All in, Just a year!

 My father used to recite me some very powerful quotes and stories when I was a Kid. One of them was the Edison’s famous story where he brushed aside his failure by saying that he knows over 1000 ways in which the Light Bulb cannot be made. In retrospect now I can understand the impact these stories had as they kept on playing in my still developing brain again and again.

Over the years, I have failed many times but have never kept a tab on the failures or successes. Somehow we are also wired to remember our successful life changing moments and forget the role failures have played.

I am not sure how the next 10 years of my life are going to play out but I found the last one year one of the most challenging ones in my adult life. For I have failed multiple times in just a year. So I thought let me just recount what really happened?

1. My venture into building a O2O e-ccommerce company, Pumpkart failed and I had to leave the project. And this was happening while we were entering into a lockdown due to Coorona (which no one in the country was aware of).
2. Planned out to work as a seller to the government organizations for certain set of products and took licence to a software providing tender details. Could not work this out because of the requirement of the tenders were too high and money was to be paid upfront as safety deposit which we were already running short. On top of it Corona happened and everything started shutting down.
3. With the advent of Corona, I tried to do some trading in medical wear like surgical masks. Got stuck with over 2500 masks as we could not sell them out even to the local suppliers as the prices fell very sharply.
4. Tried to work towards monetizing my knowledge through online speeches and lectures but was not able to build audience due to lack of proper social media strategy.
5. Tried my hand at Digital Advertising but could not move beyond a single customer as was running short of funds and was afraid to borrow more in times of Corona.
6. Started ed-tech venture along with Vikram but failed badly after a minor beginner’s luck in a few programs.
7. Tried buying leads from Indiamart to sell them or tade a few products but all the 7-8 leads failed. Could not invest any further.
8. Tried doing some consultancy with a local person Parminder Singh and help a few small MSME players get government loans. But the process was too slow and had to leave it mid way.
9. Tried some consultancy for RCED by helping one of their service providers to start selling their products online on Amazon. But again the process was too slow and had to again abandon midway.
10. Even tried to do online tutions and built a facebook profile of a company by the name MERITO. But could not generate enquiries as did not have sufficient money to invest in digital adds.

In a different time, probably my approach would have been different but in the time of Corona, I wanted instant results. I got them through Digital Advertising which helped me put some food on the table. But these flurry of failures have finally taught me that building anything would take time and is not an instant thing.

Also as I write this, we have already laid out the plan to close down our Pre-Schools to whom we gave ample time. But the idea had an execution flaw which couldn’t be overcome even with time.

So an idea needs time as well as constant improvement in the execution to remain relevant and grow. With this learning of 5 and a half year, I patiently accept my failures to now focus on building something better.

Experience is what you get when you don't succeed!

"Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. And experience is often the most valuable thing you have to offer. " - Randy Pausch

By 2019, I had spent almost 5 years trying to build a social enterprise in the education sector. Country’s education policy had changed dramatically in those years and we were unsuccessful in surmounting the execution problems in the villages. Preeti had stretched herself beyond imagination and even when she did not believe in the project, she ensured that she gives her blood and sweat to it.

While I had realized the shortcomings of the project within the first 18 months, I was too attached to the idea itself. Because I had seen it getting successful in Karnataka, I wanted to give it more time and for that reason I joined LPU in October 2016 so as to keep connected and earn bread and Butter.

But by mid 2018, when I realized that its time to move on, I started to search for more opportunities. With heavy heart, I wanted to get back to the corporate sector with eyes still on setting up a school of mine in the long run.

But it had been over 4 years since I had resigned from Staples and getting back was really tough.

One fine day I got a call from Chandigarh where the founder of Pumpkart wanted to have a conversation with me. We started to spend some time on the calls discussing his business. While nothing was too impressive, I still kept wondering the reason behind the calls. But when one day he offered me to join him, I realized that he intends to create an impressive team to take the company to the next level.

I was hesitant as I did not believe much in the idea and wanted to take time. So we agreed on me doing consulting for some time. But he was extremely persuasive. I wanted to move back to the corporate world, LPU was being managed in one of the worst possible ways, this was the only offer I had and not everything was right back at home and Preeti was struggling emotionally a lot - these were the couple of things which made me decide in favour of joining Pumpkart. The best part of Mr. Bhatia’s offer was that he wanted me as a co-founder which I sincerely thought was quite generous.

I was very clear that this company had not made much progress yet but was very impressed with Mr. Bhatia’s enthusiasm, his ability to take risk (to get me in as co-founder) and had a strong belief in my own capability in operations.

In the first 15 days at Pumpkart, I had realized the mistake I had made and I told Preeti that even a year here would be really tough but I wanted to give my best shot. With little to do in operations, I started getting engaged in almost every-thing.

But with people leaving the organization quickly, I tried to consult Mr. Bhatia but he just waved aside my advice and kept on single handedly taking decisions on manpower. With an extremely shortsightedness in hiring and firing, I realized that the longetivity of this firm is not going to be much. And by the time we entered November 2019, the sales team was reduced to merely 2 young boys in their 20s.

Still giving it all I had, I finally understood that one had to start looking out. If I had to list what was wrong with the organization, I think I can write a complete book. But instead, I have analysed my time in Pumpkart into various learnings for a startup and its founders.

