, shares some personal recommendations.

As Delivery Manager (UK & I), Alcatel-Lucent Services

“I only worked briefly alongside Sharad, but he came into an organisation in need of change and improvement to create a Software Development Factory (SDF). He's taken a disparate group of software delivery staff/teams, and brought in his rigour and broad best-practice knowledge, and is definitely helping deliver mature processes and practices.” - James Winspear, OSS Solution Architect, Alcatel-Lucent

As Delivery Unit Head (for Capita), Mastek UK Ltd.

"Sharad is an extremely personable individual and I would have no hesitation in recommending him for a project or programme role that is challenging and needs an holistic and well balanced approach to change. He entered the Mastek/Capita relationship at a very fractious time and he was able to diagnose quickly what was going wrong with the relationship. He quickly structured a programme of improvements and delivered against the promise." - Paul Thomas, Programme Director, CAPITA

“Sharad introduced a lot more rigour into an outsourced relationship and ensured that roles and responsibilities were clearly defined. This resulted in clear accountabilities and improved visibility across the relationship. I found Sharad very easy to do business with and he always listened to the customer to meet their needs. He remained professional at all times and I would be happy to do business again with Sharad in the future.”
- Top qualities: Personable, Expert, High Integrity. - Nick Breeds, Technical Director, Capita Professional Services UK

"These (initiatives launched to turn around the delivery unit) are good initiatives and producing results. There is a lot of them for others to learn from…” – Ram Mohan, President & COO, Mastek

“I have worked with Sharad for nearly 3 years now. He is a seasoned delivery professional with a keen eye for the programme risks and target mitigations. He liaises well with senior stakeholders and is 100% focused on delivering quality solutions to time and budget. I would unreservedly recommend him for any senior position in programme management or client liaison/account management.” - Steve Latchem, Vice President, Solutions and Strategy, Mastek UK

The Capita NI DU led ably by Sharad, is one of the Delivery Units with all their projects operating at CMMI L3. This is due to the leadership and commitment shown by Sharad with his demonstrated focus on value added processes. He has, over the last few years, come up with process improvements and has institutionalised the review processes across his DU. Some of the best practices that have been initiated & institutionalised by Sharad within his DU are the Partnership Scorecard, Review portal, PSRDC (modified), Project initiation document for any release in the CME projects, System Acceptance Criteria for each release, post project reviews, etc. These initiatives have helped in bring in more clarity on the customer expectations and measure the quality of the deliverables quantitatively. His process focus has rubbed off to a large extent on the next layer of management within his team.

I would also like to point out that Sharad was responsible for detailing out the new CRESS process and form. This was pending for a long time and was finally completed only when he took on the responsibility to develop the new forms. It’s been good for the PC and SQA to work with him as they can count on his support for the initiatives that are undertaken. They have been involved in all the reviews and are happy to be considered a part of the integrated DU team. As we move ahead towards CMMI L5, I have no doubt that Sharad and his team will play a vital role in setting an example for the rest of the organisation to follow.- Head, Organisation Process Group, Mastek

“Sharad is a colleague on whom we in sales teams depended upon to assist in convincing our prospects and clients about our capability to deliver. He takes keen interest in understanding the prospect/client situation and presenting the solution options with process and institute independent view points. An approach which resulted in win-win results.” - Prakash Dogra, Geschäftsführer, Mastek GmbH

“I remember Sharad as a very meticulous person who was highly process oriented and open to new ideas. He was extremely articulate and could present his thoughts with a lot of clarity. Last but not the least, he was a team player and a very good people manager.” - Jayesh Shah, Sr. Vice President - Corporate Systems, Wadhawan Holdings Pvt. Ltd.

“...thanks to Sharad for his exceptional support and motivating us to think, visualize and dare to experiment. - A participant from Team Building Workshop

As Project Director (for Patsystems UK), Mastek UK Ltd.

“Sharad impressed us with his hands on management and rigour in executing the offshore engagement. He created clarity and visibility in the midst of considerable uncertainty, consulted, enrolled, built trust and managed stakeholders through the transition, while balancing perspectives and conflicts of interest between disparate teams.” - Raju Oak, Director, Shift Thought

"I have known Sharad since 2002 when he was selected by Mastek to lead an outsourced development project for Patsystems PLC, of which company I was Global Head of Development at the time. We worked closely together for some 4 years during which time Sharad earned the respect of all the senior management team within Patsystems. The engagement was a departure for Mastek in as much as Patsystems was a small (c.200 staff) early stage company with innovative product and excellent market positioning but lacking in process maturity.

One of the primary objectives of introducing a disciplined external party into Patsystems’ development function was precisely to change the prevailing culture which was based on a small number of ‘star programmers’ and was neither scalable nor consistent. Over the period of the engagement, Patsystems managed to establish structured product management, software testing and release management functions; Sharad’s contribution to these developments, over and above the software delivery project itself, was of significant long term value to the company. The software delivery project was inevitably challenging in this environment and Sharad had to deal with a degree of scepticism from the incumbent team at the outset. This he addressed by demonstrating the highest degree of commitment and professionalism and by being seen to address matters of genuine concern in short order.

With two changes of CEO, the project was subject to due diligence review in each case and although there were changes in terms of business goals, the role of Mastek and Sharad’s credibility were never questioned. Subsequent to the completion of the engagement with Patsystems, I have remained in touch with Sharad and sought to employ his services on other projects of my own, although I have not been able to achieve the appropriate confluence of events to bring this about." - William R Todd, Global Head of Development, Patsystems PLC 2001-2006. Principal, Exchange Network Systems Ltd 1996 - Present

“I have known Sharad professionally for over 6 years now and have found him a very goal oriented and result customer focussed individual. He has a sound understanding of the IT outsourcing business, understands the dynamics of the profession very well and applies his personal and organisational capabilities in a proficient and intelligent way.

Sharad's work has been known to make a direct impact on customer's business which is visible and delivers benefits. I have observed Sharad's true capabilities coming out whilst performing programme management and senior delivery roles, where has been responsible for bringing together large geographically separated and fragmented engineering teams and organising and managing the teams to bring the best out of individuals.

Sharad also possesses extensive experience in supporting the sales and business development teams in generating new business by virtue to strategy, procurement and delivery assurance. He has strong IT process and frameworks understanding and years of consulting experience with technical and management background which enables him to provide sound and professional advice to his clients and partners like. ” - Ashish Julka, Principal Consultant, Mastek UK