The Journey of Mr. Smeer Walia, co-founder of ‘The Smart Cube’, as captured by Monika Sharma(IWSB pg12).

Mr. Sameer Walia, co-founder of ‘The Smart Cube’

This was a great opportunity for all of us to have a face-to-face interaction with a person of such a stature in my journey series. Mr. Sameer Walia co-founded “The Smart Cube” (TSC) in 2003 and has built the organization from a scratch over the last 4 years. He currently takes care of the India operations and is focused on developing a strong capability for the firm.

He started his words with the ultimate secret of success, which we all know ,but we never implement it in our life that is “FAITH”.  Consultancy is a desk based business in which we need computers and proper phone line but while starting this venture there was nothing with him, except his Faith on himself. Before actually starting up with his venture, Mr. Walia and his business partner outsource their business from Evalueserve and became their client.  And one fine day they decided to set up their own venture. He quit his job on sept 23,2003. And after a lot of planning he started up with his own office. He believed “whatever you do, do well”. He gave an example of that, In his office 40% of his investment was gone in a single generator, because he wanted to create an environment which would lead to increase in productivity. And the result was that, the people from city bank, world banks and London business school joined them, there was of course more analytical rigor. Their planning shifted from staring of the first year to its end, at first they planned that it is not necessary that they will succeed in first year, so failure is not a problem, but eventually they made a go for it, make or break situation and they succeeded. One more different key to their success was they didn’t have investors they own all their investment and they never run out of cash

But it was not about success only. They suffered several setbacks too.

First setback for them was, when 18 analysts out of 50-60 in numbers left them to Hyderabad to set up their own ventures. It was a huge loss for them, both emotionally and financially. Second setback was when they kicked out Sky which was an important client for them, having a turnover of $ 2.8 million, whatsoever were the issues behind it he didn’t share with us but again their business suffered. Next set back was Ceiling of their office in which, they invested Rs 2.5 crore and it was a salvage value. They went to Supreme Court for this. Their cash reserves went down to zero but they get the relief for 9 months.

Then he proceed his speech by showing his confidence that now they are strong enough to fight with any kind of problems as they have learnt a lot in this period. Of course they walked two steps forward and one step backward during those unfortunate periods but, this is a part of business, therefore you should take setbacks very calmly, and things will go on. You need challenges in life of success., It’s all about how you take it. This must not be wrong to say “There is a will, there is a Way”.

His opinion on entrepreneurship was:

It’s not about being an entrepreneur, one should be entrepreneurial. Which means being resourceful. sNo, “NO” should be there. He shared his experience with us, that while he was traveling to the Koraput his train was caught in cyclone and they stuck there for many hours. Then they saw a train which was moving in opposite direction. They caught that train and of course they didn’t reach their destination, but at least they moved from there and then took some other way of reaching there. So he always remains resourceful, so he was extremely entrepreneurial. He said even as a student we can be extremely entrepreneurial. We could be resourceful always. If we are lazy, we can’t help our self so we should be hardworking and last thing Entrepreneurship comes with huge personal sacrifices.

He also gave us ingredients of success.

There is no Magic Mantra. It’s all about luck. He also believed, there is nothing like permanent bad luck. Both good and bad luck lasts at sometime. Hard work and perseverance changes your bad luck. He gave examples of Shahrukh Khan, Akshay Kumar and Rajnikant that they didn’t succeeded in one day. Akshay had 17 successive flops, but it was his bad luck, by his 18th film he was back again. It’s not about bad luck but It’s about how you face it.

About taking risk, He said:

In binary situation, it’s easy to say but difficult to live that moment, when u go to minus actually. Taking risk is core thing.

About making Decision and living consequences, he gave his views as:

Decision making is a natural procedure. While he take decisions he know it that  out of 10 ,2 of them are going to be wrong .Once you made a decision good or bad you should live with that. This kind of attitude makes life happier. It is worse to taking back your decision. People shy from a conflicting situation, but they have to take tough decisions.

Then he told about humbleness, as If we treat all as equal. If we are humble we can do many things in life. The more humanity we have, more grounded we are, more grasp we will be having in our business. These are small things which will go a long, long way. We should have ability to connect dots together. Environment should be perceived, economic and social. Analytically it’s called Trend analysis.

He gave his views on ability to with stand adversity.

He said he didn’t think success requires high IQ, It’s about high EQ, and Emotional Quotient should be high. If it is not increasing, 5-10 yrs from now, we will less likely to succeed.

He spoke about personal sacrifices also.

Personal sacrifices, includes health but biggest scarifies is time. Even we have to sacrifices time for our family too. We have to sleep less and less sleep will lead to certain consequences.  Our body is unchangeable, so we should take care of it properly, it’s very important. He said, we should be very detail focused. God lies in details, a lot people do yoyo, Up and down. Consistency matters a lot and it brings in people’s trust.

Dark side of Entrepreneur.

Speaking in his language, first of all it’s not about Money. Money is a driver, the joy and satisfaction that lead to drive. Money part is not as glamorous as it looks from outside.  There are lots of heartburns, tears. It sounds glamorous from outside. It takes away your comfort, it’s very lonely ride as an entrepreneur. It’s stressful, no back outs. It can make you a tough person. You have to take hard decisions, even if you don’t want to, as business demands it. Your antenna should always up, you can’t trust anyone. Your life will be completely changed.

