31 March 2025

Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play

Recommendation

FranklinCovey sales instructors Mahan Khalsa and Randy Illig offer a no-nonsense, emotionally intelligent approach to making selling easier, more professional and more fulfilling. Drawing on decades of experience in sales and sales training, they explain how to avoid the fundamental indignities of sales – countless cold calls and constant rejection – and replace them with a thoughtful, consultative methodology that helps salespeople, their companies and especially their clients. Khalsa and Illig contend that when salespeople forget about numbers and quotas and focus completely on client needs, good things follow for all. While this manual will most benefit business-to-business sellers of six- and seven-figure solutions, BooksInShort recommends its counsel to salespeople, sales leaders and persuaders in all fields at all levels.

Take-Aways

  • Salespeople and clients often distrust and disrespect one another.
  • Fix this dynamic by seeking “mutual self-interest.”
  • Always put your prospects’ needs ahead of your own, and make it clear you do so.
  • Know your clients’ values and priorities before saying a word about your “solution.”
  • Stop cold calling. Get referrals. Chase far fewer but better qualified leads.
  • Qualify opportunities and budgets; if they don’t fit, persuade the client to make changes or walk away.
  • Know your client’s decision-making process and influence it in your favor.
  • Strive to make sales presentations in person and with all decision makers present.
  • Address all issues openly. Give clients everything they need to make an immediate decision right after your presentation.
  • Talk price only at the end of the sales process. Make small price reductions in return for corresponding scope reductions.

Summary

Think Differently About Sales

Salespeople face suspicion and rejection daily. Clients often ask them to answer a ton of questions, reveal proprietary information, and spend hours and money on proposals for projects that may never occur – or for which they’ve already selected a winner.

The dynamic between sales and clients has to change. As a salesperson, start this change by thinking differently about your job. You don’t sell: You consult. Focus your efforts on your customers’ success. Never force a sale to meet quotas or numbers. Involve customers in evaluating whether your offering meets their precise needs.

Mutual Self-Interest

Change the sales-purchasing dynamic by earnestly seeking mutual self-interest. Acknowledge the truth of five “key beliefs”:

  1. “Consultants and clients want the same thing” – Clients want solutions that address their issues or needs. Problems emerge when salespeople think they know a client’s problems or offer a ready solution. Clients don’t always know what they want and often can’t describe it. They block consultants’ access to the people who do know, or internal politics interfere or no one makes decisions. To win your clients’ trust and openness, focus on determining a solution that addresses what your clients need.
  2. “Intent counts more than technique” – Your knowledge, expertise and “technique” don’t matter until you convince clients that you always keep their interests and needs foremost. Build rapport and trust by demonstrating your focus on your clients’ needs. Forget numbers. Take care of client concerns; your needs will take care of themselves.
  3. “Solutions have no inherent value” – No one cares about your solution or listens to you unless it directly solves their problem. Your client might encourage you to describe your solution. You may ache to talk about it. Don’t. Learn about client challenges before you say a word about your solution.
  4. “World-class inquiry precedes world-class advocacy” – Listen well, ask questions, and understand what your clients value and need. Discuss and explore their issues, challenges and opportunities. Together, describe the perfect solution with clarity. If your solution can’t deliver, bow out graciously – don’t wait until you’ve spent months and thousands of dollars on a proposal.
  5. “Methodology matters” – A single approach can’t satisfy every situation. Therefore, address sales opportunities methodically. Aim for a balance of intellect and relationship building when pursuing deals. Reach clients with both your intelligence as well as your emotional awareness.

The “ORDER” Methodology

To “qualify, win and grow” new business and to execute a replicable sales processes, use the simple but powerful ORDER method:

1. “Opportunity”

Explore the Opportunity you offer with prospective clients. If their needs fit your abilities, make sure they have enough money. Qualify your prospect. Don’t “guess” what your prospect needs. In initial meetings, don’t talk about your solution. Listen to clients; get “all of their issues” on the table. Test by asking, “If you resolved all of these issues but nothing else, would that deliver on your needs completely?”

“Sales skills are life skills. What makes us better at sales makes us better in life. And vice versa.”

Take care not to hear only what you want to hear. Read between the lines, and when you hear anything that raises concern, treat it the way you’d treat a “yellow light” in traffic. Address the issue, ask questions and make sure you’ve mutually resolved the question before moving on. After you’ve discussed all the issues, work with your client to rank their concerns in order of importance.

“It takes some time to build a referral network, and it is worth every minute of the investment. People will call you and you will be able to make your sales goals with ease.”

If you identify 10 problems that the client needs to solve, about 80% of the value of your solution will come from resolving the first two. Quantify the value of your solution by asking “five golden questions” about the current problem:

  1. “How do you measure it?”
  2. “What is it?”
  3. What would you prefer it become?
  4. What is the “value of the difference” between what it is and what it could become?
  5. How much value would you like to gain from this difference over “two to three years”?
“Helping clients succeed is...a powerful, if paradoxical, means of getting what we want.”

