CORPORATE CHALLENGES
CORPORATE CHALLENGES
“Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then happy low, lie down
Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown”
These words were uttered by the title character in the famous play King Henry IV written by none other than William Shakespeare. The king is bemoaning that unlike the humble cabin boy he cannot find a moment of peace and repose due to his responsibilities.
Even though these words were spoken centuries ago yet they are so very true in the Corporate world today that those at the top of any organization are charged with major responsibilities which carry a heavy burden that makes it difficult for them to relax. And yet it is the ambition of every executive to strive hard and reach the top of the corporate ladder.
Have you ever wondered how some of the executives in a company show a meteoric rise to the top? Well, their journey is not as smooth sailing as an outsider may imagine. They have to strive hard at their job and work relentlessly to achieve sometimes seemingly impossible targets. While on his way to the top one of the most important factor to impress the management is his ability to accept the challenges thrown at him from time to time. Sometimes these challenges may have nothing to do with his current job and he may have to think out of the box to meet these challenges.
These challenges have become more difficult to achieve in the current scenario due to the unprecedented calamity which has befallen the whole world. The rapid spread of the deadly Coronavirus has resulted in severely affecting the lives of the common man and completely upset his daily routine. The sudden declaration of complete lockdown was a great shock to the corporate world and for the first few days, its affairs were in a complete mess. Slowly the corporate management realized that this lockdown is not a temporary phenomenon but was going to be a long term affair. It had to devise means to overcome this obstacle to continue to remain in business. And then thanks to the internet it came out with the novel idea of work from home. Though this was a boon to the managements it was a curse in disguise for the executives more particularly those with smaller accommodation or large families. Whereas earlier their corporate work was limited to the office time now the boss could call him any time of the day or night and fix up a meeting on the conference call. This added to the woes of the executives and presented a new vista of challenges. He had to show his commitment to work by being available all the time and present a smiling face to the boss before his laptop.
As it is well known the executive ladder in any Company is like a pyramid with several competitors at the base trying to climb the steep ladder to reach the top. This accession is full of several impediments and the one who accepts the most challenging tasks at every step of the ladder manages to reach the top. The struggle to succeed amongst the executives is quite severe and sometimes results in cut-throat competition. As the executive reaches near the top of the pyramid it gets narrow and the going gets tougher and tougher and only the fittest manage to survive and reach the summit. The fate of each participant in this race brings him to a crossroad where he has to choose the right path. There are two options before him, one which is full of difficult challenges and the other is the routine day to day job assigned to him. His whole future in the organization depends on the path that he chooses to follow in the Company.
This story is about one such executive Abhay who rose from the level of a junior law officer in the Company to reach the position of Vice President within ten years only by accepting the challenges thrown at him by the Management from time to time.
After acquiring the professional qualification of Company Secretary, Abhay was selected by a large multinational petrochemical Company as its junior law officer.
One day his boss Mr. Rathod called him and said, “Abhay the Company is contemplating to diversify its manufacturing activities and take up the manufacture of speciality chemicals preferably in a backward area to take advantage of the several incentives offered by the Government.”
He further said, “The Management has decided to form a team of executives to explore the various available sites in the backward area and take all initial steps such as the acquisition of land, water and power connection, obtaining all approvals from various authorities required for setting up the factory.”
The boss also informed him that the team will have to be located at the barren site to supervise the construction activities.
Mr. Rathod then asked, “Abhay are you willing to join this team for looking after all the administrative work for this project? I know it will be outside your regular scope of work.”
Thus fate had brought Abhay to an important crossroad in his life and his future progress in the Company depended on the path that he chooses to follow at this moment. One path led to his routine job as a law officer and he could have told his boss that he would like to remain where he was. The other path was full of unknown challenges which might lead to success or failure. This path required him to handle several different types of assignments which had no bearing on his qualifications and experience so far.
Abhay decided to take up the challenge thrown at him by the Management. He said, “Yes Mr. Rathod I am willing to take up this additional assignment.”
Mr. Rathod said, “Please think over carefully as this will involve your remaining away from the family for months. If you like you can discuss this deputation with your family.”
Abhay said, “No problem sir. I know my family will support me in taking up this venture”
This was the major turning point in Abhay’s career and his acceptance of this difficult job raised his image in the eyes of the management. He was identified as one of the High-flyers in the Company who can be groomed to take up more responsible positions in future. His meteoric rise in the Company was entirely due to his dynamic attitude of never saying no to any challenge. Since this was the first time the company was undertaking a major expansion project, the courage of the members of the initial start-up team was appreciated by the management as well as the employees of the Company.
Had Abhay refused this challenge he would have continued as a junior officer in the Company till his retirement. The acceptance of this challenge paved the way for future growth in the Company and helped him rise to the top.
The work at the new site in Lote Parshuram near Chiplun was quite tough as it was located on a barren hill and the nearest town was 25 km away. Even all the agencies whose approvals were needed to set up the project were located in different towns. The office of the factory inspectorate was located in Kolhapur, the Sales Tax office was in Ratnagiri and Central Excise office was in Satara and Pune.
