Aditi Sharma

I think I have been a continuous learner, and everyone has to be in our field because things have been evolving very rapidly, but more than being a continuous learner, I think I have been very strong observant of my surroundings, learning from people directly and indirectly. Being on some complex, difficult projects and going through that experience has been a game changer for me, and it definitely has been a reason of my growth across both organizations. I have not been a hopper - Accenture is just my second organization, so I believe in staying in a place and growing within the organization than just switching jobs. I think solving very complex, challenging projects through technical and delivery lens has been my road to success within Accenture, especially being brought into projects where things were not going in the right direction and turning them around.

I have been told by multiple leaders to be who you are, don't change yourself. I'm very transparent with people I work with, and sometimes it's a little tricky in a corporate setting, but a lot of leaders have told me to be who you are, do not change yourself. This advice has been meaningful to me because authenticity can be challenging to maintain in corporate environments, but it's been important guidance throughout my career.

I will advise take chances and risks, because it's just, trust me, it's not just my story, there are a lot of females like me where the only difference that we may have done a little differently was we took chances, where things were risky, and then the rewards were big.

I think more than technology, I have always felt it has been the complexity of dealing with organizations and their internal dynamics, solving them. I have always believed technology can help you, but people have to come along for technology to help them. My experience from a consulting lens has been it has always been challenging to solve people's problems. And trust me, every second organization - I have never seen an exception where it has not been a problem. When I say people problem, I'm talking of organizations and their own internal dynamics of rules, power struggles, behaviors of poor collaboration across them, and then we are brought in to make things successful. So I would say more than technology, it has always been how do you take along people and still deliver success.

I am a strong believer that sometimes when you are in leadership roles, you are who you are due to people who support and surround you, so I think that matters to me. I know day in, day out, it's not easy, considering there's so much going on in terms of client expectations and the evolving technologies, but I think having that continuous reality check that people matter, and they make you who you are today - that definitely is always in my mind. As a leader, I may not be doing coding, but I am successful as successful the people with me are. So I try to keep it in mind even in corporate settings under pressure, because that's something that continuously stays in my mind.