You may learn, for example, that the client’s wish for higher quality means achieving fewer defects. The client explains how many defects occur now and says the solution should lead to 50% fewer defects. You ask the cost per defect, and go through the math with the client to run out a projection looking at the next few years, so you can agree on a monetary range. Now you have a priority issue with an attached price that you determined with the client by using hard evidence.

“Having a credible referral makes such a difference in securing and succeeding with initial calls that it is worth considering not contacting a prospect at all without a referral.”

Find out why the client’s company hasn’t done anything about this problem. How does the solution affect other parts of the business or its systems? What barriers and obstacles prevented its resolution in the past? Past obstacles will resurface. Address them now, or find yourself –months into the process – dealing with a cancellation due to the rebirth of similar obstacles.

2. “Resources”

Find out if prospective clients have the resources to accomplish what they need. Salespeople sometimes spend more on the proposal process than client’s budget for a project. This happens when sales consultants don’t qualify their clients’ resources until the end of the process. Resources include the personnel and money the client can commit. Who will the client put on the team, what will those people do and to whom will they report? With such data, plus your knowledge of the cost and pain of the problem, ask what budget the client has ready. They will turn that question back to you. Talk about similar projects and give them a cost range. Ask if that range works for their budget.

“If yellow lights exist in the client’s mind, then no matter how difficult they may be, we want to bring them to the surface while we are present with the client.”

If they resist stating their range or saying if your range meets their budget, ask to speak with the person who can clarify that issue. If the top of their range falls below the bottom of yours, ask how they arrived at their figure. Find out why they seem unwilling to pay for the solution you’ve both agreed they need. If they can find the solution cheaper elsewhere, tell them they should. Offer to go through the competing firm’s proposal to make sure they haven’t missed anything. If you can’t convince clients to spend more, work with them to reduce the scope of the project, or assign more work to them and less to you. If you are unsure you can offer a solution for the resources available, don’t continue.

3. “Decision”

The qualifying process continues as you determine how and if the client intends to make a decision. Even with the opportunity and resources well qualified, deals often fail or are lost because consultants don’t find out early on who makes and influences decisions. Ask about the process: What steps need to take place for the company to make a decision? Ask questions to learn the identity of the decision makers and influencers at each stage. Do they really decide, or do they simply sign off on another person’s decision? Meet with every key decision maker, from the project manager to the CEO.

“It is almost always possible to get a referral if you are determined to do so.”

Your client will almost certainly deny your requests to meet with senior decision makers. Persist by explaining your intent – to deliver the best, most precise solution possible. Tell them you’d rather not guess what their main stakeholders want. When they tell you the boss has no time to meet with you, agree – but say that a 30-minute meeting now will save a lot of time later. When they tell you it’s unfair to your competitors, respond that they should allow the same access to any competitor who asks. When they say they’ll pose your questions for you, politely insist you must ask your questions yourself to assess the responses, including body language. Ultimately, if your client won’t offer access, decide whether to compromise and meet with only some of the decision makers, or go around them to get to the people you want. If nothing works, either walk away or decide to accept the risk of going ahead without these meetings.

“Don’t go to the Exact Solution step without qualifying the client on time, people and money.”

You want to find ways to influence the decision-making process. For example, say that the client’s process for choosing a new Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform involves meeting with you and six competitors, and then putting forward the top three. An IT “selection committee” reviews the three and makes its recommendation. Finally, an “executive committee” discusses the recommendation and “rubber stamps” it. You suspect IT will prefer a competitor’s solution due to its popularity with techies and its ease of implementation. But you know that your solution is a better fit for the company’s strategic and financial objectives. You might influence the client’s process to change the order of the steps so the executive committee makes the initial recommendation according to business needs, rather than allowing IT to influence the decision based on technological concerns.

4. “Exact Solution”

If the clients “qualify” in opportunity, resources and decision-making process, arrange to present your solution and obtain a verdict from them. Win the contract and even expand the work by determining their “Exact Solution.” Present it in person; don’t send a proposal in place of your presentation. Work to ensure that all decision makers attend and that you have sufficient time. Draft an agenda leading to a decision at the meeting’s end. Know the decision or action you want the clients to make. Tell the clients you’d like to have their decision, yes or no, at the end of the meeting. Ask for their agreement either before or at the start of the meeting.

“You can build a referral network that will turn cold calls into warm calls and put you on the fast track to achieving your sales goals.”

Anticipate and confirm which items the clients need to see in your presentation in order to be able to make a decision. Address their needs and nothing more, but make sure you’ve covered them before continuing. Listen to questions carefully. Don’t guess a question’s meaning and don’t jump to answer it. Understand “the real question.” Acknowledge objections by pausing in your presentation. Ask questions to understand objections; try to resolve them directly, right away.