One of the good habits of Abhay was that he always studied the problem in detail. While following up on power connection for the project he made himself aware of the various technical jargons.
Once he approached the MSEB officer and said, “Sir, our manufacturing process requires power continuously and in a rural area connection from a 33KV line is not quite reliable.”
MSEB officer agreed, and said, “Yes that is right but we have provided power to all industries from a 33KV feeder line.”
Abhay said, “There is a 220 KV tower near our site. Can we not get supply from that line by putting a step-down transformer?”
The officer was surprised at this suggestion and said, “Are you an electrical engineer?”
Abhay said, “No, I am the Legal officer of the company.”
The next problem was regarding water connection as the project site was on a hill and water was required to be drawn from the river in the valley and pumped up factory site.
Abhay met the concerned MIDC officer and said, “Sir, how are you going to supply water to our site.”
MIDC officer said, “There is a river in the valley which receives tailrace water from the Koyna power project. We will install submersible pumps in the river and draw the water from the river to your site.”
Abhay said, “But sometimes power project reduces the outflow of water from its power plant and the level of water in the river will go below the inlet valve of your pump and there will be a break in supply of water to our site”.
Abhay discussed the problem with the higher authorities in MIDC and convinced them to put up a regular pumping station on the river.
In this manner, Abhay was able to overcome all the difficulties and the start-up team was able to commission the project within a year.
Soon after his return from the project Mr. Rathod convened a meeting of all the officers of the department and spoke, “The Management was extremely pleased with the efforts put in by Abhay for the new project and has decided to decorate him with Outstanding Performance Award for that year.”
Soon thereafter he was promoted to the next grade of Senior Legal Officer.
One day Mr. Rathod called Abhay to his cabin and said, “Abhay Mr. Shah the Manager Legal has submitted his resignation. The management desires to entrust the responsibility of the entire Legal Department to you.”
Being a person who liked to face challenges he said, “Sir I will be very happy to accept this responsibility”
However till now he was only handling a part of the legal department and taking over the entire department meant handling several diverse matters such as Central Excise, Customs, International contracts, Trade Marks and Patent cases from filing to taking action against infringements. The Central Excise work was very demanding during those times because after every National Budget the Company was required to file Classification Lists and Price Lists of all the products manufactured by it. Abhay used to convene a meeting of the marketing executives and explain to them the various changes made in the Budget relating to the products sold by the Company and help them in preparing and filing Classification Lists and Price Lists without which the Company was unable to move its products from the factory.
By this time the Speciality chemicals business of the Company was in full swing and the products were being sold all over India through agents. The Government Inspectors would collect samples of pesticides from these agents and send them to Government Laboratories where for some flimsy reason the samples were declared substandard and prosecutions were launched against the Company in various courts all over the country. To defend these cases Abhay was required to travel to the particular town and appoint a local advocate to appear in these matters. These cases were filed in remote towns situated in UP, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab etc. As more and more cases started coming up many times Abhay had to travel for the whole week and was unable to attend to the table work in Head Office. So he had to attend the office on many Saturdays to finish the backlog. The only silver lining was when the Management in appreciation of all the hard work put in by Abhay decided to promote him as Manager – Legal.
After a few years Mr. Rathod once again called Abhay and said, “Abhay, Mr. Dias Manager Administration is retiring next month. Will it be possible to take over the administrative function of the Head Office?”
Administration of the Head Office comprising of more than 500 employees, maintenance of several flats, pool cars for management staff, canteen, domestic and foreign travel of all executives was a huge task. Initially, Abhay was a little hesitant whether he would be able to shoulder such an onerous responsibility.
But then he knew at the back of his mind that the offer was being made to him by the management to test him for a greater role in the Company in future and said, “Yes sir it will be my pleasure to accept this responsibility. I hope that I will be able to do justice to the department”
As stated earlier the workload in this department was quite heavy as it involved managing the day to day running of the Head Office. There were several sub-departments in administration such as Travel Desk for domestic and international travel of the executives, Transport department for providing local transport to the employees, reimbursement of medical claims, payment of utility bills, maintenance of Company flats, assignment of work to the lower staff etc. The commitment and dedication to work in hand were once again noticed and appreciated by the Management and Abhay was promoted as General Manager – Legal & Administration.
Another important assignment that was completely different from his routine was the management of a hospital in a village across the factory premises of the Company. This hospital was being given financial assistance by the Company. When management noticed that the hospital was not being managed properly by the local trustees the management requested Ajay to become the Chairman of the trust and take over the day to day running of the hospital.
One day when he was sitting in the hospital supervising the work Mr. Bhoir, the union leader of the employees came to him and said, “Sir the employees of the hospital are not happy with the wages paid to them and would like them to be increased.”
Abhay said, “You know this is a charitable hospital being run on a no-profit basis. There is no possibility for any increase in their wages.”
Mr. Bhoir then handed over a demand notice and said, “Sir if these demands are not accepted within 15 days the employees will be proceeding on strike.”
Abhay said, “Mr. Bhoir in that event we will have to close down the hospital and the employees will lose their jobs forever. Please do consider the financial position of the hospital and do not tell the employees to go on strike.”