Even though he was extremely unpredictable and impulsive I was able to predict his moves with extreme accuracy. Whether it was unnecessary hirings, firings, change in business model or even reduction in the pay. But once I was fully convinced that the company had no future, I finally decided to move out even when I had no future course of action laid out.

Though I had given an interview for Grofers, and they were quite positive, no confirmation had come yet. While moving into Punpkart was a risk, leaving it seemed zero risk to me.

And my last day at Pumpkart became the first day when the Lockdown in the country started due to the Corona Pandemic!

AndolanJeevi

Around 1997-98, I developed my political awakeness. And have seen two Brilliant PMs since then – Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Dr. Manmohan Singh.

While one brought in a president whose popularity cut across the various divisions of India, the other ensured that the country grew at an unprecedented rate for 10 years. Both also had their own share of mistakes too. While one could not keep its allies together, the other had his team embroiled in the biggest scams of its times.

Then came in a leader promising clean governance and growth showcasing his development model he built in his state. Soon after he got into the second term, his attitude showed a drastic difference from his first term. While in the first term, the agenda was taking the development work forward, the second term seems to be more focused on festering an irreversible social divide in the society.

A Prime Minister of this country, gets on the stage and tells his audience that “It is easy to identify people inciting violence by their CLOTHES” pointing to a specific minority. (At 3min to 3:15min in the video here)

In countering Congress, he is making veiled attacks continuously on a minority and his own party men including veteran and intelligent leaders like Piyush Goel, Law minister, Shri ravi Shankar Prasad and even Minister of State for Finance, Anurag Thakur are indulging in speeches which are violent. All this is happening with the Judiciary just watching it as a spectator and sending notices to people like Prashant Bhushan for a simple tweet questioning the conduct of the Court.

The divisive nature of the Prime Minister crossed all lines when talking in the Parliament a few days back, he coined a new name for all social activists – “Andolanjeevi”. He ensured that anyone and everyone who dares to speak against him or his government is identified and demeaned by using this word. This is being done when his government is facing the biggest protest in his regime from the Farmers.

He clearly forgot that his own political journey started as an activist, Mahatma Gandhi, Khudi Ram Bose, Deen dayal Upadhyay, Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, Subhash Chandra Bose and even Jai Prakash Narain laid the foundation of this country through continuous activism. It’s their ideology that we teach our kids to speak up when you see a wrong happening around.

Even our scriptures talk about Dharma which purely means that “A mighty must protect the weak”. Activism is in the veins of this country and by demeaning activists and activism, the Prime Minister has lost not only faith but respect across a large section of the society.

My father always taught me that Britishers had devised a successful policy to rule this country. But I had never seen it in action. This is the first time I am, in my adulthood witnessing a National Leader using “Divide and Rule” as an official policy.

Moving Forward or Stuck in Time?

 

2014 was a strange time when India got a Prime Minister who was not even considered in the race a year before. It was also a time when the World was still trying to understand the best ways to use social media to impact lives. And here we had a leader who had mastered it.

My own reading of the situation was a little confusing. 

I had seen and read many documents on the Gujarat Riots of 2002 and had followed them closely. The brutality and institutional patronage to rioters used to send shivers down my spine. And Mr. Modi was the Chief Minister then. Though there was no proof but it was common knowledge that what happened in Gujarat for 3 days was in agreement with his office.

But by 2014, Mr. Modi was riding on a wave of development which was even corroborated by a lot of friends and relatives of mine who stayed in Gujarat. I myself witnessed a lot of basic infrastructure development during my visit there in 2014. And this lead to the confusion in my mind as to what is the right representation of Mr. Modi as a leader – The Gujarat Riots or the Vibrant Gujarat!

As an entrepreneur, I am trained to think positive and I assumed that Mr. Modi would take the development agenda forward. And he also did so. 

He accepted a lot of his mistakes and corrected them. First he took Aadhar’s implementation to the desired levels and then he adopted NREGA as one of the biggest welfare schemes; both of which he had initially rejected as biggest failures of Congress.

But then he took two biggest economic decisions of Demonetization and GST implementation which left a lot of us wondering. Both these decisions had severe flaws which I again assumed would be corrected over a period of time like Mr. Modi corrected his earlier stance.

But by now we had entered into the next elections and riding on the wave of popularity he was back in the office and even I believed that it was important for him to lead again so that he can work on improving a lot of things he needs to.

But his second term seems to have given him a confidence of political immortality. The mistakes are piling and now there seems to be no reevaluation and correction of the course. And his own attitude of correcting himself has taken a backseat now.

Abolishing article 370 in J&K, Expediting the decision for Ram Mandir, CAA-NRC and then ordinances on Farm Laws are strange precedents where Law was used in a manner to appease a small section of the population. The usage is such that it can neither be called illegal nor termed as oppression. But there is no denying that the manner in which this govt has introduced and implemented these initiatives is disturbing. People are out on streets for CAA-NRC and Farm laws and the govt representatives are using all kind of expletives against them. J&K has been divided and converted into a UT and leaders been on House arrest for more than a year.

The usage of UAPA, a draconian law where there is no evidence needed to lock one up has been used freely on any and everyone. The irony is that Indian’s had opposed a similar act “Rowlatt Act” by the Britishers in 1919.

Until and Unless Mr. Modi reverts to his original practice of identifying his mistakes and improving upon them, I find that there is no way that the country is going to move forward on the path of development. 

Seems like we are witnessing the age old adage – Power corrupts and absolute Power corrupts absolutely!