Wit Wisdom and Whoop

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 dapperl...

People in general used to be in awe of her – Mrs. Lila Poonawalla or LFP as we fondly called her or Ma’am officially. As one overseas colleague said – She can walk into a hall full of people and you will find a momentary silence as everyone turns to look at her. She has presence. The first lady engineering graduate from Pune Engineering College, joined a global engineering giant in India as an engineer trainee on the shop floor, grew to become the Chairperson and MD of the company and was awarded the Padma Shri by the Govt of India. One can write a book on her. Apparently, the global management felt the Indian company had twice as many people as it needed to do the business it was doing and as with most western organisations, the suggestion was to reduce manpower. LFP said we will double the top line in 3 years and thus was born the slogan Billion Rupee Challenge. This was how I learnt of her on the day I joined the company. 3 years later she said Double Billion Rupee Challenge (DBRC...