“The more important it is to meet your numbers, the more important it is to stop concentrating on your numbers and start concentrating on the client’s numbers.”

Your presentation ends when the client has no more questions and you’ve resolved all objections. Only now should you talk price. Find out by asking, “If the price were right, would you move ahead with us right now?” If yes, press on; if not, go back to resolving outstanding issues. Don’t waver on your price – at least, not easily – and, then, only if you get something in return. If your client can’t agree to your price, offer small discounts reluctantly and only in return for scope reductions, or the like.

5. “Results”

At the end of a presentation, if you get a no, find out the real reasons and move on. If the clients can’t decide, press for the next steps and a firm timeline for a decision. If they say yes, lay the groundwork for a good relationship by anticipating challenges, discussing them, setting expectations and making sure the transition to implementation goes smoothly. Decide how you will “measure results” so you have evidence to prove your contributions. Obtaining future business from this and other existing clients costs far less than earning new business. Keep treating current clients like “prospective clients” so they don’t turn into “former clients.”

Fewer, Better Leads

Instead of making cold calls, get referrals. Consider a policy of never approaching a prospect without a referral. Happy clients provide referrals, as do colleagues and friends. Pursue far fewer but better qualified leads, and pursue them thoroughly. Know about prospective clients and their firms. Know what issues they face and how your solution addresses those concerns. Plan meetings with prospects carefully, draft an agenda and share it with them. Practice how you will start the meeting. Know the outcome or decision you want before you start. Your quotas and numbers as a salesperson don’t matter. Focusing only on client concerns will fulfill your needs.

About the Authors

FranklinCovey sales trainer Mahan Khalsa helped Randy Illig boost sales when he was CEO of an IT consulting firm. Subsequently Illig joined Khalsa at FranklinCovey. Together, they teach and consult about sales performance for global Fortune 500 firms.


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Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play

Book Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play

Transforming the Buyer/Seller Relationship

Portfolio,


 



31 March 2025

The Secrets of CEOs

Recommendation

Famous chief executive officers (CEOs) have an aura of invincibility. But scandals and failures have engulfed many infamous CEOs who ultimately lost their powerful jobs. And avoiding risk is no guarantee of top-job security. Many companies want their CEOs to serve as agents of change, not caretakers. How do successful CEOs stay on top? The answer depends on their style of leadership. Today, most chief executives are superb managers or bold entrepreneurs. Others are visionaries or astute diplomats. To find out what motivates CEOs and how they think about leadership, Steve Tappin and Andrew Cave conducted comprehensive interviews with 150 chief executives and compiled their findings in this book. BooksInShort recommends their work to anyone who wants to know how CEOs think and act.

Take-Aways

  • Being a chief executive officer (CEO) is one of the toughest jobs in the world.
  • Many CEOs have little time for themselves or their families.
  • CEOs who cannot deal with pressure and stress should choose another line of work.
  • The job of a CEO can be very rewarding. Unlike many other types of workers, CEOs get the opportunity to make a real difference.
  • The five predominant CEO types are “commercial executors, financial value drivers, corporate entrepreneurs, corporate ambassadors” and “global missionaries.”
  • Companies that are insensitive to environmental sustainability may face regulatory constraints on their operations.
  • The recruitment of quality talent is sure to become a major challenge for CEOs.
  • The old “command-and-control” model of dictatorial executive leadership is passé.
  • Financially driven CEOs who make efficiency their top priority may react slowly to rapid changes in their industries or the economy.
  • Corporate entrepreneurs thrive by conceiving profitable new ways to disrupt industries and defeat competitors.

Summary

So You Want to Be a CEO?

Being a chief executive officer (CEO) is more demanding than ever. As a CEO, you have little time for your family. Your organization and its stakeholders frequently put many demands upon you. Achieving a proper professional and personal balance may be impossible. Unless you can handle stress, you are headed for big trouble. The pressures that CEOs encounter could break those people who lack remarkable personal strength and character.

“Life at the top isn’t all it’s made out to be.”

A successful CEO is wise, determined, resilient and visionary, a capable leader who is passionate about his or her organization. The job of CEO also can be very rewarding because it allows the CEO to shake things up and truly make a difference. Few other positions offer this much opportunity for success – and this big a risk of failure.

“To be the final decision maker in a multibillion-dollar business with hundreds of thousands of employees and pensioners relying on you is an awesome responsibility.”

What advice can prominent CEOs offer young professionals who hope to reach the same dizzy heights? For a start, they should stay healthy. Being a CEO is a notable health risk. Individuals who are unable to cope with the demands of the job are unlikely to remain CEOs for long.

Going Global

As a CEO, you need to develop a plan for the rapid globalization of your business. CEOs who ignore this trend do so at their organizations’ absolute peril. Why? By 2025, India and China will represent a stunning 49% of the world’s economic output.

