celebrate Clay Christensen - 2

In Tribute 1, I shared about how I got connected to Clay. In this post, I aim to share about my first meeting with Clay in 2010 which was my biggest dream at that time and in particular, about the people who helped me to realise my dream.

In 2015, I wrote an article summarising my journey through a Linkedin blog titled 'What I learnt from my MBA'. I shared about my MBA journey culminating with a job at Innosight Ventures, a business incubator/VC firm that was aimed at bringing Clay's theories into ventures in the real world. I wrote that blog for two reasons 1. to share my journey and to express my gratitude to the people who helped me 2. to challenge the people who say we need to write concisely. It was my longest post till now and it is the one that got the most views among all my articles.

I am learning intensive French now. Christophe Lestang, my amazing French teacher, is special. His teaching is very unique. He teaches context first and then, how the language evolved as a tool to help people navigate that context. From him, I am learning French culture, French history, French society, French philosophy and also, French language. He said 'In French, you need to get to the point quickly. If you use 50 words to make a point that you can deliver in five words, you will be considered rude and impolite because you are wasting my time. This is very important when you learn French'.

I am not sure whether he shared this instruction on his own or whether my wife and friends complained about my excessive talking to him, during their respective classes. It is an important skill I need to develop to ensure I respect everybody's time. Having studied in Japan, I value time immensely. BUT... BUT... I studied in Japan only for two years. For most of my formative years, I studied in the schools and roads of India. My 7th standard class had 143 students in a 'boys- only' school in Madurai. We didn't have benches to sit and so, we had to sit in the floor. The class teacher will collect 10 paise from each student and with the amount collected, he will buy a stick with which he will hit us. There were no carrots and only sticks to ensure that we stayed in line and respected the rules. We invested in the stick and we used to hit by the same stick. My teacher was entrepreneurial. You may wonder what is the point I am trying to make with this teacher example. It is for my French teacher. In the Indian roads, if you want to get from point A to point B, it is not that easy as in Japan or Switzerland. You have to navigate cars, rickshaws, buses, auto-rickshaws, scooters, bicycles, bikes, people, cows, sometimes even elephants and also, pot holes. You can now appreciate why it is not easy for me to get to the point right away. I still haven't started sharing about my first meeting with Clay and I already have written 500+ words.

I am still a beginner in French and so, I will use that as an excuse with my French teacher. I apologise in advance to you, the reader and also, to my amazing French teacher for telling a story for so long. My brother is a film maker in India and Indian films are 2.5 - 3 hrs long. But Hey! 1.2 billion people like that storytelling style. I promise that I will get better next time and will try to get better from now on in this post.

I joined Innosight Ventures on 03 July 2008. It was my dream job. When I was interviewing with Innosight in early 2008, I was also interviewing with World Economic Forum, where I ended up after my stint at Innosight. But this job was absolutely what I wanted and also, most importantly, it was because the firm was co-founded by Clayton Christensen.

The dream was made possible by two people in particular and the first one being, Hari Nair. Hari believed in me from my first interview and without him, everything would have just been a dream. I still remember the awful presentation I made in front of my colleagues at the firm's first annual retreat in Singapore. Hari must have been so disappointed because I was not an easy hire for the firm. But he believed in me and backed me to the core. Hari managed MBAs effortlessly but his ability to manage our office caretaker, Mohammed, needs one blogpost on its own. Hari is such a great manager. I learned from him on how to be creative in every situation and how to value time over money. We also share the same birthday, 02 April. Hari opened the door to my god and I am indebted to him forever.

Another amazing leader who taught my first and most powerful lesson at Innosight was Kuen Loon Ho. Kuen was Clay's student at HBS and he had a special way of completing his email. When he wrote an email, he signed off with 'Thanks, Kuen'. I found that extremely powerful and very spiritual. Every email, every problem and every work is an opportunity to serve another person. Without the other person and the problem, there is no work for us. We need to thank them. I learned this from Kuen. Since 2008, my every email will end with 'Thanks, Vijay'. You can check my email to Clay in my previous post (Tribute 1) and I would have used 'Best Regards'. I wish I had more opportunities to work with Kuen. Hopefully, at some point in time, I will be blessed with such an opportunity.

Dheeraj Batra was my caretaker at Innosight. Dheeraj was raised in the US. He had an entrepreneurial body in a consulting spine. I learned so much from him. Once, we both went to meet one of his uncles, the Head of India's top bank in the state of Andhra Pradesh. His uncle asked 'What would you like to have? Wine or Beer? My immediate answer was 'Wine'. Dheeraj then responded 'Uncle, not in front of you'. I was ashamed. Here is a guy who was raised in the US, who went to Wharton and he is being so respectful of the Indian culture. On the other hand, I was raised in Madurai and studied in Madurai all my life. I forgot my roots and started acting as if I were from some other world. Dheeraj taught me so much, especially, cultural nuances, staying close to my roots and how to be creative even in strategy.

