Pooja Khilnani

About Pooja Khilnani

With progressive HR Leadership experience in Business Partnering and Talent management spanning US and India, Pooja brings in a strong foundation in talent strategy, leadership development and culture enablement. She is passionate about enabling business impact through people by focusing on talent, leadership & organizational effectiveness. Currently at Microsoft HQ, Pooja leads enterprise-wide talent strategies for engineering organizations, encompassing Sr talent discussion rhytms, Executive Promotions, and Leadership Development. She has successfully driven Key HR processes such as Partner & Exec Promotions & Rewards, Partner & Exec Forecasting & Pipelining, leadership development initiatives while fostering cross-functional collaboration to ensure seamless OneHR experience for the client. Prior to this role, Pooja was Senior HR Business Partner for Microsoft Azure Engineering organization in India, supporting a 2,600+ headcount organization through hypergrowth. She partnered with senior leaders (CVPs & VPs) to evolve leadership operating models, drive strategic talent planning, and activate geo-specific talent strategies. Her key strengths are Systems thinking, Senior stakeholder management, enabling business driven talent strategies, and Strong execution focus. Pooja holds an MS in Learning & Organizational Change from Northwestern University, & an MBA in Human Resources from Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM). Key Expertise: HR Business Partnering, Talent Management, Leadership Development, Diversity & Inclusion, HR Consulting, Organization Development, Workforce Planning, Senior Stakeholder Management.

Experience

1. Senior HR Partner Microsoft Enterprise Sales

   Microsoft

   Oct 2025 — Present · Mumbai, IN

   Strategic Talent Partner: Driving talent priorities aligned to business strategy to enable business growth and build high performance culture.• Talent Management: Designing & executing people strategy for the business including talent management, succession planning, critical talent moves & leadership development to enable business outcomes. • Organizational Design & Effectiveness: Shaping and evolving organizational structures, assessing effectiveness, and implementing systemic solutions to enable business growth.• Data driven insights: Leveraging talent and business analytics to identify insights & trends, diagnose organizational health, and influence decisions with evidence-based recommendations.• Culture & Leadership Enablement: Coaching leaders to model Microsoft values, foster inclusion, and strengthen leadership effectiveness across enterprise sales teams.• Critical Partnerships: Collaborating across HR disciplines (HR Consulting, Total Rewards, Talent Acquisition, Employee Relations) to deliver OneHR impact and seamless employee experience.• Change Management & Transformation: Leading organizational change initiatives, navigating ambiguity and ensuring alignment with Microsoft’s evolving People vision, future of work strategy, and accelerating Microsoft’s journey towards becoming a AI frontier firm

Education

• Usha Mittal Institute of Technology

  Bachelor of Technology - BTech

  2000 — 2004

• XLRI Jamshedpur

  Strategic Hurman Resource Management Certification Course

  2013 — 2013

• Society of Human Resource Management

  SPHR

  2009

• Symbiosis Institute of Business Management

  MBA

  2004 — 2006

• Northwestern University

  Masters of Science Learning and Organizational Change