Meet Alka
Alka Kesavan is the Principal and Owner of ODEV Consulting LLC, a boutique consulting firm that specializes in organizational effectiveness and talent management solutions. Prior to starting her independent consulting practice, Alka was the Global Officer for Organizational Capability at Marriott International. The company is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, and has approximately 200,000 employees and a reported revenue of nearly US$12 billion. As a key member of the Global HR leadership team and practice leader for the organizational capability discipline, she led major transformational initiatives to support the strategic priorities of Marriott International businesses worldwide. During her 11-year tenure at Marriott, she worked with senior executives across the company to provide consultation expertise on organization strategy and effectiveness, business process design, culture alignment, talent management and change management issues.
Prior to joining Marriott, Alka was an Associate Partner with Accenture for nearly 10 years. As part of Accenture‘s Human Performance practice, she consulted with clients on a wide variety of workforce performance and organizational effectiveness issues. Her clients included global leaders from consumer products, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, health insurance, as well as federal and state government agencies.
Alka’s international career includes earlier assignments as a consultant to the World Bank and as Director of Organization Development with Rolls-Royce North America. Born and raised in India, Alka also worked for three years with two renowned state-owned enterprises in steel manufacturing and automobiles after completing her MBA from the Xavier Labor Relations Institute in India. She also has an M.S. degree with a concentration in Organization Development from the American University/NTL Institute, Washington D.C. Alka is certified in Benchmarks, a leadership assessment and development tool designed by the Center for Creative Leadership, North Carolina. She is a member of the National OD Network and the Society for Human Resources Management.