John Boddie was another colleague who inspired me a lot. John was a force. John was fearless, boundless and endless. John had some good savings and decided to pursue an idea that took him from my birth place Palani to St.Petersburg to Singapore. He spent all his money to experiment and check whether the idea had legs. After his stint at Innosight, he went to Afghanistan with a development agency. I was not ready at that time to learn all that he was teaching all of us. Now, I experiment all the time and I owe it to John. The world is still not ready to handle his force but I truly believe that John will make a dent in this world.

Today, so many people talk and write about how to test and learn about an idea as well as experimentation. Every day there is some new literature that keeps coming on innovation. Hari, Kuen, Dheeraj, John and some of my other colleagues like Jim, Catherine and Crystal at Innosight Ventures along with the colleagues at Innosight Consulting, were the first in the world to move the needle on innovation. They dared to fail. They learned a lot and paved the first mile for innovation to become mainstream in the corporate world. I learned so much from them.

While Hari opened the door to my god, there was a priest who was able to talk between the god and his followers. Scott Anthony was Clay's favourite student. While Clay developed a great theory, it was Scott who translated the high level theory into actionable frameworks and tools on innovation. When it comes to innovation, Scott was the one who bridged the ideas flowing from Clay to the world and the ideas that were emerging from our work on the ground through his articles and books. Scott can convert an entire meeting into a slide in his small pocket book and then, publish a blog the next day. Scott has written several books and my favourite one is 'Seeing What's Next'. It is one of the finest books on strategy and foresight. Scott saw what's next for Innosight and in 10 years, he took the firm to new heights moving his base from US to PhD and sacrificing his PhD. The entire business world is benefitting from Scott's work on innovation. Recently, Scott was named as the 9th most influential management thinker by Thinkers50. Scott is one of my biggest mentors and teachers.

I still remember the day when I made the request to Scott that I wanted to meet Clay and that too at Harvard Business School. It was 2009. This was the time when Tata's Nano (1 lakh car) was released and I was going in a car along with Scott, Dheeraj and Sriram. We were discussing whether Nano would succeed. While I was very excited about Nano's prospects, Sriram (Sriramagopalan Desikan works for Facebook now and was my manager at that time) predicted that Nano would be a failure. According to him, for the same price, Indian consumers would rather buy air-conditioned 'used-cars' over Nano because 'used-cars' gave more value for money than Nano. His words became prophetic. I learned not to get overly carried away by labels and be sharp in my observations. He is one of my mentors who encourages me constantly since then.

In less than a year, Scott made my dream come true. He sent me to Harvard Business School(HBS) to meet Clay on 25 March 2010. It was a dream come true in two ways 1. I was going to meet Clay 2. I was going to HBS. I applied to only two schools for my MBA: HBS and IUJ in Japan. I came to know about Harvard only when I was working in Mumbai between 2002 - 2006. In spite of my low GMAT scores, I applied to Harvard in 2006. I still remember my admission essays. For one of the questions on learning, I had written how I learned to cycle on my own without anyone's support when I was 12 and how I learned swimming without anyone's support at 22. I thought they were good answers but they didn't find a fit or may be they thought that I was a slow learner to learn swimming at 22. The Harvard dream didn't materialise. But through Scott, my first and even bigger dream was going to come true along with the promise of HBS. Scott and my other colleagues were either Clay's students or Clay's proteges who have contributed so much to the world of innovation.

Finally, Hari Nair was the one who took me to Clay's office. Hari knew how much I worshipped Clay and he was so happy for me. I reached the door and interestingly, Hari Nair, who opened the door for me initially at the firm, was the one who actually opened the door to meet my god.

I had an opportunity to spend 90 mins with Clay Christensen at his office in HBS, my dream school. I shared with him about how I am like Ekalaiva. In Indian mythology, there is a character called Ekalaiva, who learned the art of warfare just by watching the great guru Dronacharya. Since he was not from a royal family (HBS), the guru could not teach him as per the norms of the time. But Ekalaiva learned everything by observing the guru when he used to teach the royal clan (HBS), especially his favourite student Arjuna. Clay was so humble that he was taking notes when I was sharing my perspectives. He blessed me with a copy of Innovator's Solution with some beautiful words in it.

My daughter, Midoari, is a brilliant child and she aspires to study at Harvard. Interestingly, on 25 Jan morning, when the news of Clay's departure from this world was shared by my friend Aravind, she had woken up early. I was writing an email to Clay's inbox. We both prayed to his picture and then, I sent the mail to him. With Clay's blessings, she will help to realise my Harvard dream.

In India, there is a tradition to offer Dakshana (offerings) to the guru. They call it 'Guru Dakshana'. Ekalaiva offered his thumb as an offering to his Guru. My 'Guru Dakshana' is a promise that I will stay as humble as him or even more for the rest of my life.

One of the ways I will measure my life will be through how I lived up to this promise.

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Appendix

To read the whole journey, please read in the order below

1. celebrate Clay - 3
2. celebrate Clay Christensen - 2
3. celebrate Clayton Christensen - 1
4. What I learnt from my MBA?