“Just like being a top athlete, being a CEO requires that you are as close to your best as much of the time as possible.”

What does this mean for companies today? Simply this: You should get on the global business train quickly before it leaves the station. The time for “flag-planting” in disparate markets across the globe is past. Globalization means neither opening far-flung subsidiaries around the world nor selling undifferentiated products in multiple foreign markets. Operate in this ill-informed fashion and savvy international competitors will beat up your organization.

“Corporate entrepreneurs have something to prove. They disrupt industries because they believe in a better way of doing things.”

Prepare for worldwide competition by adopting a true “global mindset.” Change your product line to suit unique markets. What sells well in Des Moines may not work in Johannesburg or Reykjavík. To attain global marketing goals, cede substantial operational authority to local offices around the world. At the same time, maintain a system of sharing best practices among staff members in all your offices. These are just some of the requirements of a bona fide “global business model.” Your management team must fully reflect this mindset in its orientation and make-up.

The Environment and the Internet

Promoting a sustainable environment is a primary global issue confronting business leaders and other citizens of the world. Indeed, the issue of preserving an inhabitable planet no longer is a matter of dispute within most of the business world. Concerned consumers and shareholders will not let companies continue to take neutral stands on this vital threat.

“Tomorrow’s CEO will abandon the outmoded command-and-control model that is too inflexible for the modern business environment.”

When it comes to sustainability, smart CEOs and their firms now “swim with the tide.” They understand that “going green” has become the way of the world. They are redirecting their commercial efforts so they can profit from environmental practices. How does all this translate on a day-to-day basis for CEOs and the companies they lead? With shareholders urging them on, CEOs are developing a wider understanding of what it means to be a responsible business. In the process, CEOs are creating imaginative business models that reflect the new sustainability imperative and, at the same time, they are securing their regulatory licenses to operate into the future. Businesses must be sure they’re “doing the right thing.” Savvy CEOs fully understand and support this rapidly evolving, remarkably high-profile paradigm.

“Relying too heavily on customers telling you what they need is always risky: no one asked for an iPod, remember.”

Another transformative trend is the proliferation of online business. Smart CEOs increasingly scout for opportunity on the Internet. Do you know how to differentiate truly unique, promising new Internet business opportunities from the false starts, also-rans and dumb ideas? If not, add young hires to your management team who understand “connected consumers.” After all, the Internet is growing up. In the Web 1.0 era (“late 1990s to 2001”) commercial opportunities online were few. The Web 2.0 era (“from around 2004” to the present) is a consumer-driven age of proliferating social networks. Are you ready for Web 3.0? The next era of Internet development could be astounding. Microsoft’s Bill Gates says, “You’re going to look at what we have today and think it’s a kind of a joke.”

Sustaining Liquidity

In a challenging economic environment, CEOs must ensure that their businesses generate sufficient cash to cover all their obligations. Additionally, they must trim expenses wherever they can, while making sure to budget their most vital operations adequately. In 2007, the subprime mortgage fiasco in the United States helped prompt a huge liquidity crisis. With funding sources dried up, companies suddenly had to scramble to secure needed capital.

“Chief executives agree that in the next decade the global economy and business world will change on a scale not seen in 200 years.”

“Capital markets are like the tide,” says Andy Hornby, CEO of HBOS. “You have got to catch the tide. Once it has gone out, you are left high and dry.” In addition to the capital crunch, other factors that can roil the global economy include “high food and commodity prices, a price correction in the stock markets and a weak dollar.”

Recruiting Talent

Few CEOs succeed alone. CEOs who assemble strong teams of employees find it relatively easy to overcome major challenges like a credit crunch and to hold onto their jobs. Winning CEOs spend 25% of their time on new talent development. In a recent survey of companies whose stocks comprise the FTSE 100 index, 68% of the CEOs said the “human capital agenda” was their primary priority, ahead of strategy and execution.

“Poor rural consumers who have access to mass media are just as keen to get consumer products as...their urban counterparts.”

No wonder. As experienced people from the huge baby boom generation retire, how will companies find the talent to replace them? This is a major problem. Hiring can be hellishly hard. In a Forbes magazine survey, 74% of CEOs said staffing represents a “very significant challenge.” But Sir Martin Sorrell, chief executive of Wire Plastic Products (WPP), says the rewards of effective recruitment can be spellbinding: “If you have the right people running the business units, it works magically.”

The Five Types of CEOs

CEOs tend to have one of these five types of personalities:

  1. “Commercial executors” are detail-oriented individuals who drive their companies to achieve maximum performance.
  2. “Financial value drivers” concentrate mainly on valuing assets and liabilities. They focus intently on shareholder value.
  3. “Corporate entrepreneurs” develop the ability, skills and staff to turn interesting ideas into viable marketing realities.
  4. “Corporate ambassadors” focus on their firms’ impact in a global context.
  5. “Global missionaries” seek to make notable contributions to the world’s betterment through their firms.
“Share price growth depends on increasing profits year on year, and it’s difficult to see better opportunities for sustained growth than in Asia.”

