‘Indian CEOs can make dollar run longer’

NEW DELHI - CEOs of Indian companies can make a dollar run longer than their Western counterparts because of the spirit of frugality with which they have been brought up, says a top India-born US-based recruiter of corporate honchos for Global 2000 companies.

“The CEOs in Indian companies grow up to work with constraints and are able to optimise their operations more than their counterparts in US and UK. They can make the dollar run many more miles than CEOs in the West,” Cleveland-based Umesh Ramakrishnan, vice chairman of global executive search firm CTPartners, told IANS in a telephone interview.

He was in Bangalore - the city where he grew up - to promote his new book. Ramakrishnan is a widely quoted expert in the global business media. He is one of the top international recruiters of CEOs, CFOs, COOs, directors and other senior managers.

As for the Indian corporate work force, Ramakrishnan gives them “eight on a scale of 10″.

“Indian executives have a strong foundation, skill set and are competitive. They only need a bit of a polish,” he said. One of the reasons, he feels, is because the business schools in India are on a par with the West.

Ramakrishnan’s new book, “There is No Elevator to the Top”, has been published by the Penguin-Books India in June. It compiles the success stories of CEOs of top companies like Cadbury, Schweppes, Coca-Cola, Charles Schwab, Starbucks, Dell and Fidelity and a dozen other companies based on one-on-one interactions between the writer and corporate leaders.

The leaders share their strategies, credos and insights into what distinguishes the business people who climb the highest. He uses anecdotes from the lives of former CEOs Steve Reinemund of Pepsico and Bill Amelio of Lenovo.

“The vanilla five (qualities) that make a successful corporate leader is if you can make somebody do something that they originally did not want to do, but do it happily in the end. Then you are a true leader.

“Good listeners make terrific leaders and the ability to communicate a complex message in a simple fashion which can be understood by workers both at the top and the bottom is a sign of good leadership,” Ramakrishnan said.

The two other traits, said Ramakrishnan, which a good CEO must have are the ability to decide quickly - based on gut and analysis - and the spunk to take tough decisions in an environment of downturn even if it means “sacrificing a sacred cow in an organisation you head”.

“One must have the ability to turn around and fire his best friend,” said the management expert. “It applies to India also,” he said.

Credible experience is another important criterion for leadership.

“The Indian worker needs to respect the individual/boss for what the person has done in the relevant field. If you are to lead a marketing team you must have 15-20 years of relevant experience in marketing and not 30 years in HRD. In that case, the years don’t matter, but the experience does,” the management guru explained.

But one need not always have a business degree to go the top. “One can learn the right things from the men on top. That’s one of the reasons why I wrote the book. You can learn from anyone. When I went to interview Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw of Biocon, I was impressed by her assistant who kept me engaged. I was inspired,” Ramakrishnan said.

The corporate guru’s magic mantra for success in a cutthroat MNC ambience where companies relentlessly push their brands is a line that Jim Donald, the former CEO for Starbucks, told him.

“Donald told me that when he went to work for Sam Walton, the founder of Wal-Mart, he realised ‘one should never grow bigger than the front line’. It is the most brilliant line I have ever heard,” Ramakrishnan said.

(Madhusree Chatterjee can be contacted at madhu.c@ians.in)