This interesting session was concluded with a query session in which Mr. Walia cleared all the doubts and curiosity of the students, by enriching them with various insights of professional as well as personal life.

(The article is part of  ‘My Journey Series’  at IWSB)

‘Summer Internship – A waste of time?’ by Prof. Arindam Lahiri, Executive Director, Indus World School of Business



Does summer internship really contribute substantially to the learning process of a business management graduate?

There are arguments on both sides and both views can be logical. Before we delve into this, let us take a look at the process of management education. During the first year of the usual 2-year MBA programme, a student is exposed to the various functions of an organization. This prepares the student for the foundations of management theory. However, management education in hardly academic in nature – it has a strong focus on applying the same in real life situation and this transition is difficult.

My own view is that the summer internship provides you with the best opportunity to attempt at making this transition. And most students fail while making this transition, as this is the first time that most of them are attempting such a transition. Yes, even for the students having pre-programme work experience – since it is the first time that they will attempt to put management theory (which most of them are not aware of, except for undergraduate management students) into practice.

It is this failure that raises a question mark over the entire practice of summer internship. And most students do not fail only once at this summer internship. They fail a number of times subsequently in their first job. This also raises another issue about a large percentage of management graduates leaving their first job within the first 12 months – we will not get into this here.

Learning through failure is an important pedagogical tool. A summer internship allows student to get frustrated and underscores the challenge of application of management theories in practice. Such an exposure, if absorbed internally in a constructive manner, can be one of the most important learning for the student. The student, with the help from his faculty members, must analyze the challenges of application and failure points. Understanding the constraints and parameters within which various theoretical constructs are applied is important. And without repeated practice, this is difficult to achieve.

However, once word of caution at this point, one must be careful about internships where the student is completely left on his own and not challenged to deliver. In such a case, opportunities to fail, is minimal. Though the internship experience may be comfortable, the learning may be incomplete.

Using the opportunity of summer internship to understand how organizations work, especially how people in the organizations behave, is a must learn for all management students. It also helps the students to establish some useful networking relations. At the same time, it allows the student to gain self-confidence by comparing his own efforts with other existing employees in the organization. It helps a student identify his strength and weakness for effective working in the organization.

A summer internship may add more value to people who have worked for less than 2 years with an organization. The challenge in most cases, result from expectation mismatch of the student and the organization. The core objective is that the need for summer internship is of the student and not necessarily a need of the organization. The onus is on the student to make the most out of this opportunity.

A summer internship has been a life-changing experience for a large number of students (and these students are not necessarily the students with pre-placement offers from organizations). It impacts the choice of organization, functions and the pace of career growth of an individual.

‘National Training Workshop on Personality Development’ at IWSB.

Indus World School of Business (IWSB), Greater Noida conducted a Two-Day National Training Workshop on Personality Development from 20-21^st October 2010. Peoples from all works of life like students, Library professionals, and academician attended the workshop. Around 75 people attended the workshop. In the Inaugural Session Chief guest Dr. Janardhan Jha kicked off the workshop by lightning the lamp along with Satya Narayanan R who is the founder and chairman of IWSB, Executive Director Arindam Lahiri IWSB and Dr. Rajesh Kumar. Janardan Jha, who is presently Director, Amity center for innovation and New Concept, Amity University Noida Uttar Pradesh also shared some words of wisdom. Dr. Rajesh Kumar, Organizing Secretary gave the introductory remarks. The first Speaker on the first day was Dr. Rakesh Kumar Bhatt. Dr. R.K Bhatt who is presently serving as Associate Professor and Head, Department of Library and Information Science, University of Delhi touched on the key points of the Personality such as Interpersonal Skills, Communication Skills, Basic Etiquettes, Body Language, Time Management, Stress Management etc. After that Sreenivasan Ramakrishnan, Co-Founder IWSB and Career Launcher took the session. This was mostly an interactive session, where he used many tools to help the participants understand more about their personality. Like how ambitious one is? How much growth oriented one is? and many more such traits about one’s personality. Overall the main motive was to get a clear picture of one’s personality and where all is the scope of improvement lies. Prof. Arindam Lahiri took the next session. His topic was the Locus of control. This session also used loco inventory tools to give a clear picture of one’s locus of control. The second day started with Dr. C.V Ramanan’s session. Dr. Ramanan is the Director at National Academy for Training and Development, ISTD. He shared with the participants the unique concept of Total Quality Person (TQP) and how one can be a Total Quality Person. The session was full of very interesting and fabulous stories. It was really a very enlightening session and the end of which Dr. Ramanan also shared how one can achieve what one want to in his life. Dr. Jaideep Sharma who is Associate Professor Social Sciences, IGNOU, conducted the last session. He concentrated on the topic of competency mapping of professionals. He mentioned about three key attributes knowledge, skills and attitude. These three play a key role in an individual’s efficiency and his competency mapping. The two-day workshop ended by Prof. Arindam Lahiri’s Valedictory remarks. Dr. Rajesh Kumar delivered a vote of thanks. Overall the workshop was a grand success.

Research paper from Prof. Arindam Lahiri(Executive Director – IWSB) got selected at IIM Ahmedabad.