Action-oriented commercial executors insist that their companies excel and won’t settle for second best. They place a premium on business plan implementation. “Our business is 99% execution and 1% strategy,” says Phil Cox, CEO of International Power. Achieving superior results requires monitoring not just day-to-day performance but also progress toward strategic, long-term goals. “The critical requirement is to balance and achieve simultaneous success at short-term results and longer-term strategic change when the two can often pull in different directions,” says Mark Tucker, CEO of Prudential.

“In 2007 PetroChina became the world’s most valuable company...after its partial listing in Shanghai nominally valued its shares at $1 trillion.”

Financial value drivers share professional traits with investors, bankers and stock analysts. Nothing matters more to this type of CEO than developing optimum returns for shareholders. To achieve this goal, financial value drivers trim their operations to remove all excess costs. They pride themselves on running truly streamlined companies. Such CEOs are not “sociopathic accountants,” but they are excellent at identifying and championing initiatives that truly add to the bottom line over the long term. But because they concentrate so much on the financials, their narrow focus may prevent them from quickly identifying and reacting to sudden “industry shifts or economic downturns.”

“We are at the outset of the first world war for talent, driven principally by unfavorable demographics in the West, skills scarcity in the East, a worldwide shortage of global leaders and the frequency with which employees are now shifting jobs.”

Corporate entrepreneurs love to shake things up. They are expert at spotting new business opportunities that others miss. They are supremely confident that they can operate better within an industry than their competitors. Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, is a prime example of a corporate entrepreneur. Formerly with Saatchi & Saatchi, Sorrell bought Wire Plastic Products, a trolley manufacturer, in 1986. He used the firm as a holding company to purchase a variety of advertising and marketing companies. This included his hostile takeover of J. Walter Thompson, a firm 13 times the size of WPP. Sorrell then bought Ogilvy & Mather, another huge firm. It was twice as big as WPP. By 2000, he had acquired another 35 advertising and marketing firms. Today, WPP is among the top firms operating in the advertising and marketing industry worldwide.

“Today, most companies fill vacancies reactively, a resignation putting them on the back foot, scrambling to locate good enough candidates.”

Corporate ambassadors tend to lead well-known organizations with operations around the world. Most CEOs of this type head firms that sell international financial services or such commodities as oil and natural gas. They have finely tuned diplomatic skills, and know how to work well with governments and regulatory agencies. But if they spend too much time with public agencies and other external entities, they may respond too slowly to emergencies within their companies.

“Most CEOs do not even know their top 100 people in detail.”

Global missionaries are inspirational CEOs who put an inordinately high premium on values. They believe that doing good and being profitable should go hand in hand. They work hard to serve their customers, while believing fervently that their companies can achieve great things and become great corporate citizens in the process. They often operate in emerging industries and markets. And in many cases, they radically transform the companies they run. Ben Verwaayen is a typical global missionary.

When he became CEO of British Telecom, the company was in deep trouble and its leadership was suspect. Five years later, BT had regained consistent profitable growth and its share price was up 35%. In the process, Verwaayen and the company have championed environmental sustainability. He tries to ensure that BT pursues noble goals: “Leadership for me is to set the agenda; set the tone...It’s about hearts and minds.”

Managing Oneself

CEOs must make time for activities outside of work. Create an agenda that you control. Don’t let your firm’s activities control you. You are in charge at your company, so take charge of your life outside the office, too. Avoid the regret of the CEO at an FTSE 100 corporation who lamented that he had worked too much when he was younger to enjoy fatherhood fully: “I can’t remember the first two boys growing up when I was with my first wife.” CEOs with rewarding private lives almost always have “active support networks” of friends, family members and even the leaders of their companies’ boards, who can serve as a valuable “sounding boards.” Executive coaches also can be helpful; four out of ten CEOs of FTSE 100 companies use coaches. Many CEOs find that “executive coaches are just like sports coaches: They help you with your technique.”

On the job, team play is becoming a more common approach to management. The “command-and-control” model of top-down leadership is no longer operative. Today, a fellowship approach makes far more sense. “Cell-like businesses” will be the new norm. With this approach, “a chief executive provides business leadership at the nucleus of the cell by giving greater freedom to act to much more decentralized operations, while still policing performance.”

Aspiring CEOs must develop strong career foundations but take risks when necessary. They need to gain a wide diversity of experience: “multifunctional, multigeographic, multibusiness, multi-industry.” Learning to reflect someone else’s brilliance is advisable, too. At some point in their careers, CEOs who aspire to greatness should “work for a great leader.”

