National Chamber announces NBEA Awards 2022

The National Chamber yesterday announced National Business Excellence Awards (NBEA) 2022 for the 18th year.
Being one of the pioneering awards competitions initiated as way back as 2004, by the National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka, the NBEA has maintained its highest standards and gained much recognition and prestige amongst the business community. 

The president of the National Chamber, after recognising the current evolving trends and situation in the country, such as the agile nature of strategies to address the disruptive nature of business environment, pandemic and other socio-political and economic issues, considered the weightage adjustment to give a high emphasis to the recovery efforts of the organisations. 
The emerging trends such as adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals, emphasis on reduction of carbon emission, transforming nature of workplace, increasing tendency of capital getting attracted to trusted, ethical, environmentally friendly, socially responsible and with sound governance structure (ESG) and the purpose of the institutions more aligning towards creating long-term sustainability and creating value for all in society and not restricting to selected few, are among some of the aspects incorporated into the structure of the application leading NBEA. 

The National Chamber-appointed select committee, headed by NBEA Panel of Judges Chairman Sunil G. Wijesinha with National Chamber President Nandika Buddhipala, E&Y Country Managing Partner Manil Jayesinghe, NBEA Technical and Financial Evaluation Panel Chairman and E&Y Partner Assurance Sanath Fernando and PNB Holdings (Pvt.) Ltd Director and CEO Priyantha Hearth to revive the NBEA application, in order to accompany such important emerging trends. 
The quality of the applications has been on the rise over the years.  The competition comprises of categories – Extra Large, Large, Medium, Small and Micro and diversified industry sectors; it also creates the opportunity for 29 industry sectors to secure awards, category-wise or on evaluation criteria.

Ninety-two awards will be presented to the winners this year (NBEA 2022), including Overall Excellence Winners of Gold, Silver and Bronze. The evaluations will be carried out initially by a technical and financial panel headed by Fernando and other panel members: People’s Merchant Finance CEO Nalin Wijekoon, Merchant Bank of SL PLC Business Consultant and former CEO Gamini Karunathilake, former Merchant Bank of SL PLC Head of several divisions Shyamalie Amaratunga, PNB Holdings (Pvt.) Ltd Founder and CEO Priyantha Herath, Moore Aiyar Partner and Moore Consulting (Pvt.) Ltd Director Nishani Perera, People’s Leasing & Finance PLC Head of Projects Sanjeewa Bandaranayake, Partner Advisory and KPMG Head of Management Consulting Kamaya Perera, Deloitte Sri Lanka (SJMS) Partner Muzawwir Manzeer, BDO Partners Partner Audit and Assurance Jerad Dias and PWC Partner Industry Leader for Financial Services Malinda Boyagoda. 

The shortlisted applications will be reviewed and interviewed by a panel of judges to ascertain the best corporate companies as award winners. Selection of winners will be made by an eminent panel of judges chaired by Sunil G. Wijesinha, Past President of National Chamber, former Chairman of the Employers’ Federation of Ceylon, former President of the Japan Sri Lanka Technical and Cultural Association (JASTECA) and Non-Executive Chairman of several listed companies and other panel members: Professor Malik Ranasinghe, Senior Professor in Civil Engineering, University of Moratuwa, Professor Ajantha Dharmasiri, Professor in Management and Immediate Past Director, Postgraduate Institute of Management (PIM), University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Dr. Dayanath Jayasuriya,  President’s Counsel, Faizal Salieh, Chairman, The Sri Lanka Institute of Directors, former Managing Director and CEO, Amana Bank PLC and Director of several listed companies, Dr. Jagath Peiris, Past President of the National Chamber of Exporters, former CEO of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka, Managing Director in large manufacturing organisations, Founder Member of the Sri Lanka Accounting and Auditing Services Monitoring Board (SLAASMB), former Chairman of the National Institute of Exports, Kanishka Weerasinghe, Consultant, Labour Law, Industrial Relations and Employment, former Director General and CEO, Employers’ Federation of Ceylon, Eardley Perera and Company Director andConsultant.
The awards ceremony will be conducted in May 2023, at a venue to be announced in the coming months.