Title of paper:  Role of Vocational Education and Training in mitigating the challenges of inclusive growth in emerging economies

About the article:

The paper examines the challenges of capacity building and its linkage to the overall challenges of inclusive growth in emerging economies. The Indian formal education sector has not included vocational education and training (VET) as an inherent part of capacity building. Over a period of six decades post-independence, the initial focus has been lost and today we end up with a capacity mismatch of VET capacity in formal sector vis-à-vis the workforce that enters the Indian labour market for the first time. The case studies include the social impact of the capacity development initiatives and compare it with such initiatives being undertaken with other emerging economies around the globe. The research firmly emphasizes that inclusive growth and empowerment in emerging economies can happen through vocational education and training.

Research paper from Prof. Raju Majumdar got selected at IIM Calcutta.

IWSB congratulates Prof. Raju Majumdar (Faculty Finance, IWSB) on this wonderful achievement.  The abstract of the research paper is given below. The paper will be presented in International Finance Conference to be held at IIM Calcutta from 9th to 12th January.

Abstract:-

Agency, Asymmetric Information and Market Timing Theories of Capital Structure: A Reinterpretation of the Relation Between Growth and Corporate Borrowing

Financing growth opportunities is one among the biggest challenges that a firm face. Corporate finance theory, based on agency conflicts and asymmetric information issues predicts an inverse relation between the two; empirical analysis of firm’s borrowing behavior also corroborates the assertion of theory.This paper develops an alternative interpretation of the observed inverse relation based on the market timing theory of capital structure and provides empirical evidence to substantiate the claim that incorporating growth in terms of market-to-book ratio does in fact measure alternative theories that have varied interpretations based on firm specific micro factors as well as macro economic factors. Consequently, in order to devise a conclusive and non-overlapping test of theory there is an urgent need to revisit the issue of firm growth and its estimation, as well as reinterpret existing findings in the light of our findings.

Yet another Milestone! IWSB’ians Bags 1st Prize at IIM-B in RMAI(Rural Marketing Association of India) Competition.

From the horse’s Mouth:-

The winning of a gold award in a competition organized by a prestigious organization Rural Marketing Association of India (RMAI) at IIM, Bangalore was a great moment for us. The competition was organized for management students from across the country that did their summer trainings/ projects in rural domain, catering to the markets in rural domain. Our project aimed at setting up an enterprise in the rural setup, an enterprise that was setup to produce sanitary napkins by rural women, who were both the producers as well as consumers of the product. The concept of inclusive marketing was actually practiced in the project by including the consumers at every point in the value chain.

The competition was held on 23^rd September, 2010 at IIM Bangalore’s Management Development Center’s auditorium. The competition started at 10:45 a.m. with the Co-coordinator’s address. The initial presentation was given by the team from IIM Calcutta, followed by the team from SCMLD, Pune & GNIMS, Mumbai. In the tea break, which was immediately after these two presentations, gave us a chance to interact with the teammates of the rest colleges. It made us feel proud that we were competing with the top notch colleges of the country & were at a platform, where the name of our college was unheard of. Immense confidence was generated out of having come at a place where our unheard institute made the mark. Our presentation was scheduled at 6^th place, post lunch. Till lunch, 3 more presentations were given by SPJIMR, IIMI & IIMC. The post lunch session started with our presentation, when the chief guest (Prof. Pankaj Chandra, Director, IIM-B) & eminent judges arrived. The final presentation was given by IIML. Post presentations came the most awaited moment, the award felicitation. Prof. Chandra delivered words of wisdom to all the participants, post which the awards were finally announced. The list came as: bronze- IIMI, silver-IIML & the gold winner is IWSB, Greater Noida. We were overjoyed with the results & it was like a dream come true for us, having won a competition, defeating the stalwarts of management education at their backyard.

The feedback & compliments given by the judges post ceremony were highly encouraging for us. Prof. Chandra said “I am really proud of you & would wish you both to take this project at national level. I would be very happy to help you people at every step of your journey in the project. Feel free to call me up anytime”. He gave us his card. Mr. Khurram Askari, the coordinator of the competition and CEO, Insight Outreach said, “Your project was the only project which was selected unanimously for first position by all the judges, though there were debates for the 2^nd & 3^rd positions”. A lot of positive feedback by rest participants & other eminent guests further boosted our confidence & gave us the strength that we must look forward on strengthening this project further. The whole competition was a moment of joy & confidence for us.

The details of the 7 participating teams:

1.) Nitesh Yadav  – IIMC

Title -Unlocking the rural opportunities in East India with focus on crackers & cookies category

2.) Angad Singh Uberoi & Kuldeep Singh –  SCMLD – Pune & GNIMS – Mumbai

Title – Study of haats as a marketing hub for FMCG companies

3.) Mohit  Sareen – S.P. Jain Institute of Management & Research, Mumbai

Title – Strategic Business Plan for RUDI in Ahmedabad

4.) Sandeep Nair – IIMB

Title – Brand Revival of Asataf –  A National Rural Marketing Campaign

5.) Abhishek Mittal on behalf of Amit Chhabra & Tanvi Dhamija – IIM -Indore

Title – IT Enabled solutions for financial Inclusion

6.) Ankita Gupta & Shobhit Jain  – Indus World School of Busines(IWSB)

Title – Developing & executing a complete business model for an emerging enterprise Sahyog

7.) Ashish Sharma – IIML

Title – Understand and analyze the attitude and usage behaviour of rural consumers in Andhra Pradesh & Maharashtra and develop a marketing mix for the rural markets.

