Amazing Bosses 7 - Mr. Satish Tandon

A tough one on where to start because I had a “destined” meeting at his home in Delhi just a few days before he suddenly passed away. Driving back to my hotel on an impulse I messaged him, and he immediately called me. He asked where I was and immediately invited me to visit his home. His first comment when I met him was “You still don’t drink, or will you have a drink?”. I spent a marvellous evening with him and his wife Dr. Mridula and for the first & last time I had a gossipy, personal relaxed chat with him and his wife. We chatted till late in the night. He spoke of his visionary plans for identifying leaders, leadership development, marketing them suitably and creating a “pull-demand” for them and placing them in high positions in industry - as a business. It was a fascinating strategy he outlined, and I was hoping to go back to him on this. But destiny played spoilsport. To get back to the beginning.

For long I knew him only by name. The only memory of him was the dapperly dressed, page 3 persona, stylish and classy to a fault – the typical Delhi Punjabi if you will – when I saw him at conferences. He was easy going, did not seem to care too much for anybody around him, relaxed to a point, where he was like the benevolent king of all he surveyed. On one occasion just as the annual conference was to begin somebody told him he was the first speaker. Those were the days when you used slide paper for presentations. He asked what the topic was and scribbled a few quick notes even as he was walking to the stage. Yet, his presentation was brilliant. To me they were like a whistle attracting corporate presentation but his ability to put his finger on the exact button, being focussed, targeted and blunt to a fault was his trademark style - extempore.

Honestly the first time I met him I didn’t like him because in my presentation when I spoke about how things happened in “South India” he openly called it bull shitting, giving excuses for not performing. I generally steered clear of him and did not know him personally till few years later my long-time boss got promoted and Mr. Satish became my boss. He brought in many changes and to my surprise retained me.

Soon after we visited Cochin together for a high-level meeting and he stayed at the Taj while I stayed in some small hotel, I was comfortable with, for my taste in food etc. At dinner he asked where I was staying, and I told him. He was a rather upset and asked how I expected to do business if I allowed my personal tastes to prevail over my official position. He curtly advised saying my job involved  meeting senior management of large companies, discussing high value contracts and if I told them where I was staying they would form their own impressions about me and my company and that could prove detrimental to business. Image is very important he said. You cannot sell a Mercedes while driving a Maruti was his mantra. I was given a curt feedback and literally ordered to change my behaviour and present the right image of the company. A year or so later when we managed to obtain a high value contract I realised the import of his advice – I had bumped into the CEO of the company at a star hotel and we exchanged cards and when my team was in a crunch situation on the contract I reached out to him and literally the same day issues were resolved, contract signed.

If any of us said we knew somebody very well he would ask – “Does he know you?”. If we said yes, he would ask – “Will he do what you tell him to do?”. The moment you hesitated he would go for the jugular and say – “Then you don’t know him”. This always intrigued me till one day we were negotiating with a client for a contract on a particular equipment and the client wanted a reference letter from a user. Unfortunately, we had supplied the exact same equipment to only one other client where it had failed. We had rectified the flaw but fact was the equipment had failed with the earlier user. When I met Mr. Satish he asked me to speak to another colleague Mr. Sandhu who he said “knew” the customer. In front of me Mr. Sandhu spoke to the client and told him that even though the equipment had failed with him, he still needed to give a letter to help me, he coaxed him in typical Delhi style and I returned with a commendation letter that helped us get the contract. His instructions to me were very clear – “2 weekends in a month are yours to enjoy, the other 2 you and your wife will socialise with top management of organisations, government and their family”

My first real brush with Mr. Satish was when I, in my ego trip, enthusiasm and desperation in 1994 finalised a prestigious contract then worth more than Rs. 10 Mil all by myself. I was on cloud 9, decided to get home early in elation when Mr. Satish called me and gave me hell for what I had done. Did not let me get a word in edgewise and for about 10 minutes kicked my butt so to speak and banged the phone down. I was shaken and bewildered. 20 minutes later he again called and harangued me before banging the phone down again. By now I was beginning to get scared. Few minutes later he again called and slaughtered me with his anger leaving me sweating and trembling. Mentally I decided that quitting was the best option.  

30 minutes later he again called and this time he was calm and friendly. He started off by saying that he was extremely proud of me, that he had a guy on his team who had the courage to take such decisions, the initiative to seize an opportunity, leadership and all that. He said – “You know I am very happy with you. I am sorry I yelled at you but let me tell you why I was so angry”. He gave me a top management “political” strategy lesson when he said – “Whatever the decision and even if you are 100% sure you are right, never ever make a decision all by yourself. Ask for a few minutes time from the customer and play the drama of talking to your seniors, other concerned colleagues, juniors so that everybody feels involved that they were a part of the decision. If not when anything goes wrong everybody will wash their hands off the project and point a finger at you. You would have made it a one man show and easily become the fall guy. I do not want to be the one standing and fighting for you with everybody else against you. That is why I was furious because this is a very prestigious contract with a very prominent client and the silliest things will get blown up into a national crisis with you in the middle”.

On another occasion I had confirmed information that a junior colleague was hobnobbing with a competitor though I had no “proof”. Mr. Satish asked for my decision and I said I would like to let him go. He asked if I had the courage to stand up to the situation because this was an embarrassment and HR could well put me under pressure to avoid it. He wanted that I fight this issue on my own and advised “If they refuse to listen tell them that you are submitting your resignation and they can choose one of the two options”. In Hindi, typical Delhi style he asked “Dum hain? (Have guts?). Before I could answer he said, “HR cannot accept your resignation without my approval which I will not give and they don’t have the guts, so stand up to what you believe is right”. I did and events happened exactly as he had predicted, and I won the day finally. One tough business year the company issued a tight cost control regimen and Mr. Satish sent a stern circular on controlling costs. I took it rather seriously and when we met got a dressing down on not having done certain things. I protested saying that he had himself issued a circular on not spending money. He didn’t skip a heartbeat as he curtly told me – “I have to show the management that I am doing my job of controlling costs by issuing that circular. You must show me you are doing your job by getting sales for which you have to spend money. The circular is not an excuse for not doing your job”

As I mentioned earlier, he was a master when it came to “Political strategy” in management and Mr. Satish taught me its importance in Leadership/ Management more than once. He taught me much in terms of human behaviour, how they react, how to “manipulate” situations by planning in advance and playing “games”. None of what he taught were negative and that is when I started realising that “Politics” was not a bad word and meant far more than what one thinks conventionally.

Thinking through the likely reactions of your juniors, seniors, colleagues, customers etc and then factoring them into decisions and actions would mean that the path would be smoother to drive on. It helps where conflicting viewpoints can be converged towards what one as a leader seeks to achieve.  He demonstrated what I had learnt in a global management training session – “Merit and competence will help you grow to become the number 2, but to be number one in any organisation, involves politics. You need to understand and play the game”. Over time this reality of “political strategy” in management has been reinforced time and again by observing, experiencing – and rarely in a negative manner though leaders can easily go rogue and end in disgrace.

Then came a time when I had a couple of career options and decided to move on from the company. I told Mr. Satish who discussed it pragmatically and once he understood my reasons he agreed and asked me what options I had. He discussed them with me and finally he suggested which option I must go for and why. Finally, he said, if you feel you made a mistake do not even hesitate and just come back to me. Rarely does a boss extend such help and even if the training style of Mr. Satish were to push you down in the deep end of the pool, you came up a stronger person.

An Amazing boss in my book with a unique style very different from all others.