Career Track
How long at current company:
More than 12 years in the current company and over 27 years since I
began my career.
Most important career influencer:
The zeal to excel and do my best with integrity, along with the
faith bestowed on me by my seniors, has always helped and
influenced me while moving ahead in my career.
Decision I wish I could do over:
None so far as I believe that whatever happens, happens for the
best.
Vision
The next big thing for my industry will
be:
- Not just us, but every company is looking at consolidation of
operations with respect to infrastructure.
- Other powerful trends include virtualization in every possible
way and cloud computing.
- Mobile computing with handhelds, smartphones, netbooks and
gadgets like iPads will be the media to reach people in remote
areas. These can generate awareness and serve as an advertising
medium for products.
Advice for future CIOs:
- One must always plan and think ahead and befuturistic in terms
of strategies, processes and the way one works.
- Thinking big is another way of expanding operations and
respective businesses with the help of technology. CIOs must think
in a global way and look at offering services beyond geographical
boundaries.
- They must also display a strong techno-commercial and
entrepreneurial way of thinking, work intelligently with commitment
and integrity and add value beyond their existing roles.
- They must also ensure they build teams and mentor them
along.
On The Job
Top initiatives
- Ensured that all our production and creative work was done
in-house using state-of-the-art high-end machines. This resulted in
a huge amount of savings and went a long way towards building
better efficiencies. This helped us save costs for our clients as
well as our company at every stage of our operations.
- Our ERP implementation as well as CRM implementation were the
first in our industry and hence were both challenging.These
initiatives resulted in best practice operations including
controls,timelines, strategic advantage as well as retention of
some clients too.
How I measure IT effectiveness:
- This is always measured in terms of strategic and business
benefits.
- Effectiveness is measured based on whether the initiative
resulted in adding business or clients, adding value to clients and
internal users and also whether it resulted in time and cost
savings.
- An implementation will be successful, and there will be better
utility and acceptance, if there has been user involvement.
- Ultimately, everything finally comes down to cost-benefits or a
return on investments of time, money and resources.
- One must also measure IT effectiveness when users excel in
their work using technology optimally.
CIO Unplugged
Leisure activities:
Whenever time permits, I love to exercise to keep fit and
unwind.
I also enjoy doing social work.
If I weren't a CIO I would be... An
Acupressure therapist doing free and
social service. I also see myself mentoring students.