Meet the team

Bhakti is the Founder and CEO of BigSpring, a work readiness platform focused on moving people from test ready to job ready. The AI-powered platform enables companies to rapidly create and retool talent for business growth at pace with changing market needs. BigSpring measures outcomes (versus seats or hours), to establish investing in people as essential. Google, Uber, Facebook, AXA, Tata have adopted BigSpring across their ecosystem of teams, partners and customers. BigSpring has been selected by the World Economic Forum (WEF) as a Technology Pioneer 2020, joining a select group of companies that are poised to have a significant impact on business and society.

Bhakti also serves on the Board of Governors for JA Worldwide. Previously, Bhakti worked as an Engagement Manager with McKinsey & Company leading client engagements for the High Tech and Corporate Finance practices. She started her career in product development in Silicon Valley with Siebel Systems. Bhakti is a Computer Engineer with University Honors from Carnegie Mellon University, where she was among the first women from India to attend. She earned an MBA from The Wharton School, where she was a Joseph Wharton Fellow.

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Jonathan is the CRO at BigSpring. He has built and led global go-to-market and commercial teams for Startups (MetaVRse), ScaleUps (OYO, REEF, Booster) and Fortune 50 companies (Verizon, T-Mobile).He has devoted his career to developing the people around him and his passion about closing the global skills gap fuels the purpose behind building and scaling BigSpring.

He studied at Harvard Business School and received a MBA from Bethel University. He has earned certifications for Revenue Architecture and Generative AI.

Rajesh is the Head of Engineering, ML at BigSpring. Previously Rajesh worked with Oracle Corporation where, as Senior Director of Engineering, Rajesh managed a distributed global team of engineers and engineering managers working on Oracle’s flagship ERP product, known as Oracle E-Business Suite. He specifically worked on cloud adapters for Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS), various other integration tools, data analytics, UI framework, cloud migration tools, mobile infrastructure etc. During his tenure at Oracle Rajesh was awarded six US patents.

Rajesh is a Graduate in Engineering from Jadavpur University. He has also done an Executive General Management Program from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore and Advanced Strategic Management Program from Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode.

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Yin is Sr. Director of Customer Growth at BigSpring. Previously, she was a founding member and COO & Head of Customer Success at COMPAS Global, which built global expansion software for ambitious B2B startups, at least one of which has become a unicorn. She has spent over a decade in Silicon Valley holding various global growth positions in cleantech and SaaS, after starting her career with The Boston Consulting Group in Berlin, Germany and Beijing, China.

Yin is Founder and Board Member of the Qian Zheng Memorial Scholarship, which supports underprivileged female STEM students in China through funding, programming and mentorship. She attended the University of Pennsylvania and its Wharton School, where she obtained her MBA, BS in finance and BA in international studies in 5 years. 

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John Chambers is the founder and CEO of JC2 Ventures. In his role, Chambers focuses on helping disruptive startups from around the world build and scale, while also promoting the broader development of startup nations and a startup world.

Prior to founding JC2 Ventures in January 2018, Chambers served as CEO, Chairman and Executive Chairman at Cisco Systems. During his 25+ years at Cisco, he helped grow the company from $70 million when he joined in 1991, to $1.2 billion when he became CEO in 1995, to $47 billion when he stepped down as CEO in 2015. As Executive Chairman, a position Chambers held until December 2017, he led the Board of Directors and provided counsel to the CEO and leadership team on strategy, digital transformation and strategic partnerships. John also spearheaded the creation and development of Cisco’s country digitization program, where he partnered with government leaders across the world to harness the power of technology to create economic opportunities.

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Adam Grant is an organizational psychologist and bestselling author who helps people find meaning and motivation at work.

Adam Grant has been Wharton’s top-rated professor for 7 straight years. As an organizational psychologist, he is a leading expert on how we can find motivation and meaning, and live more generous and creative lives. He has been recognized as one of the world’s 10 most influential management thinkers and Fortune’s 40 under 40.

​He is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 5 books that have sold millions of copies and been translated into 35 languages: Think Again, Give and Take, Originals, Option B and Power Moves. His books have been named among the year’s best by Amazon, Apple, the Financial Times, and the Wall Street Journal. His New York Times article on languishing is one of the most-shared articles of 2021

Frits Van Paasschen has been President and CEO of both Starwood Hotels & Resorts worldwide and the Coors Brewing Company.

He held numerous executive roles at Nike, ultimately becoming President of Europe, Middle East, and Africa. Before that, van Paasschen was a Vice President, Finance at The Walt Disney Company, having begun his career in consulting at The Boston Consulting Group and McKinsey & Company. He serves on the boards of Royal DSM and William Sonoma and previously was a director on the boards of Oakley, Jones Apparel, and Barclays.

Van Paasschen is an investor and board member of three hyper-growth unicorns, Sonder, citizenM Hotels, and Convene (Chair). He is a frequent keynote speaker and Amazon best-selling author of The Disruptors' Feast.

Greg Badros earned his B.S. from Duke University and his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Washington.

He has over 20 research and trade publications including the Cassowary Constraint Solver which is now integrated into Apple's iOS and OS X. Greg worked as a Sr. Engineering Director at Google leading AdSense and then Gmail+ and Google Apps, then was a VP of Engineering & Products at Facebook leading both Ads and various consumer teams.

He now runs Prepared Mind Innovations advising numerous startups, makes early-stage investments, and builds prototypes for fun.

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Shailesh is a Partner at TPG, responsible for its Growth and Social Impact portfolio across sectors in India and Southeast Asia.

Previously, Shailesh was the Vice President for International Operations at Twitter, launching the service in over 50 countries and MD of Google India, when he was recognized among the 100 most impactful leaders in India by Businessweek. He has served on the board of JLL, a Fortune 500 real estate services company.

Shailesh holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management and dual degrees from the University of Pennsylvania – B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School of Business and a B.A. with Honors.

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Hugo Bague is a seasoned global executive with experience in metals and mining, technology, advanced manufacturing and pharmaceuticals.

From 2007-2017, he was the Group Executive Organisational Resources for Rio Tinto plc, a leading international metals and mining group. Bague was previously Vice President of Human Resources for the Technology Solution Group of Hewlett Packard Corporation. He also worked for Compaq Computer, Nortel Networks, and Abbott Laboratories.

Bague is an external advisor to McKinsey & Company, and also a Non-Executive Director with Jones Lang Lasalle, where he chairs the Compensation Committee.