The panel of judges consisted of:

1. Mr. R.V.Rajan – Chairman of Anugrah Madison, Chennai
2. Professor Mithileshwar Jha – IIM Bangalore
3. Harish Bijoor – CEO Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, Bangalore

Mr. Khurram Askari, CEO, Insight Outreach Pvt. Ltd. was the coordinator for the competition.

Ankita Gupta

Shobhit Jain

“My Journey” – Sridhar Iyengar

Sridhar Iyengar is former chairman and CEO of KPMG India. He has been with KPMG for 34 years as a partner in the UK, US and India.  Currently, Sridhar is an independent mentor capitalist to early-stage companies. He sits on the boards ofAmerican India Foundation, Infosys, ICICI Bank, Rediff, OnMobile, among others. He has also served as president of TIE and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

Sridhar Iyengar is also on the board of governors of Indus World School of Business (IWSB), that promotes entrepreneurial leadership among youth through hands-on learning experiences integral to the business programmes. Last week, Sridhar was on the campus to interact with the faculty and students. The interactions were amazing and threw a lot of questions that Sridhar went on to address. At the end of the visit, Sridhar spoke about how we need to reassess all our Basics.  Thanks Sridhar for sharing your invaluable thoughts.

“My Journey” features Vishwadeep Bajaj, Founder, ValueFirst at IWSB campus

Entrepreneurial journey across borders – Vishwadeep Bajaj. ValueFirst

Mr. Vishwadeep Bajaj, Founder, ValueFirst, one of the new-age mobile technology major, delighted the young CEO aspirants at IWSB (iwsb.in) campus. It was a first for him and also students at the IWSB campus though he has been figuring in our brochure and communications and also has been a judge at one of the regional rounds of ‘SRIJAN’, business plan competition of IWSB this year.

Vishwadeep did his MCA and CFA, and went on to work with CMC and then Siemens in India and Germany. Even during his college days he used to dabble in Stock Markets! He switched between corporate life and entrepreneurial life a couple of times, before starting his steadfast journey as an entrepreneur in Europe in the technology space. He has since then founded a couple of companies in UK/Germany and exited before founding Valuefirst. Valuefirst, with headquarters in India, serves in many countries across Asian, African and European continents.

Vishwadeep is a down to earth, approachable, jovial person ever keen to help a learner. He has been a great risk-taker. Not so great on technology, but has always managed to rope in core-technologists to execute his ideas. As we always hear, ‘Hire a guy who is better than you’ to run your company. He has been doing it all the time.

His talk at IWSB :

– About ValueFirst : An organization where learning comes first
o We go to office to learn
o 240 of us are on a journey, fun along the way.
o Most of what we do is controlled from outside (market forces and changes); But we give our best shot to whatever we can control
o We experience the joy in negotiating/shaping the world
– Main goal is of enjoying
– Every moment is an exciting moment
o Current vision 2010 – Touch billion lives daily as a publicly traded communication services company by December 2010
– Touching lives meaningfully
– Not unsolicited content
– Publicly IPO

“My Journey” – Starts his wonderful journey

Childhood and Education

– Childhood in Srinagar and Jammu
– At class 11. Was thinking of who am I and why am I here? Started what is the purpose of life
– Did not perform well in board exams
– Got admissions in
o BITS Pilani – MSc in Museum studies – wondered what will I do there?
o Lucknow college of Architecture – short on age
– Graduation I joined in Agra? I am not able to recall which stream..see!!
– One day I bumped into a boy, in many places in a couple of days while going across shopping. I discovered that he is doing something called CA
– I thought that is a wonderful Idea and shared with parents. I convinced parents.
– Parents moved out of Agra. I continued to be there
– At 21 while I was studying, got chicken pox…came home, parents were in Gwalior.
– Mother convinced to look at some interesting advertisement in newspaper..
– MCA happened from MITS, Gwalior, the third institution to introduce MCA in the country after DU and JNU.

Into the corporate world and Entrepreneurship
– Went to CMC for summers, and joined them after MCA.
– First assignment was at RITES – Train reservation system, very impressive, many from the US, UK were wondering how India managed it?
– I fell in love with my boss, and married her within six months!!
– I thought, now I can start my own company, with someone at home who can support

– Started my own company, software development
– I did not know how to sell, I thought people will buy, targeted big companies.
– Finally thought will sell to small companies; went around got some projects

– Delivery guys were my friends from CMC, all moonlighting for myself
– I used to capture all requirements, and started delivering.
– I started making three times my salary 3K (10K in those days)

Stockbroking and UPWARD CURVE plunges

– One of the clients is stock broker. I got intrigued by the way he makes money
– I made 5 rupees per share, in a couple of hours I made 500 rupees
– I thought Wow! this is a great way to make money. Fast and Quick.
– I then opted to become a sub-broker, convinced the broker. He accepted me
– I got to know, a lot about the scrips, market behaviour etc.
– In 6 months made 33 lakh rupees.. in 1993

– I thought of starting a company.. planned
– Harshad Mehta scam happened
– I kept myself thinking that it is a correction
– In no time everything was wiped off…
– I had a contessa, best car in those days (better than my house owner)

– I had to sell every thing… borrow from father (from his PF)
– Everyone in family was worried. They asked me to get back to a job.

Seimens’ interview
– Seimens ad came up. Went to the exam with a friend..
– Were late, the manager reluctantly accepted us.
– Copied through the test from my friend. Go thru!!
– There was GD. I could not speak a word, a south Indian girl dominated it.
– A gentleman walks in. Looked like the big boss. He asked me to summarize. As my luck would have it. I was the only one short listed!!

