People behind the highways: Human capital in India’s InvIT story

India is not just building infrastructure of concrete, but of capital and trust as well. With the government spending on infrastructure rising more than fivefold in the last decade, the country is assembling the world’s’ largest road networks. Yet even with this momentum, an infrastructure financing gap of over 5% of GDP remains. 

Against this backdrop, the Infrastructure Investment Trust (InvIT) sector in India is undergoing a transformational phase. With rapid institutionalisation, deepening capital markets, and evolving regulatory frameworks, InvITs are no longer seen merely as passive conduits of capital – they are emerging as platforms that are delivering on operational excellence, strategic agility, and robust governance. 

While the financing aspect is the visible backbone of this growth story, the less visible but equally critical foundation is the human capital. InvITs, still relatively new, are simultaneously building highways and institutions. It is here that HR has emerged as a strategic enabler, empowering the audience with this crucial insight. 

The Evolution of InvIT

Although InvITs were officially introduced in India in 2014 by SEBI, their conceptual roots echo the evolution of REITs in mature markets like the United States, where REITs have existed since the 1960s. Globally, REITs paved the way for asset-light, yield-focused investment vehicles, and the Indian InvIT structure adapted this concept for infrastructure.

An Infrastructure Investment Trust (InvIT) is a SEBI-regulated investment vehicle designed to pool capital from investors—both institutional and retail—to own, operate, and manage income-generating infrastructure assets such as highways, power transmission lines, and renewable energy projects. Structured similarly to mutual funds but focused on infrastructure, InvITs allow developers to monetise assets, improve liquidity, and attract long-term capital, while offering investors regular returns and diversified exposure to infrastructure. As a hybrid between operating companies and investment funds, InvITs combine financial oversight with operational delivery.

What Makes InvITs Different?

InvIT assets are operational, capital-intensive, and long live. Unlike conventional industries or corporates, InvITs don’t grow by launching new products or expanding into markets; they grow by acquiring, integrating, and operating assets over the decades. This unique operational model presents intriguing challenges that keep the audience engaged. 

This requires not just financial acumen but a parallel emphasis on people readiness—professionals who can navigate governance, compliance, stakeholder alignment, and operational resilience with equal dexterity. These aren’t peripheral capabilities; they form the institutional spine of InvITs. And it is the people who animate them. In this context, Human Resources is not a support function—it is an institution builder. As Christine Lagarde has noted, ‘Behind the numbers, there are people’—a reminder that infrastructure ultimately succeeds through its human foundation. 

Human Capital as a Strategic Lever in InvIT

Most InvITs are now stepping into a phase where operational readiness must be matched by institutional depth. InvITs in India are not legacy businesses with decades of experiential evolution behind them; they’re relatively new, operate across multiple entities, and cater to a mix of investors, regulatory and operational expectations. In such a setting, it’s the alignment of organisation structure, clarity of roles, cultural nurturing, and strength of leadership that hold the whole construct together. 

Unlike traditional corporates, InvITs are lean by design. A small but highly capable and professionally qualified team manages billions of dollars of assets. This means flatter structures, cross-functional collaboration, and decision-making that cuts across silos. Job descriptions evolve rapidly in InvITs, where functions span finance, legal, engineering, operations, and community engagement. Rather than filling roles, HR must also build capabilities in risk management, stakeholder engagement, digital tools, and data analytics.  HR must foster a culture where collaboration is valued, and agility is prioritised over hierarchy. 

In this journey, human capital quietly becomes one of the biggest differentiators—and often, HR is in the pilot seat. But steering this transformation isn’t a static task. It demands that HR evolve from traditional functions into a strategic integrator—anchoring the next phase of institutional transition.

Five Key Transitions HR Must Lead in the InvIT Ecosystem 

Progressive investors today conduct ‘people due diligence’ alongside financial and legal diligence. They want to know: does the leadership have the capacity to scale? Are there unaddressed talent risks that could derail growth? Is there cultural fragility that needs fortifying?

The above represents a profound shift in how human capital is viewed—from being process-led to becoming purpose-driven. To build continuity, agility, and credibility in this evolving space, here are the five key transitions that HR must proactively lead:

1. From Setup to Institution Building: Early InvITs in India borrowed governance frameworks from the sponsors. Over time, they had to craft their own DNA. Today, HR plays a pivotal role in this evolution—designing systems, policies, and cultures that endure individual leaders. The ongoing challenge is to professionalise at speed while retaining agility. In toll roads, operations are daily and granular, even as global investors demand governance that is exacting and long-term in nature.

Additionally, InvITs, by nature, operate through a layered structure, encompassing ManCos, SPVs and operational teams. As scale increases, these layers can create silos and blurred accountability. HR needs to anchor an organisation design that’s agile, transparent, interconnected, aligned to business priorities—clearly defining roles, spans, and governance touchpoints, while allowing each asset to run with operational autonomy. 

InvITs attract some of the world’s largest institutional investors, which necessitates HR to align domestic teams with global standards on disclosures and governance. This is a unique challenge in the InvIT sector, and HR’s role in balancing global accountability with local execution is crucial.

2. From Cultural Co-existence to Cultural Cohesion: It is important to note that compliance and process discipline are non-negotiable in InvITs; however, institutions cannot be built solely on processes. HR must enable an environment where employees see themselves as co-owners of the InvIT’s mission and fully align with its unique operating dynamics. Recognition, transparent communication, and empowerment are critical to making people feel invested beyond compliance or routine responsibilities. 