About the Authors

Steve Tappin is a managing partner of an executive search firm. He is an expert on CEO issues. Andrew Cave is a financial journalist with the Daily Telegraph in London.


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The Secrets of CEOs

Book The Secrets of CEOs

150 Global Chief Executives Lift the Lid on Business, Life and Leadership

Nicholas Brealey Publishing,


 



31 March 2025

India Inc.

Recommendation

An old Hindi proverb says, “Mare bina swarg nahi milta.” Never have truer words been spoken. In fact, this adage could be the mantra of all 10 visionary, gutsy entrepreneurs profiled in Vikas Pota’s book about celebrated corporate leaders in India. Pota’s treatise offers intriguing insights into the backgrounds, beliefs, values and attitudes of these highly prosperous business leaders. While Pota’s access to such renowned members of India’s commercial sphere is impressive, his minibiographies do not contain much practical advice on how to emulate these stars or how to establish an enterprise in India, and the stories overindulge in figures and statistics, which hinder reading. However, BooksInShort recommends this book to global managers seeking a solid overview of India’s business environment and to those looking for inspiration to launch a start-up anywhere in the world. And that old Hindi proverb? “Without death, there can be no heaven”: Great things can only be achieved through great effort.

Take-Aways

  • Ten entrepreneurs exemplify India’s progress: N.R. Narayana Murthy of Infosys is a moral leader. He believes entrepreneurship is the only way to rid society of its ills.
  • Media mogul Subhash Chandra is a plucky entrepreneur. His media empire engaged in a protracted battle with Rupert Murdoch’s STAR TV network.
  • Objective businessman Malvinder Singh had the guts to sell the family business, drug maker Ranbaxy, when reflection told him it was the right decision for the firm.
  • K.V. Kamath of ICICI Bank values fidelity and develops employees for the long term.
  • Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw persevered in the face of rejection and built a vast biotech firm.
  • When Subramaniam Ramadorai led IT firm TCS, he scaled up to boost its growth.
  • Kishore Lulla’s strong faith in Bollywood drives his success in the movie business.
  • Tulsi R. Tanti’s passion for his industry – wind energy – is evident in all he does.
  • Shiv Nadar, founder of HCL, an IT giant, prospered because he is a “big picture” leader.
  • Baba Kalyani’s conviction that he should take a bold risk and invest heavily in forging operations when his product sales were in a slump paid off for him and his firm, BFL.

Summary

The Indian Commercial Juggernaut

The 10 Indian entrepreneurs documented below are tough, resilient, determined and visionary. They have strong self-confidence. Many have overcome incredible odds with minimal resources while dealing with a tightly controlling bureaucracy. These gritty, opportunistic individuals are helping to transform India into a rising superpower as they turbocharge its economy. They are forcing businesspeople the world over to pay attention to the “Made in India” brand as they turn their companies into dominant global enterprises.

N.R. Narayana Murthy, Co-Founder of Infosys Technologies

As a young man, N.R. Narayana Murthy was a Communist, but a violent run-in with Bulgarian guards in 1974 provoked him to rethink his ideology. He came to believe that entrepreneurship is the only way to rid society of its ills. Murthy co-founded Infosys Technologies, a software and “information infrastructure” company, in 1981. It is the “largest publicly traded software” enterprise in India and was the first Indian firm listed on Nasdaq. Annual revenues reached almost $5 billion in 2007-2009, and the firm has more than 105,000 employees globally.

“This is the first time in the history of the world when a developing country like India has been the writer of the rules of the game.” (N.R. Narayana Murthy)

Many people refer to Murthy as “the Bill Gates of India.” But although he is now a billionaire, he had to borrow $250 from his wife, Sudha, to buy his stake in Infosys, which he set up with six engineers. After nine years of hard effort, Murthy’s partners wanted to cash in and sell the company for around $1 million. Murthy firmly opposed this idea. He had strong faith in Infosys. If his partners wanted to sell their interests, he promised to somehow raise the money to buy them out. His partners were so impressed with Murthy’s faith in Infosys that they kept their money in the company. Smart move. Infosys is an exceptionally competent firm. Across the globe, about 65% of all software projects finish on schedule and within budget. Infosys’s average is approximately 92%. Murthy is an exemplary ethical leader. He donates liberally to Indian charities, cares for the environment and refuses to exploit struggling IT firms.

Subhash Chandra, Founder of Zee TV

Subhash Chandra, chairman of Essel Group, launched Zee TV in 1992 to provide both the huge Indian diaspora and India’s indigenous population with homegrown Indian TV programs – “reality shows, melodramatic television serials” and “chat shows” – which he transmitted via satellite. Chandra is a fearless leader. He engaged in a protracted court battle with global media baron Rupert Murdoch, and his Zee TV competes fiercely with Murdoch’s STAR network. Zee TV now has more than “500 million viewers in 120 countries.” The company operates 28 TV channels in India and 18 channels in other countries.