– I was told the last round is Technical interview. When they spotted about my stock market dabblings, due to Harshad Mehta episode, everything ended being technical analysis of stock market!! I could answer reasonably well.
– Got selected…

Packed off to Germany
– I was sent to Germany, surprising! On landing, I was told that the project was cancelled and I have to get back to India.
– The German boss, CHRIS, called me for dinner. To my surprise something else unraveled.
– He told me that, I have been asked to prove myself and I can select a two member team and you are there in it. CHRIS is a great boss who goes all out..
– What are you really good at, he asked me? I told that I work hard and I will deliver.
– We have to find a job, and the boss started internal sales within SIEMENS.
– He chanced upon Performance management Analysis order from one of the departments
– Finally we became a performance management guru team, multiple orders came within SIEMENS
– Our name spread, and we started to get orders from everywhere
– My boss was spotted as a potential CEO, and he was sent for a business school
– My boss said I will send you to a friend who needs people like you..

Found myself in England
– In the new place. I was hired for writing emails on SS7, as I was very good in English (Germany had very few people of my language capability)
– One gentleman from England came visiting, he saw me working..
– He went back and called me saying that looking for SS7 specialists
– WELSH boss, in ENGLAND siemens pulled me..SS7 Guru arrives..
– Finally they wanted Something more than SS7 as there were not many projects
– Why do not you do pre-sales he asked.

Who the hell knows, What is BPR?
– I would work hard and do very well in the sales..
– Manchester trip happend– Business process re-engineering needs? No one knew about it? A Potential order for BPR.
– Went to a shop to buy books on BPR.
– We went and pitched saying, We know the business of telecom from down up… hence we are a better company. We got orders…
– When I got back, the boss said “You won the order.. you Deliver”
– I thought Siemens is a great company and I will find someone to do it within
– I spotted a team in Siemens germany. They landed. My drive from Heathrow to Manchester revealed that they are no good.
– My boss told me “Fire them…”. I just dropped them at airport..

India Calling –
– I thought I will find some consultant in India.
– I got three people from India… best brains…
– They could not get to understand even the language and pronounciation
– So I kept them in the back office, and did all front-ending; Went on delivering…
– Management Consulting Practice was set up in Seimens..
– My boss asked me to set up my own company to help Seimens. Which I did in Chandigarh to help with development.
– My boss was promoted to become Seimens global telecom head
– Management conculting business is so person intensive. I thought of parking the company..

New move – Internet Technologies
– A British ISP was set up providing free services
– I jumped in as a CTO. THE CEO was 26yr English man
– Profiling Engine. Target advertising
– I convinced that we will do it in India
– Consulting company of mine in India is converted into software development
– We developed the free service in England…
– We were go to live. It was 1999.
– ALTAVISTA made an announcement in press. Said free complete internet service. One interview was enough to collapse our 43 people company
– Let me start my own company. I was reasonably networked. E-Commerce portals
– Model was sales in UK develop in India; also started Body shopping – Staff augumenting service…
– 2001 – Dot com bust. Many of our customers failed, and our business collapsed

Wireless and Mobile services
– We thought wireless application company. Appln for PDA – parcel, London metropolitan service etc..
– Management consulting  e company -> wireless etc.
– 25 crore business happened
– I was in the process of progressing – 9/11 happened – US collapsed..
– All techies from US moved to EUROPE and UK
– I started losing all my customers to WIPRO, inexpensive labour
– Went to banks. I was pitching for funds. I was told – YOU ARE AS GOOD AS YOUR LAST SALE
– We will have to give you money and own your business? We cannot run it.
– WHY DO NOT YOU BUILD A PRODUCT? They asked
– FIRST time I realized that if you own an IPR then greater possibility of success!!
– We were wondering what to do?

Back to INDIA; OUR FIRST IPR
– One day walking on OXFORD street. I bumped into CHRIS, my first boss in Germany, It was a sheer confidence..
– He shared that he was running mobile messaging company. MTV service and said that we will work together.
– He went back and I got a call saying that all money invested in his company, he realized was of SERBIAN MAFIA and he has to close his company.
– I am looking for a product and CHRIS had it. CHRIS did not mind shifting to India.
– He came to INDIA to help us build MOBILE SERVER. A product was built finally, our IPR.
– I went to VCs for funds, they said that kindly show that it can be sold …
– In England it was costly to sell, people use it as a pilot, but none would buy
– We sold first in INDIA to MODI CARE…
– We went back for funding
– They said that you are very confusing…
– we consolidated every business under ValueFirst in2003
– NOW we have 25oo customers.. 3-4 crore messages every day.
– I had to convince family to get back…to INDIA
– Finally the family moved 2 years back!! Though my daughter is heading back to UK for her O level courses now…