With employees coming from diverse backgrounds, industries, and setups, InvITs often carry distinct cultural imprints. HR must move beyond superficial or surface-level engagement to build a shared identity rooted in performance, integrity, and respect. This sense of shared identity makes the audience feel connected and part of a larger mission.

Culture, in an InvIT, is less about transplantation and more about adaptation — carefully curated to honour both origin and destination. For Cube Highways Trust, pride is not only in owning & operating highways but in building a trusted institution. 

3. From Uniform Talent Playbooks to Segment-Specific Talent Strategies: One of the unique challenges in InvITs is the diversity of talent. Each role comes with its own aspirations, motivators, and career trajectory. HR can’t afford a one-size-fits-all approach, no matter how simple the operating structure looks like from the outside. Instead, it must build layered talent frameworks — offering curated growth pathways for mid-career professionals, development and stability for the field staff, and leadership acceleration for the high-potential. Skilling, career design, and role clarity must be adopted to suit this talent spread.

4. From Legacy Compensation Models to Market-Responsive Rewards: As InvITs compete for talent not just with infrastructure companies but also with fund houses, real estate platforms, and public sector organisations, among others, compensation design needs a fresh lens. HR today needs to ensure that reward structures reflect performance, retain critical talent, and stand up to external benchmarking — while maintaining internal parity. Long-term Incentive Plans (LTIPs), variable pay, and retention-linked models will need to evolve with the nature of roles and stages of the InvIT lifecycle.

5. From HR as a support function to HR as a strategic integrator: One of the most demanding shifts HR faces in this environment is learning to balance and align expectations of multiple stakeholders—often pulling in different directions. The Board(s) expect progressive and institutionalised people practices being embedded swiftly. Investors want assurance that the organisation is structurally sound, leadership-ready, and built for the long term. Internal leadership teams often prefer greater autonomy and less process drag. Employees, from investment professionals to field technicians, have varied and evolving expectations around growth, rewards, and workplace experience.

In this kind of setup, HR cannot afford to remain a back-office function. It must operate as a strategic partner — translating different expectations into coherent, fair, and sustainable people interventions while carefully balancing the expectations of all the stakeholders, internal and external. That means building frameworks that are consistent yet flexible, policies that are uniform yet context-driven, and processes that strike a balance between agility and governance. It’s about understanding where alignment is needed, where differentiation is necessary, and where influence—not enforcement—is more effective approach. This ability to sit at the intersection of business, people, governance, and expectations is what will define HR’s real impact in the InvIT journey.

Execution Needs More Than Intent

While these five transitions capture the broad direction HR must move toward, the real challenge lies in making them work on the ground. Transformation doesn’t happen on a slide or in a boardroom — it plays out in real time, across entities, hierarchies, and expectations. And this is where the real weight of HR’s role comes in: navigating complexity, adapting to context while maintaining fairness and effectiveness.

Context is Everything: Why InvITs Need Their Own Approach to HR

At first glance, many of the transitions mentioned earlier—like organisation design, culture building, or reward realignment—may seem universal. And in principle, they are. But when it comes to InvITs, neither there is any historical blueprint nor industry handbook to refer to. These platforms have no legacy to draw from, no case studies to replicate, and no benchmarks that fully reflect their hybrid nature. Every InvIT has grown within its own governance framework, capital structure, leadership style, and operational construct — shaped by its investors, sponsors, asset types, and regulatory engagement. This makes each platform distinct—not just in design, but in personality.

While HR has been part of the story from day one, the expectations from HR have shifted dramatically over time. What was once seen as a basic function to manage statutory processes and workforce hygiene is now expected to enable leadership alignment, cultural integration, and value creation at an institutional scale. And this shift hasn’t come with ready-made playbooks. HR in InvITs must move beyond the comfort of conventional frameworks and look at every intervention through a fit-for-purpose approach—grounded in business context, governance, and future-readiness.

Rewriting the HR Mindset: Unlearning Before Implementing

To deliver in this environment, firstly HR itself must go through a mindset shift. It’s not enough to bring in best practices from conventional infrastructure or fund-based setups. In fact, some of those practices may not even work here. HR must first unlearn—let go of assumptions, detach from rigid models, and question whether familiar processes still serve the current purpose. Only then it can build what is truly required: an employee-centric approach that is relevant to the business, aligned with the governance framework, and responsive to the expectations of all stakeholders—be it the Board, the investors, or the employees on the ground.

This isn’t about overhauling everything; it’s about recalibrating thoughtfully. Listening more than instructing. Designing systems that speak the language of both control and agility. And above all, recognising that in a space as young and high-stakes as InvITs, HR is not just a partner in execution—it’s a co-owner in shaping the institution itself.

A Journey of Challenge and Possibility

The real test of InvITs will not be just financial prudence or operations excellence, but whether they can endure leadership transitions, policy shifts, and market cycles. Endurance stems from culture, systems, and the people themselves. And in the long run, trust is the strongest currency any institution can hold. 

The HR journey in InvITs is layered and often without precedence. However, it’s also one of the most exciting opportunities for any HR leader—to build from scratch, to influence structures that will last, and to shape the culture of institutions still in the making. There’s a space here—not just to implement, but to imagine. And that’s rare. In many ways, the absence of legacy is not a limitation—it’s a blank canvas. For HR, this is more than a function. It’s a responsibility to create clarity, drive alignment, and help build a platform that can stand the test of time.

“There are no signposts on the roads of the future. Only those who build them will know the way.” —Anonymous

And in many ways, HR in InvITs is in that very role—building the road while walking it.

The views expressed are personal to the author and intended for information purpose only.