S. Sankar Narayan

S. Sankar Narayan is a senior global leader with Smith & Nephew, where he serves as Global Lead – Master Data Management (MDM), Right Sourcing, and APAC Centre Lead within Global Business Services (GBS). In this role, Sankar plays a critical part in shaping and scaling the organisation’s global capability centre (GCC) strategy, with a strong focus on data-led transformation, operating model evolution, and sustainable value creation across India and Malaysia centres, catering to functions across the globe.

Based out of Smith & Nephew’s GBS centre in Pune, Sankar leads enterprise-wide initiatives that strengthen master data governance, data quality, and business resilience, positioning data as a foundational asset for global growth. His leadership spans strategies that balance efficiency, control, and scalability—ensuring global services are delivered through optimised, future-ready models.

As a GCC leader, Sankar has been deeply involved in shaping the evolution of multi-function capability centres in India and Malaysia, aligning them with Smith & Nephew’s broader global transformation agenda. His work emphasises moving GCCs beyond traditional cost-focused constructs toward value-centric hubs that integrate domain expertise, digital capabilities, and strong governance frameworks. Through this approach, he has consistently focused on scaling processes from traditional back-office functions to functions influencing revenue and customer experience, ER&D and in the process improving business agility, strengthening risk controls, and enabling faster, more reliable decision-making.

Sankar is widely recognised for his people-first leadership style. He has built and led diverse, high-performing teams across functions, fostering a culture of accountability, continuous improvement, and leadership development within global service environments. Sankar has in his professional journey has worked in traditional manufacturing organisations, Startups, Large captives and 3rd party service provider environments. His ability to connect strategic intent with disciplined execution has been a key enabler in scaling GCC capabilities while maintaining alignment with enterprise priorities.