Ritu Kochhar leads Spencer Stuart’s India offices and the firm’s Financial Services, Private Equity and Boards practice in India. She has previously led the firm’s Private Equity and Financial officer practices in Asia Pacific. Having lived and worked across multiple countries, she has over 25 years of experience across Board and leadership advisory, executive search, business consulting and capital markets. Based in Mumbai, she advises investors, corporates and founders across leadership development, CEO and board succession planning, and cultural issues.
Global financial services expertise
- Ritu brings several years of financial services and business consulting experience prior to her career in leadership advisory and search. She has held various roles in financial services firms, including institutional equities sales at JP Morgan in Mumbai, where she advised private equity and U.S.-based institutional funds investing in Indian equities.
- Earlier, Ritu was a senior economist at Bear Stearns, focusing on Indian markets within the firm’s equity research business in New York. At Bear Stearns, she advised institutional clients on investment strategy, managed relationships with key policymakers and Indian companies, and spearheaded the firm’s annual India Conference.
- Ritu has also worked in the insurance space with John Hancock Financial Services in Boston, and began her career with Arthur Andersen in the audit and business consulting practice in New Delhi.
- She brings deep expertise in the area of board governance and CEO succession planning. She is a member of the Corporate Governance council set up by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), and the Risk Taskforce set up by Global Risk Management Institute in association with Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI). Earlier she was a co-chair of the Women’s Corporate Director forum in India.
Ritu is a chartered accountant in India and passed the CPA exam in the U.S. She received an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School and a Bachelor of Commerce from Shriram College of Commerce in Delhi.