Malvinder Mohan Singh, Former CEO and Managing Director of Ranbaxy

During his reign as CEO of Ranbaxy, a generic drug producer that ranks among the top 10 pharmaceutical manufacturers in the world, Malvinder Mohan Singh doubled the firm’s profits. He mastered the art of acquiring valuable firms to strengthen Ranbaxy’s breadth. He also developed joint ventures with the world’s leading drug manufacturers for research and development, an unusual step for a generic drug manufacturer. And, he accomplished these triumphs before his 38th birthday.

“Not taking a risk is the biggest risk you can take.” (Malvinder Singh)

Singh places a strong premium on “objectivity”: For instance, in 2008, he sold the Singh family’s long-held interests in Ranbaxy to Daiichi Sankyo because he realized the Japanese firm could provide the business with more resources than his family could. This $4.6 billion deal made Ranbaxy the 15th-largest pharmaceutical firm in the world. Singh became chairman of the newly expanded company, a role he resigned from a year later due to a drop in profits. Indeed, Singh sold his family’s shares just before the bottom dropped out of the stock market. He owns and manages numerous hospitals in India and is group chairman of Religare, a “nonbanking financial services” firm that describes itself as the “investment gateway of India.”

K.V. Kamath, Chairman of ICICI Bank

With assets of $102 billion and 1,520 branches worldwide, ICICI Bank is India’s “largest private bank.” K.V. Kamath, its chairman, successfully steered the giant financial services firm through the 2008-2009 global fiscal crisis that crippled so many other banks and financial institutions.

“It is an Indian genetic trait that we have always been a country that has looked at ways to get the maximum out of the minimum.” (Kamal Nath, India’s former minster for commerce and industry)

Kamath started at ICICI in 1971 as a specialist in project finance. Eventually, he became the executive assistant to S.S. Nandkarni, the firm’s chairman. In 1996, Kamath became ICICI’s managing director and CEO. He made numerous prominent acquisitions as CEO, including the Bank of Madura. In 2000, the New York Stock Exchange listed ICICI, and in 2003, Kamath united ICICI, the parent firm, with ICICI Bank, a huge merger at the time.

“The developed world has conquered using brands. India still doesn’t have a super brand, but that is not particularly surprising because the Indian success story is only 20 years old.” (Anshu Jain, Deutsche Bank)

Kamath cherishes loyalty. Except for a short spell at an advisory firm in Indonesia, he has worked at ICICI for his entire career. He expects the same fidelity from his employees. He aims to develop “the best and brightest bankers,” and to inspire them to commit to ICICI for the long term.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, “Queen of Biotech”

At a young age, Kiran Mazumdar decided to follow in her father’s footsteps and become the Chief Master Brewer and Managing Director at United Breweries, a famous Indian alcoholic beverages firm. She qualified as a master brewer at a top Australian university. However, upon her return to India, she found that prejudice against women in the brewing industry prevented her from working professionally in her chosen field. But this did not dissuade Mazumdar-Shaw from putting her hard-won knowledge to work. A persistent leader who never quits, Mazumdar-Shaw invested $250 to start her own firm. She founded Biocon, the biotechnology company she now heads, in a small garage in Bangalore. She applied her “knowledge of brewing and fermentation” to producing medicines. Her gamble paid off: Biocon is now Asia’s biggest biotechnology company, with worldwide sales of $712 billion. Mazumdar-Shaw is India’s richest female entrepreneur.

Subramaniam Ramadorai, Vice Chairman of Tata Consultancy Services

Tata Group, the mammoth Indian conglomerate, has a commanding presence in numerous industries, including steel, textiles, hotels, energy and IT. The Tata Group is so big that it “accounts for around 4.3% of the total value of the Bombay Stock Exchange.” Subramaniam Ramadorai is vice chairman of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). When Ramadorai became CEO of TCS in 1996, the firm had only 5,000 employees. In the interim, TCS has grown to around 130,000 employees, successfully scaling up its operations and activities. Ramadorai believes that TCS eventually can have the same breadth as IBM. One of the reasons for TCS’s success is its close-knit family mentality, a typical Indian characteristic. The Tata Group uses nearly two-thirds of its profits for philanthropy.

Kishore Lulla, CEO of Eros International

Bollywood is India’s colorful, engaging commercial response to Hollywood, home of American cinema. If Bollywood has a king, he is Kishore Lulla, CEO of Eros International, India’s leading distributor of cinema and entertainment. More than four billion people around the world love Bollywood films, and Eros, with 2,000 film titles and 5,000 music videos, keeps supplying them. Lulla believes Bollywood will catch up to its famous California rival in a decade. Discussing a head-to-head Bollywood-Hollywood match-up, Lulla said, “We sold 3.9 billion tickets in 2007 in India alone. Hollywood sold 3.1 billion in comparison.”

