I have always lived outside my comfort zone. Started with my father’s profession (officer in the Indian Navy), where we were in a new city every few years (new school, new friends, new environment). This continued into my professional life. With 24 years in the Consulting, IT and Engineering Outsourcing industry, I have engaged with clients in Automotive, Aerospace & Defence, Rail, Consumer Electronics, O&G, CPG and Chemical industry, across the globe. Having held leadership positions at Quest Global, Larsen & Toubro (L&T), Atos, Infosys, Tech Mahindra, I have had the privilege of defining and executing strategy, building, and leading high performance multi-cultural teams, to deliver profitable business portfolios to $150 million in annual revenue. Profit & Loss: “when you carry your own water, you realise the value of every drop”. The value of running a P&L comes when one knows the pains of generating sustainable profits to cover costs, recovering all your investments and growing a business with authenticity. A solid P&L is about accomplishing more with less, with no compromise on quality.Lateral Thinking: Most of my roles required me to develop, execute and deliver growth in industry sectors where I had no prior experience. My role at L&T is a great example where I inherited responsibility for a geography with zero revenue. We defined the GTM strategy, brought in the right people, established partnerships, and grew the business exponentially in six years. Customer Obsession: Ask the right questions. Talk to customers. Make time to find solutions to customer problems. Present one big, hairy, audacious solution to key customers every quarter. This is the path to becoming a ‘trusted advisor’.Grit: Optimism + Confidence + Creativity + Resilience = GRITEmotional Intelligence: Learnt (the hard way) the art of self-regulation, self-awareness, and empathy. Founder’s Mentality: Most successful organisations started out being fast, agile with an aversion to organisational drag. Their focus of ‘Customer Obsession’ needs simplicity and speed. As companies grow, they lose the much-needed bias for action. Have executed every role with founder’s mentality - did not shy away from conflict or accept bureaucracy, as a path to achieve the best results for customers. Courage: it takes courage to leave corporate and fuel one’s entrepreneurial spirit.