Kishan Nanayakkara featured in 2024 APAC Leading Lights list

Resus Energy Founder and Managing Director Kishan Nanayakkara was recognised at the 7th annual Asia Pacific “50 Leading Lights: Kindness in Leadership campaign” that was released on the recent World Kindness Day.

“As we celebrate the seventh year of our 50 Leading Lights: Kindness in Leadership campaign, it’s evident that kindness is much more than a feel-good gesture – it’s a strategic advantage. Both successful leaders and leading academics consistently affirm that kindness enhances wellbeing, fuels innovation, and drives productivity. It is, therefore, a great honour to announce the 2024 APAC Leading Lights list, in association with Asia Square. By leading with kindness, these remarkable men and women transform workplaces into thriving ecosystems where both people and businesses flourish. They are an inspiration to us all,” said 50 Leading Lights Founder – Kindness and Leadership Pinky Lilani, CBE DL.

Incorporated in 2003, Resus Energy is an award-winning company having won multiple awards across numerous spheres for its work and governance and was amongst the first bracket of Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) listed companies to adopt Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). Resus Energy’s initial foray into the power sector was through a joint development of a 100MW thermal power plant. In 2007, Resus began developing its first renewable energy project and became a pureplay renewable energy company in 2015. An equal opportunity employer, Resus operates in a strong “Environmental, Social and Governance” system, built around international best practices with “caring for people and the planet” as its ethos, and has been listed on the CSE since 2009. Currently Resus operates eight small hydropower and two ground mounted solar PV stations across five districts in Sri Lanka and dispatches over 70GWh annually to the national grid. Its third solar PV station is currently under construction. Most of Resus’ power stations are in extreme-rural hamlets. Apart from generating clean energy, Resus plays a pivotal role in protecting the natural environment, uplifting livelihoods of families, providing employment to villagers, including women in the surroundings of its power stations. “We make every effort to keep our carbon footprint low even as we expand our operations and ensure none of our development work or operations adversely affect the environment… and at the same time, our core values reflective across our policy framework, are instilled into our culture and way of life,” said Nanayakkara. “With our work ethos, we reckon that we contribute to sixteen out of seventeen UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and to Sri Lanka’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), which Sri Lanka has pledged to achieve as a nation being a signatory to the Paris Agreement.” 

Nanayakkara who has Masters Degrees from the Universities of Cambridge and Birmingham and AMLP from Oxford, as well as being a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants, is a worthy recipient of this award. In 2019, He was accorded the Most Outstanding Alumnus Award, AMLP, from the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. 

This year’s judges included the Panel Chair and British High Commissioner to Australia Vicki Treadell, IHS Markit Asia Pacific Account Management team Former Partner and Senior Vice President Dr. Bo Zhou, Piramal Industries Vice Chairman Dr. Swati Piramal, Dole Packaged Foods Global Chief Marketing Officer Rupen Desai and Blackrock Real Assets Managing Director Hugh Andrew. The inductees were hosted for a special reception at the residence of the British High Commissioner to Singapore, on 26 November.

“Kindness and leadership is a strongly evolving leadership principle today and one that is at the centre of wide discourse,” said Nanayakkara.