The Elixir of Growth

Travelling back 13 hours from Singapore gives you lots of time for an irrelevant musing or two. One thing that strikes me about working for an Indian company is the constant talk and pursuit of growth and revenue – something which was always less of a topic of conversation in Accenture. The conclusion that I have drawn from my experience over the last year is that achieving growth basically equates to having the right number of people (typically you need to hire more people) and then you have to give them clear roles, responsibilities and the right incentives. If you get this right sized team doing what you they agree to do, then you’re pretty much on the right tracks to grow. I really don’t think it is a lot more complicated than that.

I also think it is important to recognise that this constant talk of numbers even has an effect on our clients – some of the clients I have spoken to so far are quicker to talk about needing to ensure Wipro’s growth than the Wipro people themselves, something which I always finds a tad peculiar! That said despite this relentless talk of numbers and growth, there was one introductory conversation that I had with the team last week which l will remember for a long time to come. Basically I outlined the conclusions that I had drawn from the handover with my predecessor. I also outlined three key messages which I said I would elaborate on during our upcoming town hall. When I asked one group for their reaction they said that they were happy to finally hear someone talking less about top level numbers and more about them, their careers and their long term future on the account. They said that they were relieved to hear this type of discourse, and that knowing there was a long term future for them on the account would encourage them to give even more in their day to day work as they started to feel less like visitors to Switzerland and more like real team members. And here’s me thinking that the Indian culture is more numbers than people focused. How wrong I was, and how similar people are the world over....