“Indians have a tremendous sense of dealing with diversity. We deal with it on a daily basis. Everything is complicated and we learn how to make it simple.” (Baba Kalyani)

Lulla’s father, Arjan, began distributing movies in 1977 when he noticed that Indian expats had no access to Bollywood movies. Eventually, the family moved into acquiring the rights to Indian films. Today, Kishore is “sitting on a goldmine market.” Experts predict that Bollywood will grow to a $50-$100 billion industry in 10 years’ time. Lulla, a fervent believer in Indian cinema, says, “The real competition will be between Korea, China and Bollywood” – not Hollywood.

Tulsi R. Tanti, Chairman of Suzlon Energy

As the cost of petroleum-based products continues to skyrocket along with worries about global warming, wind energy will become an increasingly popular alternative. Tulsi R. Tanti is chairman of Suzlon Energy, Asia’s largest producer of wind turbines. He runs the firm based on the premise that global warming is changing everything in his industry. “Carbon concentration in the atmosphere was 280 parts per million [ppm] at the start of industrialization and is now 387 ppm. It could touch 600 ppm by 2030 with the industrialization of India and China,” Tanti explains.

“India is like an elephant, it starts slowly but once it gets running, no one can stop it.” (Tulsi R. Tanti)

Tanti believes that his company can secure 25% of the global wind energy market by 2015. Suzlon Energy is a strong global player: With operations in 21 countries and nearly 15,000 employees, it is experiencing remarkable growth. In 2006, Tanti purchased Hansen Transmissions International NV, “the world’s second largest wind energy and industrial gearbox manufacturer” for $565 million. In 2008, Tanti purchased part of REpower of Germany in a $1.8 billion deal. Placing all his chips in the neophyte wind turbine industry, Tanti is the consummate entrepreneur, an exuberant businessman who acts with passionate fervor in all his business dealings.

Shiv Nadar, Chairman of HCL Technologies

Hindustan Computers Limited (HCL) Technologies is India’s fourth largest IT company. In 2008, BusinessWeek reported that HCL Technologies was one of the “top 5 most influential companies to watch globally.” Working with five of his colleagues, Shiv Nadar – HCL’s founder, chairman and chief strategy officer – started the company in 1976. At that time, India had 250 computers. The firm first operated out of a single room in Delhi. In 1978 – three years before IBM’s introduction of the PC – HCL developed “India’s first indigenous microchip computer.”

“We are at a defining moment that will determine the economic balance of the world in the near future. India will inevitably possess the key to global success.”

In the late 1970s, India’s socialist government forced global technology firms such as IBM out of the country. HCL moved quickly to take up the slack. Nadar’s leadership style is notable for his vision and ability to see “the big picture.” He surprised the business world when he purchased a 90% stake in Northern Ireland’s Apollo Contact Centre, reversing the trend of offshoring such operations. HCL followed up in 2008 with the purchase of Liberata Financial Services, a UK firm. HCL then competed against Infosys for the $621 million acquisition of Axon – and won.

Baba Kalyani, Chairman of Bharat Forge Limited (BFL)

BFL is one of the world’s biggest forging companies. Nearly every automobile manufactured in North America and Europe includes a BFL part. With the decline of the automotive marketplace, BFL diversified its forging operations, which now serve the “energy, railways, marine and aerospace sectors.” Baba Kalyani, chairman and managing director of BFL, is largely responsible for the increased respect consumers give the “Made in India” brand, since he had to convince global firms that India could produce high-quality products.

“The answer to the all-important question of whether these Indian companies are winning globally is a resounding yes.”

Kalyani, the Indian manufacturing king, exemplifies supreme self-confidence. In 1989, he gambled everything when he made a bold move to upgrade his Pune, Maharashtra, factory against the wishes of his family. At the time, the Indian market for forged products was sluggish. Kalyani won his gamble. The Pune facility is now “the world’s largest and most technologically advanced forging facility.” BFL displays its 2,000 different forged products at its high-tech headquarters.

Tough-Minded Businesspeople

India is most definitely on the rise. Indeed, the South Asian giant has become the “economic epicenter of the world.” In part, India can thank its bold and energetic entrepreneurs for its remarkable success. These Indian businesspeople do not concentrate solely on profits. They also focus on corporate responsibility issues such as “infrastructural improvement and alleviation of poverty.” Tarun Khanna, a professor at Harvard Business School, says they have no choice: “When you have large cases of deprivation in the backdrop, you have to be sensitive to that.” This adaptability and resilience explains why an increasing number of Indian firms are making their mark on the global stage.

About the Author

Global business strategist Vikas Pota heads Saffron Chase, a PR and government relations firm.


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India Inc.

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How India's Top Ten Business Leaders are Winning Globally

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