Weekend Musings: Ambition – The Power to Progress

Given the speed of growth today; it won’t be much of an exaggeration to say that technology of today, becomes the thing of the past the very next year. Out-of-the-box innovations, evolving business models, changing consumer needs makes the landscape unpredictable and it is bound to get even more so in the future. And the only way for a business to stay relevant in these changing times is to lead by pre-empting consumer needs and innovating constantly.

And the question of relevancy extends beyond businesses today. With every industry brimming with competition, employees face this question of relevancy as well. What is my contribution on a larger scale? What is my purpose in life or organization? How do I perform optimally? What is the next step for me? And as it is people who make a company and are responsible for its success, their ambitions have to be important for the organization and it is critical to help them stay relevant and aligned to organization goals.

I recently read a book by Marc Benioff, the founder and co-CEO of Salesforce - ‘Trailblazer’ which I could relate to given the challenges I face daily as the head of a diversified tech firm like Panasonic India. He speaks about many things, but from people standpoint what stood out for me – for a company to thrive in the face of the inevitable disruption, values need to be the bedrock of the company culture. And this is what he did when he started Salesforce in 1999. When values inspire an employee to do his best work every day, both the company and the person are bound to stay relevant. Values also help define organizational behavior and kind of attributes employees need to display bringing the whole culture piece together. 

From my perspective three attributes that are critical for the success of an organization are Ambition, Resilience and Humility. Today, I’ll share my views on first one of these: Ambition. Skills, resources, and bandwidth are believed to be essential to achieve every task. However, I believe ambition to be the primary requirement as it allows you to make better use of your skills and resources and overcome any unexpected challenges. No matter where you work, setting a goal and being committed to its pursuit is the only answer to success.

There have been many instances in my life wherein my ambition is what gave energy to stay focused on the purpose in life and motivated me to fight for what I believed in. Let me share one such instance with you. I was at the cusp of starting my professional life and was gunning for a job at one of the leading electronics’ company. This was the pre-job portals era and initial days of the internet so there was no comprehensive search portal and what seems mundane today like looking for information or jobs online was an effort of different proportion. As I had a specific organization in mind, I visited their offices, followed up and waited patiently for days outside their project site to meet the concerned individual. And my persistence paid off with the authorities considering me for an interview. During the interview, I was asked – ‘where do you see yourself in 5 years?’ Not really prepared for this question (though in vogue those days), it took me a minute to respond - ‘on the cover of a business magazine’. Probably it came in from one of the aspirations resting within the subconscious. I did get the job and after nearly a decade, I also did appear in a business magazine and shared the article with my interviewer. 

This goes to show that ambition, backed with the right work ethic, always leads to success. Building capability by putting in efforts every day to make yourself future-ready is the only way to stay relevant. Ambition, small or big, material or philosophical is essential and so is the journey to achieve it as it teaches you many life lessons. 

Staying relevant requires success and success requires ambition. Be it an organization or an employee, ambition can lead to opportunities, growth, and recognition. In a world where skills are readily available to be learned, ambition makes the difference between ordinary and extraordinary. 

To end, quoting from Trailblazer on mindset leaders need to expect and harness in their teams – “They want to learn, to better the world, they aren’t afraid to explore, they crave innovation and enjoy problem-solving and also giving back. They care about culture and diversity. They are trailblazers.”