THAT IS MY JOURNEY

Back to VALUEFIRST

– WHEN I First set VALUEFIRST. I want to do it with right values, there comes the name of the company too..
– FOUR CORE VALUES that drive VALUE FIRST are :
o LOVE EACH OTHER
– Unconditional acceptance of the other human being
– We do not restrict with the company
• Express the same happiness beyond – families, customers, public
• ALCHEMY – we will be able to convert everything into gold
o TRUTHFULNESS IN EACH ACTION
– Say what you think; Do what you say
– Thought, speech and action
• Most of the times there is no congruence …we are focused on the truthfulness in every way
• We never peep into any data
o FAITH IN ONESELF AND THE UNIVERSE
– You are extraordinary; Whatever you believe in – Will come true
– The Universe is designed to accomplish your will
• Will the highest of your dreams and see them coming true.
• Act with this faith..
• EVEN IF YOU HAVE TO TAKE REBIRTH…you will achieve
o EXCELLENCE in each effort
– Your each act must ensure excellence
– The results of your effort will be available with highest quality
• We measure effort and not result
• Karmanyevadhikareste…

Q&A

1. How is that you can make things happen, whatever you wished?

VB :

Have you read the book? CONVERSATIONS WITH GOD by Neale Donald Walsch

Three steps –
– Dream the dream
– Share your dream with as many people as you can
– Whatever you dreamt, you should feel it has happened..
o get rid of self doubts in any context

Example –
– MCA days – I always told myself and told openly that I will top and I continued to top…
– ” I succeeded in getting two kids to be born on two different continents on the same day just by willing it”!!! : Vishwadeep was narrating another real life experience about how he wanted both his wife and sister-jn-law who were pregnant, DDays apart by 25 days, to deliver on the same day. One day when he was walking with his wife in shopping plaza in London, got a call from India that his sister-in-law has delivered. He thought to himself that a few more hours to go and his wish may come true. They reached home and his wife shared that she is feeling uneasy and asked Vish to feed two kids. In a while, wife asked Vish to take her to the hospital and in a couple of hours they had the baby in their hands !! The POWER OF DREAMING and BELIEF !!
– Recently, waiting at the airport, I saw a pretty lady in the boarding Que. I was sitting and reading a book waiting for the crowd to board. But kept on telling myself that I will be sitting next to that pretty lady. I was the last one to board and it so happened that the seat next her was the only empty seat, and I occupied it !! (students had a hearty laugh at this story)

2. HOW does this really happen –

VB :

– Atom building blocks of Universe
– Matter changed into energy
– Energy gets converted to matter…
– Whatever thought we have is energy..
– Energy has physical property..
– Energy will find its resonance…matching…
– Challenge is to communicate to the universe only one frequency… one thought..
– Universe follows…
– Share it as many, let it resonate.

3. How do you market your company?

VB : We follow multiple approaches…
– Online marketing and PR
– Online search engine optimizing…GOOGLE ads…[articles/blogs/appears on the screen]
– OFFLine marketing – Industry events
– Niche journals – Banking journals; Real Estate, Retail etc

4. Your experience in India Vs West?

VB :
– My SON was asked to write about three fruits in 300 words..
o He wrote Cheeku, Rosgulla, Gulamjamun
– Western markets are very mature
– SME segment in India no maturity and it is 90% of the economy
o Process are yet to take sophistication
– In West, they plan and Act, In India, we Act and Plan
o Germany : Airport was shifted without any hassles in a one shot operation, not impacting a single aircraft taking off on time.
– India is much bigger market, sheer size and scale, it is huge. We will be profitable. No economy (baring China) can match our scale.

5. What is next.. technologically?

– Black swan theory : (Taleb regards almost all major scientific discoveries, historical events, and artistic accomplishments as “black swans”—undirected and unpredicted. He gives the rise of the Internet, the personal computer, World War I, and the September 11, 2001 attacks, as examples of Black Swan events. Check wikipedia)
o Whatever you dream will happen in uncanny way…
o Everything gets driven by the UNKNOWN; Yes, planning will reduce the cycles of reinventing
– Technologically we are moving from TXT to VOICE
o SMS – call originating… call centre mapping
– Refer book BLINK? – decision comes from GUT
o Critical to find the right people…
o Look problems holistically…

6. What is the secret to your MOBILITY? Your ability to ADAPT ACROSS VARIOUS SECTORS and Countries?
– Fundamental trait is perseverance
– I never thought of shutting shop
– You need to continuously play… score a six
– Relearn and work hard
– Get the right people better than yourself

7. What is your Biggest failure?
– I never felt ever failed
– I feel like this door has shut..will do something else
– Enjoying the moment

8. As young entrepreneurs and business grads..what is your advise?
– Whatever you choose to do, do with utmost passion
– I do not feel the right Idea, People are more important
o Execution is more important and that happens because of people
– GOD lies in execution
o Many people have ideas….execution is paramount
o Execution will be through trial and error and thru people
o Will hire who will help me succeed
o Convince a story about how upside will happen…
o Investing in hiring in advance of the need…
– DREAM…SHARE…Have no doubt about it…
– Following your heart or mind
o In doing what your heart says.. will always help
o I am can dream better than others….

” Have the courage to want things. Life has its way of delivering them to you in the most unexpected ways”

Girish Batra; (Chairman and Managing Director, NetAmbit) in Discussion with Entrepreneurial Leaders at IWSB Campus.

Girish Batra, Founder; Chairman and Managing Director, NetAmbit ;
Girish, an IIMA grad started NetAmbit in 2002. Now it is a 4000 People Company. Girish was at IWSB campus as part of “My Journey” series to share lessons and learning from his entrepreneurial journey so far. The interactive session with aspiring entrepreneurial leaders was full of questions, questions and more questions from the youngsters. They got a message, “Be eager to welcome new situations, challenges and experiences, to learn and discover what more you can be”

Distribution companies in any vertical are usually larger than the manufacturers, like Wal-Mart is bigger than Unilever. Worldwide there are a few large companies that follow similar business model even in financial space, eg. Brown and Brown (UK).

