Beyond basic secondary education, I believe that intent and accountability are the key qualities in any candidate in the corporate world. To start your career, it is always going to be more difficult for someone without formal education when compared with someone who has a formal education. 


Tell us about your background, journey, and upbringing.

I have the common corporate employee educational background we generally see in India – engineering and then MBA. Being the only child, my parents ensured I enjoyed a pampered childhood. I spent my formative schooling years at the boarding school of RKM Narendrapur (Kolkata), where I imbibed the qualities of adaptability & discipline. 

Post schooling, I completed my graduation in Mechanical Engineering from Jadavpur University and started my career with Ashok Leyland. As part of my first job there, I spent time in factories across Chennai, Hosur, and Alwar before internally moving to a Sourcing & Supply Chain related role.

After four years in the automobile industry, I pursued the MBA program from IIM Bangalore. And as part of my final campus placements, I landed a role with Amazon. Having no prior experience in any tech industry, I was skeptical at the beginning. However, I was able to learn the processes with everyone’s support and soon felt very comfortable in the e-commerce industry. 

I started with managing a WW service operations team, and eventually transitioned to leading different marketplace trust & safety-related programs. In 2020, I moved to Flipkart and am currently responsible for trust &safety compliance initiatives for different group companies.


How did you rise to the highest echelons and what are your future plans?

Honestly, I feel there is a long path yet ahead for me. But whatever success I have achieved was a combination of both luck as well as the ability to follow my passion. I was lucky to be in the right roles at the right time, being a part of the Indian e-commerce industry during the initial years when it was growing by leaps & bounds. 

I spent significant time early in my career in learning different processes involved across functions, shadowing people across levels. The other thing that worked for me was proactively taking accountability for my function’s responsibilities and engaging with as many stakeholders as possible, on how I can support their areas. 

This helped me ensure I have visibility to people across the organization & hierarchy. Once stakeholders started recognizing me as the go-to person for brainstorming on business problems given my overall process knowledge & systems understanding, it only required consistently being able to deliver from my end. 

I hope to continue to engage across the e-commerce industry in a similar fashion and provide thought leadership towards making online shopping every Indian’s default choice.


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What does your typical workday look like?

With work from home, my typical workday now starts slightly earlier than it used to. Since I am at the peak of my mental energy in the mornings, I try to spend time on ideating solutions to tough problems or ongoing initiatives in the first hour after I open my laptop. 

Depending on specific projects I am working on, I review the metrics dashboards and try to understand key events impacting their weekly trends. As my work involves coordinating with multiple internal teams, I spend a lot of my day attending meetings and answering emails. 

I have quite a few recurring team stand-ups and 1:1 meetings, like these. I try to take a short break post-lunch, as it helps me re-energize & focus for the rest of the day.

During the last few hours of my workday, I spend time creating presentations or documentation of key discussions during the day for future reference as well as preparation for upcoming meetings.


Several global companies have come out and thrown their support behind not needing a formal education. What is your opinion about this?

Beyond basic secondary education, I believe that intent and accountability are the key qualities in any candidate in the corporate world. To start your career, it is always going to be more difficult for someone without formal education when compared with someone who has a formal education. 

There are certain soft skills one generally imbibes when one undergoes formal education. So, someone who did not have a formal education will need to demonstrate the maturity & practical knowledge s/he has garnered through additional work experiences such as freelancing or internships. 

But once you are in the industry, maybe after just the first five years, your educational background gradually fades into oblivion, and you are only respected for the value you are adding to the business.


How do you handle someone who has lied on their resume?

Integrity is absolutely non-negotiable. If I can identify someone lying about their resume to get in a job, I will also not be able to trust that person when I need to work on a regular basis. So, whenever there are such red flags during the hiring process, I make sure the candidate knows this is the primary reason for their candidature being rejected. 

In all organizations I have been part of, candidates are interviewed by multiple interviewers to validate their profile, and once selected they also go through a detailed background verification process.


How has covid changed things at your workplace & which of these changes do you intend to make permanently?

Being in the tech industry, luckily many of us were able to continue to work from home without any serious business impact. Apart from the digitization of most processes or interactions, I believe we have become more empathetic as an
organization post the pandemic. 

Everyone understands there is a lot going on in the personal lives of others and is conscious about the same even during tight deadlines. There has also been an incremental focus on the mental & physical well-being of employees. 

These are some of the positive changes I definitely intend to follow even after the pandemic is over.

                                

What advice do you have for those starting their career and those who are eyeing the top job?

At the risk of repeating a few clichés, here are few things I want everyone starting their career to remember: 

(i) Your career is a marathon and not a sprint. So, stay patient and focused, and always focus on the long term 

(ii) Continue to learn & experiment with as many things as possible. Technology is changing and making a lot of things we never imagined possible a reality. The more different options & tools you are aware of, the chances are you will be able to solve more problems than others. 

(iii) Reflect on your output at the end of every week to see how you added value to your organization. A self-evaluation helps in ensuring you are not getting distracted by unimportant things to stay busy. 

(iv) Success is a relative concept. Do not sacrifice your happiness & peace of mind to try achieving something just to satisfy your ego.


Which is your favorite show and why?

My favorite show is ‘The Big Bang Theory. At the end of a busy day, any random episode of this series can make me laugh out loud :) I guess having nerd friends from school and college made the show more relatable for me.