Nuggets On
early career
We live in a world of abundance of choices and that can be disconcerting and paralyzing. Leaders across fields talk about how individuals should think about some of their early career moves including the very first job that they need to think of when they graduate from an educational institution.
Committing to sports as a career
Getting into professional sport can be a “low odds” decision often. If one doesn’t have the financial buffer, it is often tempting to go towards the safer option to pursue education and get a job. Viren talks candidly about how he comes from a family with no prior sports background and how he navigated some of these questions during the points of inflection when he had to take a call.
Picking the first job after IIM
Campus placements are often a pressure cooker situation with significant sub-optimality in how students end up making career choices. Prakash discusses how one should pick the first job after campus based on some reflection on what they like doing.
Goldman Sachs versus McKinsey
High performing B School students often get courted by the top jobs in the market and often several people having to choose between Banking and Consulting. Avnish talks about how he made the decision to join Goldman Sachs after interning at McKinsey.
Career planning 2.0 for graduates
In this rapidly changing world, Ravi has three main nuggets of wisdom for graduates who are thinking about their careers and professional life ahead. How has the view of a ‘career’ changed over time and what is the best way to think about it today? What qualities should one spend time cultivating and nurturing? Hear on.
Transitioning from Engineering to Photography
A lot of us "go with the flow" either because we want to conform to expectations, minimize risk or don’t listen to our inner voice. Atul talks about how he was an exceptional student in school and ended up in UDCT - one of the most prestigious places to study Chemical Engineering. He talks about the disconnect he experienced at that point and how he moved forward from there.
IIMB, Wharton & path to Venture Investing
In a world with an exponential increase in career paths and complexity around opportunity, it can be unnerving to make key decisions around Stay in India Vs Go overseas, specialize in a field Vs Get a degree in Management etc. The multiplicity of options also makes career decisions complex when people graduate from the best of the programmes. Karthik talks about how he thought about going to Wharton after IIMB and his choice to do I Banking, Corporate Development etc till he got into Venture Investing.
Educating ourselves (and link with leadership of the future)
We are growing into a future where there are several unknown unknowns. Pramath talks about what sort of leaders would flourish in the new paradigm and how one should think about education in the context of this broad trend.
Navigating the sea of career options
"What should I do with my life" is often a question that we grapple with at different inflection points in our life. Vinita talks about the various dimensions along which she evaluates opportunities that have come her way at different points in her journey.
Building optionality during early career
Dheeraj talks about the distinction between process and substance in the context of making career choices. He also talks about how he built optionality at various points in his early career.
Message to graduating women
Anu shares her perspectives on how aspiring women leaders should think about their careers. She underscores the point about the need for having the right mentors and sponsors along the way.
Early career choices - Medical Rep/Painting/Advertising
KV Sridhar (Pops) talks about how he thought about an early fork in the road where he had to choose between disparate options in front of him. One was to become a Medical Representative which was highly lucrative in those days, Second was to become a Drawing teacher and the third was to pursue art in the world of advertising. He discusses how he walked the tightrope where the mind and heart were pulling him in different directions.
Career - getting off to a good start
Suresh talks about how serendipity got him to Hindustan Lever Limited (HLL). He speaks about initially appearing for the interview as practice for the IAS entrance but provides context on why he joined HLL eventually. He provides an interesting insight on how he thought about the trade-offs and risks at that point in time. He also speaks about how one should think about navigating their career through a large corporation during the early years where it is easy to get lost in the maze.
Joining an Indian I-Bank after a US MBA
Amit talks about how he thought about pursuing an MBA in the US. He also goes on to talk about the considerations he had when he decided to come back to India immediately after his MBA. He also talks about how he thought about Banking as a career option picked Investment Banking as a career path (as against Trading despite his strengths in quant related topics).
Overemphasizing fit in a career choice
Mouli talks about how he has made some of his early career moves based on the notion of fit. He also acknowledges that there is often an information asymmetry here and uses surrogate sources (profiles of others who have gone there and succeeded) of data as a means of determining if he would belong. He also emphasizes the criticality of focusing on learning rather than earning to drive professional growth over the long-term.
More from Chandramouli Venkatesan
Growing through the ranks at CRISIL
Roopa talks about how she drifted into CRISIL and how she was not necessarily career oriented in the early years of her professional life. She talks about the notion of focusing on excellence and on topics that are outside the realm of responsibility and how the culture at CRISIL ensured that her efforts were noticed and rewarded. She also talks about the transformative impact that one of her overseas stints had on her in terms of developing a “bird’s eye view”.
Tradeoffs by stage - post B-school, mid life, end career
Stew speaks about how the nature of the issues people grapple with varies depending on the stage of their journey. He specifically speaks about 3 points of people. 1) Point of graduation from Business School 2) Mid-life (about 15 odd years after graduation) 3) Retirement. For a longer piece around Navigating Mid-life, please see http://bit.ly/NavigatingMidLife
Choices post IIMA
Falguni speaks about how she made some early career choices post IIMA. She speaks about how she was independent in the way she went about making decisions. She also speaks about the context in which the transition from Consulting to Banking happened when she got a call from Kotak on her childrens’ 3 year birthday.
Early career choices
Venkat speaks about how he considered different possibilities for a career in “making a difference”. He speaks about briefly toying with the idea of IAS as a career option. He speaks about his summer internship with Khadi and Village Industries commission and describes the placement process which eventually leads him to accept a job at Times of India. He also speaks about his early years in Times of India and at Sony.
Educating ourselves for the future
Ashish discusses his perspectives around how we should educate ourselves for the future. He speaks about STEM versus Liberal Arts and the role each plays in informing our mental models.
Key choices along the way
35 years after graduating with a Gold Medal in IIMA, Harish speaks about how he thought about some of the key career choices that came his way including his approach during campus placements at IIMA.
Key choices in the journey
Raghu speaks about some of his choices post his undergraduate degree from IIT Madras. He speaks about how he was influenced by the times he was in and the people he came in touch with (Student Revolutions around the world, Meeting Dharampal etc). He goes on to talk about how Dharampal urged him and some of his friends to spend a decade going deep in a subject before moving on to make a difference.
More from Raghu Ananthanarayanan
Raising an independent girl child
Manjari speaks about what it takes to raise an independent girl child. We specifically touch upon the notion of ensuring that the girl makes choices that make her financially independent which in turn gives her agency.