Indian financial market is of the size of thirty thousand crore. The market is growing at the rate of 30% annually. While penetration levels are just 4%, still the market is 30 thousand crore market. The potential and opportunities are huge. There have been many ‘manufacturers’ of financial instruments, hawked through a few distribution systems (agents, banks). But consumers needed independent credible and trustworthy consultants and advisors who can compare multiple products available and advise them. That is where NetAmbit moved in.

NetAmbit sees itself as equivalent of a food bazaar of financial markets – sells life insurance, general insurance, mutual funds, corporate FDs, Loans, Credit Cards etc. Eighty percent of market in India lives in smaller towns – tier 3 and 4. Seventy six percent of NetAmbit sales come tier 2 and 3 cities. Now NetAmbit has offices with over 6000 workstations and 4000 field agents.

FORBES June 18, story named NetAmbit as the king of ‘non-affinity’ market for their rigorous process driven approach to customer acquisition.

Where did the Journey begin?

Girish wanted to be an entrepreneur, because he wanted to be secure and successful. Only after going to IIMA, he realized entrepreneurship gives opportunity to contribute to the society. He wanted to build a business that will sustain on its own. “Make yourself such a way that you are redundant…,” which charged Girish.

Girish went on to work for Escorts and Godrej for six years, with a yearning to be an entrepreneur. He was in Bangalore, when parents suggested him to take the next step in his life, getting married. Since, Girish harboured ambition to be an entrepreneur, he always thought of marrying a girl who will be working in a govt or PSU, as she can provide the stability whenever he jumps into his entrepreneurial journey. He did jump in, by moving to Delhi from Bangalore. To the surprise of many a family member, he quit his job twenty days before his wedding!! His family and wife have been very supportive. “Family support is the most important to be successful as an entrepreneur,” Girish avers.

Girish, started with one Lakh as his only investment. “Dotcom was crazy in those days. Unfortunately, the valuation was all about clicks and page views, without the existence of brick and mortar, or revenues to back up.” Girish thought of it as a great opportunity, “We thought of providing offline model to hook on to the online models…” So NetAmbit was seen as Offline services for Online businesses!! NetAmbit is all that surrounds the Net!!

“Since I did start with 1 lakh, only way was to earn our bread and butter… the journey began.”

Dotcom economy busted, we had to reorient… We moved into telecom, started looking for distributing telephone connections to SMEs. This business was short-lived, before NetAmbit oriented towards financial markets.

Today, Bessemer’s best performing investment is NetAmbit. Best capital efficiency in their Indian portfolio…

Q. Were you not fearful about failures when you started…

Failures… Lots of them!

One may fear going to the town if it is raining like today, as you may fear traffic jam… what they hell, get out and experience… why fear?

Every morning I have a long list of issues… but I enjoy trying to solve them…I will talk more about failures later.

Students sharing their day with Girish

Q. How does a Consumer behave?

– Consumer wants more at one place, with a lot of advice and help thrown in. So a bazaar type of operations is a better placed one.
– Net-based? 6.5 crore people use internet in India, only buying rail tickets has gained acceptance, everything else is low; that is where the future is, that is at least 15 years away. HDFC does only 10L on the net out of 300 Crore sales of insurance product in a month
– In any industry, various methods of doing business co-exists, but models would differ in cost efficiency, interaction with customer. India is a land of opportunities. 6000 cities of this country is ready for products. If Tata sky/Dish tv is sold today, tomorrow insurance, loans etc will definitely be. Look at SKS micro finance / Grameen bank how they have moved into explore successfully new models at the bottom of the pyramid.

Most of personal loans are sold, not bought – very few walk into a bank and ask for it…

Net Ambit goes to mass market. We do not go to High Networth Individuals (HNI). We need to evolve a model that will have vast potential. We are exploring. Any model that is scalable and cost efficient will make a killing in the future. Opportunities are immense, growth possibilities and challenges are internal to any corporate. If at all there has been a failure, it is because of internal issues – growing faster, not being open, less adaptable, mostly related to the person(s) who are heralding the business… there are immense examples of these in the recent past.

Q. Who were your competitors and what was the market like when you started?
When we started, only competitor was BAJAJ FINANCE…

Q. What is the critical factor in early days of operations?
Cost consciousness is the most important… Need to be very careful in the early days of any business. In fact, it is important at any given point of time. I have known an international bank that prided itself in their early days in India of giving Cappuccino to every guest who visited their branches. Unfortunately, they had to close down their entire operations for reasons of viability!!

Girish interacting with students

Q. How did you manage to get early customers and retain them?
You need to look out for the next customer. There is no formula. Look for the needs of people and figure out.

FORBES article on NETAMBIT… called the kings of non-affinity – June 18, 2010 article. Mckinsey was impressed by our success on this front.

Q. Affinity and Non-affinity marketing?
Affinity – Selling to those who have affinity towards you. Once a customer is acquired, you will move to affinity team that takes care of the customer. It is a relationship building. Once you create the bond and trust, affinity increases. He will keep coming back and also bring a few more of his friends.

