ICICI Bank’s CEO and managing director is Chanda Kochhar. She was instrumental in the development and molding of India’s retail banking sector. Kochhar began his career at ICICI as a management trainee in 1984. She was soon entrusted with a key position in the project. Because of her dedication and excellent performance, she was promoted to assistant general manager and then deputy general manager. She was named the head of an ICICI bank-created Infrastructure Industry Group in 1996 to tap the power, telecom, and transportation industries. She was promoted to general manager soon after and was in charge of the bank’s top 200 clients’ relationships and business. ICICI Bank has grown and prospered throughout the years thanks to her exceptional leadership. Diversification, expansion, distribution, and technology are all areas where it has focused. She progressed through the ranks of achievement and promotions until she was named CEO and managing director of the bank in 2009. Chanda Kochhar has received numerous honors for her leadership abilities and has been listed among the ‘Most Powerful Women’ in numerous business journals.
Childhood and Adolescence
Chanda Kochhar was born in Jodhpur, Rajasthan, on November 17, 1961. Although she was born in Jodhpur, she grew up in Jaipur, Rajasthan.
She went to Jaipur’s St. Angela Sophia School. She later relocated to Mumbai and completed her bachelor’s degree at Jai Hind College. She graduated from the Institute of Cost Accounts of India in 1982 and studied cost accounting. After that, he earned a master’s degree in management studies from Mumbai’s Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies.
Career of Chanda Kochhar
In 1984, Chanda Kochhar began her career as a management trainee at the Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI). She was conducting project appraisal and monitoring and reviewing projects in industries including textile, paper, and cement when she joined ICICI.
Chanda Kochhar was recruited as one of the main team members and given major responsibilities when the ICICI Bank was founded in 1993.
She rose through the ranks to assistant general manager in 1994, then deputy manager in 1996. She was appointed CEO of ICICI Bank’s newly formed Infrastructure Industry Group in 1996, with the goal of developing industry expertise in the areas of power, telecom, and transportation.
She was promoted to General Manager and Head of the ICICI Bank’s Major Client Group in 1998, where she oversaw interactions with the bank’s top 200 clients.
In 1999, she was assigned to ICICI Bank’s strategy and e-commerce units. Her capable leadership aided the bank in expanding its retail business, and she concentrated on crucial issues such as technology, innovation, process engineering, and distribution and scale expansion.
She took over as executive director in 2001 and was promoted to deputy managing director of ICICI Bank in 2006. She was in charge of the bank’s foreign and corporate units from 2006 to 2007.
She was the bank’s chief financial officer (CFO) and joint managing director from 2007 until 2009.
Chanda Kochhar became the bank’s managing director and chief executive officer in 2009. She also serves on the boards of most of the bank’s subsidiaries.
Major Projects of Chanda Kochhar
Chanda Kochhar has smashed the glass ceiling in a world where few women make it to the upper rungs of the corporate ladder. She has been the CEO of ICICI Bank since 2009, and the bank has won the “Best Retail Bank in India” award four times: in 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2005.
Achievements and Awards
Chanda Kochhar received The Economic Times’ ‘Business Woman of the Year’ award in 2005, and Retail Banker International’s ‘Rising Star Award’ for Global Awards in 2006.
She was also named to the ’30 Most Powerful Woman Leaders’ list for eight years in a row, from 2002 to 2010.
In 2010, she was named 10th on Fortune’s ‘Most Powerful Women in Business’ list. In the same year, she was rated 92nd on Forbes’ list of the world’s “Most Powerful Women.”
She was also named ‘Outstanding Woman Business Leader of the Year’ by CNBC TV18 in 2010. She was also named 11th in the Financial Times’ list of the “Top 50 Women in World Business.”
In 2011, she received the Padma Bhushan award, India’s third highest civilian honor.
Carleton University in Canada awarded her a doctoral degree in 2014.
In 2015, Chanda Kochhar was named one of Time magazine’s “100 Most Influential People on the Planet.”
She was also recognized as a woman leader in Business World magazine’s ‘BW’s Most Influential Women’ list in 2017.
Personal History and Legacy
Chanda Kochhar lives in Mumbai with her husband Deepak Kochhar. Deepak Kochhar, a wind energy entrepreneur, is a former business classmate of hers. The couple has two children: Aarti, a daughter, and Arjun, a son.
Estimated Net Worth
The estimated net worth of Chanda Kochhar is around 3.3 Million USD.
Trivia
She is the first female boss to earn the Woodrow Wilson Award for Global Corporate Citizenship from the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C.
She has won the J.N. Bose Gold Medal in Cost Accountancy and the Wockhardt Gold Medal for Excellence in Management Studies.