However, Mr. Bhoir was adamant and warned Abhay that if the demands are not accepted, he will instruct the employees to proceed on strike.
Mr. Bhoir had not contemplated the kind of person he was dealing with.
Abhay called his staff and told them to stop all new admissions of indoor patients and only keep the OPD working. Soon one by one the patients who were getting well was discharged and at the end of 15 days, only one indoor patient was in the hospital.
On the 16th day, Mr. Bhoir came to the hospital and said, “Mr. Abhay what have you decided about the demands?”
Abhay said, “Sorry Mr. Bhoir we cannot accept your demands.”
Mr. Bhoir said, “Ok then we are going on strike from tomorrow.”
Abhay said, “You are most welcome. There is only one patient in the hospital who will be transferred to a Civil Hospital and the hospital will be closed forever”
Mr. Bhoir was shocked and never expected such a drastic step from the management.
He said, “Sir I am very sorry and I am withdrawing my strike notice immediately.”
It was a unique and different experience for Ajay and he was able to shoulder this responsibility professionally.
The Company in which Abhay was working was having collaboration with one of the most famous and reputed international Petroleum Company. It was a highly professionally managed Company with written policies for every situation in corporate management. The local Company had adopted most of these professional policies. Every head of the department had been issued with a bulky Policy Manual to guide him in his work. Even the promotions given to Abhay were not based on any favouritism or godfather but by applying the world-famous Hay & MSL formula. In this formula, the additional workload of the employee proposed to be promoted is assessed by applying several criteria and he is recommended for promotion only if he gets the required number of points enumerated under the formula for the next higher level.
Another important policy of the collaborator followed by the Company was the requirement of succession planning by all heads of departments. Under this policy, each head of the department was required to identify a promising young executive working under him who can be groomed to take over his position after his retirement.
As mentioned earlier looking at the dedication and commitment of Abhay and his willingness to accept challenging assignments he was recommended by his boss to be identified as a ‘High-flyer’. Gradually over the years, Abhay was groomed to replace the boss on his retirement and take over the responsible position of Vice President and Company Secretary of the Company. It needs to be noted that this is a very important post in every Company next to the Managing Director. A Company secretary is designated as the Principal Officer of the Company under the Companies Act and reports directly to the Board of Directors. A few years before his retirement, the boss took special permission of the Chairman to allow Abhay to attend the Board Meetings of the Company to enable him to get a feel of the working of the board and introduce him to the directors of the Company. Usually, no outsider is allowed to attend the board meeting of any Company as its proceedings are confidential.
Slowly and steadily Abhay started learning the skills required to take over the job of Company secretary. By that time he was in charge of the Legal, Secretarial and Administrative departments. He had observed the unique way by which his boss used to keep track of all pending work in each department. He had kept a small pocket diary with him with each page allocated to different departments. Every Monday he convened a meeting of all the heads of departments and noted down the pending jobs in each department. In the meeting next Monday, he enquired about the progress of the earlier pending jobs and noted down any new pending job. In this manner even though he was in charge of the Legal, Secretarial, Administrative and Personnel departments he was in full control of all that was happening in each department. Another impressive behaviour of the boss was that he always expected the head of the department to report the progress of each job and never used to nag him from time to time unless the matter was urgent. This created a bond of trust between the boss and heads of departments. Abhay decided to follow this system when he takes over this important position.
Finally, the day dawned when Abhay was promoted as Vice President Legal & Company Secretary of the Company. Though it was a proud moment for Abhay he knew very well that this position was also a crown of thorns as he was responsible for the working of several departments. During his initial tenure, he handled several important matters such as a merger with a sister Company, closing down one of the important business of the Company, handling labour matters on the closure of one of the important unit of the Company, dealing with the senior executives of one of the largest corporate entity of the country for demerger and taking over of the closed undertaking of the Company, negotiating with a foreign Company for participation in the Agrochemicals business of the Company and many other such important matters. It was a moment of great pride for Abhay to sit on the right side of the Chairman of one of the leading Industrial group of this country at every Board Meeting and Annual General Meeting.
However before Abhay could rest on his laurels of having achieved his dream of reaching the top, the world was hit by the tsunami of the Corona pandemic. The office was closed down due to a sudden declaration of lockdown in March 2020 and all work came to a standstill. But then facing new challenges and overcoming them was nothing new to Abhay. He contacted all his subordinate staff and introduced to them the idea of work from home. Even though the concept was quite new and unique his staff was very cooperative and agreed to meet over the internet on Zoom and discuss the various ways and means of taking the company forward. Initially, his staff members were quite apprehensive about working from home as they missed their daily gossips in tea time and lunchtime at the office. It was very difficult to adjust to this new concept as most of them had to also look after the needs of the family during the lockdown. But slowly and steadily Abhay took them in confidence and convinced them to get accustomed to the new format of work from home.
Thus the corporate life and experience of Abhay as enumerated in this story is a glaring example to young management executives that accepting challenges in a corporate career is very important for rising to the top of the pyramid.
–
Uday Karnik
