My Entrepreneurial Journey - Uday Singh Ahlawat

Our Indian member, Uday Singh Ahlawat , co-founding and managing Partner at Ahlawat & Associates , has shared with us his journey in entrepreneurship and answered our questions:

Uday is the co-founding and managing Partner at Ahlawat and Associates in India and heads the Corporate Commercial Practice of the firm.?

His focus areas are mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, corporate restructuring, private equity and fund formations.?

Having spent over a decade in the legal profession with some of the leading corporate law firms in India, Uday has a client portfolio which is both diverse and all-encompassing.?

He has extensive experience in transactions in various sectors and advices clients in all aspects of a transaction, starting from structuring to planning their exit strategies. Uday is a specialist in Foreign Direct Investment and has structured numerous India entry strategies for his clients.

He is currently Vice President of Interlegal International Network .

What was your key driving force to becoming a lawyer entrepreneur?

I truly believe that life will always provide you “time bound” windows of opportunities, which if you don’t pay enough attention or act quickly enough, will also go away without your ever realising how life altering that decision could ever be. These decisions will never be easy, there will never be a 100% surety to success and your appetite for risk will be put to the test like never before. But I guarantee that if you take that leap of faith in yourself, it will evolve you as a person and bring about not just success but confidence and happiness which every individual should strive for.

My career began working for some of the biggest firms in the country and I really enjoyed my work. I got married to lawyer as well, we both had careers that were on the rise, and we enjoyed going in for work and getting a nice stable income at the end of each month. I had absolutely no plan of setting up our own firm.?

My first window of opportunity – a friend’s brother approached me to take over his entire legal corporate transaction, despite my telling him to go to a firm, he wanted me to handle it. I did, but little did I realise how much that “chance” would change my entire plan for the future. I enjoyed working on my terms and in the process realised all the things that were not right about how work and clients were handled by other firms. I found it impossible to continue working for someone. So, with a lot to lose, but also a lot of support from my partners, I decided to set up my own firm and vertical!?

Did you ever have doubts about the decision you had made and what made you push towards becoming the success you are today?

My early days were full of agonising doubts about whether to carry on, pushing myself to the limit, strategizing and re-strategizing and then again some more! Another window of opportunity - when I did doubt myself in my early days, when I was pushed against the wall, and felt it would be easier to get that “assured cheque at the end of the month” than worry about all the people I am responsible for – One very important person in my life told me, hustle!! Don’t you dare stop and wouldn’t allow me to back down. And that’s exactly what I did, and there has been no looking back.

Today I can confidently say, it was all worth it. The people I have met, the countries I have travelled, the situations that I have been in, the experiences that I have had – could have never been possible without this decision.?

What kind of culture exists in your organization and was that a conscious choice?

This was actually a big reason for my starting my own firm. I wanted to create a space where irrespective of a designation a person was approachable, respected and heard. A space where you don’t burn the midnight oil to prove how hard you work, but to actually do smart work and enjoy your workspace and work so much that you don’t think of it as work!! A space where shared resources can and does lead to growth.?

We thank Uday Singh Ahlawat for taking the time to share his incredible success story and educating many aspiring entrepreneurs through his life experiences.