The Journey So far.....

Well July 2021 marks 25 years since i started my professional life. My first job was an audit assistant at Sridhar and Santhanam. My first audit assignment was at a hospital. I hate hospitals and life had conspired to make my first workplace, a dingy basement office where i had to vouch expenses incurred. My first job paid INR 300 per month (~$ 4 per month). Wouldn't cover my fuel expenses but the learning and the experience I gained was what it was about. So i convinced myself, jealous of my well paid friends at Arthur Andersen.

The next 3 years of my "internship" were a whirlwind. I attended CA classes early morning and late evening, worked during the day at various client sites and even spent a few months on an assignment at the Shanrgi-La hotel in Jakarta where, inter alia, i also baby sat the boss' kid :-). I learnt how to manage clients, work with my colleagues, how to document findings, manage data in spreadsheets, do reconciliations and a whole lot more. I do think i got some great exposure thanks to the wonderful mentors and Leaders at S&S. The highlight for me was a physical verification of mountains of raw material at a Copper smelter. Man, that was fun. This period of my life, in retrospective, was when i worked the hardest. I had to study and work in parallel and it taught me how to manage time effectively. I sailed through my CA exams, being in the merit list in the Foundation and Intermediate stages and narrowly missing the same in my finals. I was just glad i passed given the infamous pass % for the CA exams.

Once done with CA, the conundrum was whether to go for an MBA immediately or to gain some work experience and then do an MBA. Finally decided on working for a few years before an MBA. I had always wanted to join Arthur Andersen after hearing about it from my good friend, Karthik Srinivasan. I could see the AA offices from S&S and it was where i wanted to be. I interviewed for both audit and tax roles though i had no experience in tax. Luck would have it that after multiple interview rounds and i suspect a good deal of favourable inputs from Karthik, I made it to AA. It was December 13, 1999 that i joined them. The next couple of years were great. I was surrounded by smart people and the learning was immense. It was also the first time I was in tears at work when something went wrong and the Partner shred the team for the work we had done. Don't remember the what and why now but that was quite the experience. AA taught me the importance of "referencing" a deliverable. The attention to detail. I also during the time made some great friends who i am in touch with even today. Looking back, i think AA had the best group of people i have ever worked with.

The time in Andersen made me realize that i did not want to be a tax consultant all my life. So the MBA itch started again. I made it to IIM-B, IIM-C and ISB. ISB was the new kid on the block and when i told the partner in Andersen that i was going to ISB and not IIM B or C, he basically thought i was mad. In retrospective, the riskiest decision i had taken in my life but also a great one. The ISB experience was top notch. Great professors, great infrastructure and a superb cohort. The 1 year at ISB was a daze at best. Drinking from a firehose is the best analogy. Looking back, i should probably have networked a little more than what i did. But, no regrets. Come placements, like all MBA aspirants, i went through multiple rounds of interviews at McKinsey and didn't make it. Took up a six sigma role at GE Capital with no idea of what that meant other than knowing that it was the buzz at the time and GE was a good learning ground for 6S.

The next 12 months were yet another adventure. A new city, Gurgaon. A new role and new colleagues. Met some great folks at GE Capital and learnt what being a "Black Belt" was all about. I also realized how the Corporate world takes common sense and packages jargon to create new techniques and frameworks. While GE was great, I didn't quite like Gurgaon. Post the 12 month lock in for the sign on bonus that i received, i took up an offer with HP in Chennai to play a similar Black Belt role.

HP in Chennai meant being back at home. We adopted our first pet labrador and the next chapter in my professional life started. The 1st year of HP was unremarkable. The highlight was going to HP Germany for a couple of months to help with SOX compliance. I learnt about SOX compliance just before that project. I would like to believe i added value during that stint. 1 year into the role, I was bored. 6S was over hyped. An opportunity presented itself with a new team that was being setup in HP Bangalore. It was an "Analytics" team. Back in 2004, Analytics was not as hyped as it is today. Jumped on the opportunity thanks to Prithvijit Roy who hired me as his 5th or 6th hire into the Analytics team. Worked with some great colleagues and learned how Analytics can help decision making. Grew with the team and over the next 9 years in HP played multiple roles in Analytics and Finance. Learnt a ton about managing people and stakeholders and also about the power of Analytics. Funnily enough, in the various analytics roles i played, i never once have written a line of code. In today's jargon, i guess i would have been called an Analytics translator, bridging the gap between the business and the quants. I also had the opportunity to be a part of a stellar leadership team with great Managers like Prithivijit Roy and Sriram Moorthy. I briefly left HP for 1 year between 2008 and 2009 when i chased a pot of gold and joined a smaller IT services company. It wasn't my cup of tea for various reasons and rejoined HP. In 2015, when i left HP, I was heading the Financial Analytics and Strategy team with teams in multiple geographies. Professionally, i was in a good place.

Joining Lowe's was quite by providence. I had just got off a call with the super boss where he was talking about the impending org changes at HP and immediately after, a recruiter called to ask if I would be interested in a role at Lowe's in a Director level position. I was not even looking out for a job at the time but since there was going to be a lot of changes, i sent in my CV. To be honest, i didn't know anything about Lowe's at the time. I had to google it to understand what it was all about. A few conversations later, i was made an offer which i initially declined as my parents didn't want to relocate with me to Bangalore and i was adamant that i wouldn't take the opportunity if they didn't come along. Long story short, they relented and we all moved to Bangalore in early 2015.

I am now in my 7th year here at Lowe's and its been quite the adventure so far. I have had the opportunity setup multiple teams from scratch and see an organization grow from an incubation space where i attended the interview to moving to our own office building. Have had the opportunity to work with some wonderful leaders and hire some great leaders for my teams. The culture, the opportunity to play many roles and not to mention, the people around me have kept me going. These days longevity in 1 organization is frowned upon I often wonder, what next? I have embarked on the journey to be a leadership/ executive coach and perhaps someday, i will be able to do that full time.

So, if you have had the patience to read through all of the above, I thank you for your patience. You may wonder, "So what, Vikram?". Well its just that i felt that after 25 years, i felt i should write about the journey, a mini memoir. I would love for my contacts who have been a part of this journey to share their memories and insights.