Non-affinity is to bring more and more first timers…We have been very successful in this space with our constant follow ups. We are highly systems driven. Every interaction is captured. Data handling and mining is very strong. This is the secret of success of any company. How well you follow through every enquiry. To what extent you go to satisfy the queries and facilitate the customer make the informed decision.

Q. How does your Non-Affinity marketing work?
Visit our office to see how we do. Seek time and visit us. We will be glad to get you guys spend a day at our office(s)

Q. As you scale up, what are the challenges you faced in building people and organization?

Name of the game is keeping people together…

When you build teams, it is very important to hire the right people. Take time in hiring. Reduce the probability of hiring a person who is not a proper fit, culturally.

1. We look for entrepreneurial, high on energy, ethical, humble, risk takers…at higher level. Humility is a keenly sought after value.
2. Trust once your hire, for their abilities and support their decision-making. Back up their failures or rough patch.
3. Look for people with high ‘Internal locus of control’ at any level

Q. Challenges around scaling up – Which cities, where and when, how do you decide ?

1. We look for Market size of the city,
2. If we decide, we do a Hub and spoke model..
3. Decentralize the decision-making and operations, yet keep a close watch to mentor

Q. Initial selection of products and diversification; future plans and challenges

Initially life insurance was just opening up

Future is very promising….market doubling every three years, growing @ 30%
We foresee 7000 people in 2011, going public in 2012, 1000Cr in next 4-5 years… 250crores in 2011.

Challenges are all internal. It is all about how you keep the culture intact and value systems. How do you bind diversity with one single culture. Appreciating the value system and facilitating them to buy in and relate. It is people driven, how you keep them motivated. How fast you hire, efficiently and train them. Whom to hire and when to hire… It may go to 40000 people, I will not be surprised. We need to constantly train on new products and innovation… train and retain is the challenge…. As market leaders, poaching is always lurking around..

How do you handle the hierarchy formation is the key. Ours is almost flat and a very open organization. We need to make sure that bureaucratic thinking does not come seep in.

Girish sharing at IWSB

Q Speaking about Selling

In India, most of the times we fail in how we sell; Sales experience at the front level is very important.

FMCG companies have mastered it. They send every new recruit as a junior sales officer. I got Rs 150 bugs a day – stayed in Rs.50/- a day hotel, though I could have afforded an expensive one. They make sure you understand the market. Even now, I go and meet two customers every month. That is part of our way of doing things..

In sales, people monitor output only unfortunately.. Very few are bothered about input – how much of effort has gone in the acquisition. That is very important. Document each interaction. Break it down and monitor – Number of calls, responses,

We look for a HR person, who has business understanding. He or she needs to understand sales and marketing front end, to identify the people who will do well in our culture and organization.

Q. How do you approach a client? Since you were the first to enter this market, you might have had to invest in educating the customer..

First we understand a client. If he is not well-informed about the market, we start with only one product

Our non-affinity is all about direct marketing. We reach out to over 80 Lakh new customers every month. FORBES called us king of non-affinity. Our processes are very strong therefore our conversions are very high. It is the process culture.

Q. Name of the game in India is distribution. It is the king. Own these channels…
Owning distribution channels is the key to success. Manufacturer’s distribution will always have great cost inefficiency. Neutral distribution channels with customer friendly services will always be cost efficient and can do many things that will hook the customer. You can see what happens in a Food Bazar…

Q. Strategy Vs Execution –

Started inside out – first Delhi then Meerut. But also look at outside in. So it is both ways. You design on paper and start executing. Then you realize how the assumptions have been not to the mark. Make corrections and keep exploring and learning.

Q. How do you cope with failure? How do you continue to be excited?

Do not hesitate to fail. Never be scared of failures, experiment. Take it as a learning opportunity, and do not make the same mistake. Critically analyze failures. Do not lose by operational inefficiency. Do not worry about experimenting new ideas. Challenges are everywhere…

If you are doing new things, you will fail. You should welcome this exploration. If you have stopped failing, what does it mean? It simply means that you are not doing anything new.

Remaining positive is the biggest thing in life. Dhoni is a good example of this orientation. Tendulkar and Kambli, difference between the two has been all about ‘learning from failures.

Q. How often your decisions were data driven and how much was intuition?
When it is futuristic, many a times it is intuition. You have not had experiences or precedence.. Operational decisions are data driven.. People and futuristic is usually intuition. Yes intuition plays a very important role.

We need to add in such a pace that we should be able to service the customer. Their genuine claims are serviced promptly. We will grow as much as we can serve the customers very efficiently. No pointing in growing faster than what we can service.

Q. Building trust among investors?
They trust your business. They look for history, plan, model… Yet, PEOPLE is the most important. They bet on it.

Q. How do you build NetAmbit as a brand?
How does the small town person believe in NetAmbit? They are buying big brands now from NetAmbit, so that is where we are. As Net Ambit becomes stronger, people will start trusting NetAMbit. That is the way the world market has been growing.. Experiences will help one build the brand…

Lot of creating awareness, educating the buyers..

Q. You have not ventured into Equity distribution, why?
Since the market has not been large, small markets do not go for it… we will move very soon..

Q. What is success?
Successful! When a person is happy about self and your peer group starts respecting you, then you can tell to yourself that it is comfortable..

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For the eager bunch of learners at IWSB it was a great experience, they surely have gained immensely from the Interaction. IWSB humbly convey’s its gratitude to Girish for the insightful visit to the campus. IWSB also looks forward to more visits from Girish and wish to learn more and more in the process.