Balancing Objectivity with Subjectivity: Naveed Shaikh of ACS Lead Tech

Naveed Shaikh, the young and dynamic partner at ACS Lead Tech, fondly recalls his childhood conversations with elder brother Assad and says, “All we discussed was dad’s chemical business and how both of us would grow it together. In fact, while we were still at middle school, we had jointly decided that we would become engineers!”  Assad went on to qualify as a mechanical engineer while Naveed graduated as an electronics engineer. Looking back, Naveed feels that the most defining influence on him has been the easy camaraderie and trust the brothers repose in each other. “Assad always wants the very best for me and I feel the same for him. In fact, we are always fighting so that the other gets it a little easy or a little better, be it a car or a holiday.” It is this willingness to sacrifice and this readiness to put the other before oneself which has ensured that the business controlled by their strict father, has grown and diversified ever since the two brothers joined the business.

ACS Lead Tech was established by Shakir Razak Shaikh in 1983-84 and is currently recognized as a leading manufacturer, supplier and exporter of environmentally sound technologies for battery recycling, litharge red lead furnaces, red lead furnaces, lead oxide ball mills and pollution control equipment. A first generation entrepreneur, Shakir Razak Sheikh, started his career as a chemical engineer and spent eight years as an expert in lead oxide and allied products, working for various organisations. It was during his stint in Germany, while working for Napro industries, when he first decided to take up full time consultancy. Soon he found the mismatch between his precise advice and the actual implementation by his clients. He asked himself the question, “Why tell others how to make and see them create the mess? Why not make and give a perfect product to the clients?” This was the turning point in the trajectory of the Shaikh family. Shakir Razak Shaikh soon set up the one man company and took on the different roles ranging from soliciting quotations to acquiring raw material to manufacturing parts to arranging transport and labour for commissioning plants. He had re-invented himself from a consultant to a manufacturer. As the business grew, so did his responsibilities and he became almost an absentee father in the Shaikh household. Naveed, here recognizes the stellar role played by his mother in ensuring that both Naveed and Assad appreciated the hard work of their father and aspired to join him soon. Assad joined the family business immediately on his graduation while Naveed decided to accept the campus placement offer from Siemens.

Looking back, Naveed feels that his decision of not going to the USA to get a master degree was the most profound decision he had taken. Citing the examples of his cousins and friends, he says that none of them came back to India and gave up on their entrepreneurial dreams. He feels that the Family Managed Business course both he and Assad did at SP Jain, has had a defining influence on them as it set their expectations right. They understood the value of sustaining their family managed business and also understood the critical role their emotional maturity and relationship handling would play. So when Naveed decided to resign from his job and join his father and brother in the business, he knew well that he would need to create a role for himself. He knew that since ACS Lead Tech is in the core business of manufacturing machines for the chemical industry, his father and brother would always a pivotal role on account of their domain expertise in chemical and mechanical engineering. Accordingly, Naveed added a new wing to their business and started trading in chemicals and metals. He took on the role of market expansion and diversification and strengthened the core team of his father and brother by pitching in as an expert in business management.

Asked to explain the key component of a successful family managed business, Naveed is forthright in talking about the importance of communication. “It is not that we do not have disagreements, but we never push them under the carpet. We discuss everything out and always take the solution oriented approach. This helps to balance subjectivity with objectivity”, he said. As an explanation of this open communication channel, Naveed spoke of the support of their father on all issues, be it starting a new business vertical, or to invest in additional space for the growing family..  Even between the brothers, the discussions are always marked with candor. “All our finances are controlled by dad. He pays for all household expenses ranging from groceries to school fee. He ensures we never feel short of money but the control remains with him. Sometimes, it gets overwhelming but then Assad and I hear each other out and counsel each other. We understand, it is in the best interest of our business and the case rests there. For me Assad has been a father figure. He is my anchor who keeps me grounded and ensures that we always have a positive work environment”, he said. Coming to his own family, Naveed takes pride in his wife’s technical aptitude and hopes that she would soon set up her own business of technical writing. When asked about the possibility of her joining him in their family business, Naveed feels that the core team of his father, brother and himself are best suited to run ACS Lead Tech. “This is an objective decision and we intend to keep it that way”, he says signing off.

Dr Minu Mehta in collaboration with Naveed Shaikh

In the Business of Movies:the journey of Akshaye Rathi

Being in the entertainment industry is one thing, and doing business for this glamorous industry is another. Ask Akshaye Rathi, who is a film exhibitor and distributor. This young and dynamic director of family-run business, Vidarbha Exhibitors (Rathi Group of Cinemas), has enjoyed a highly successful entrepreneurial journey.

It is not easy to taste success in the world of films, where the fate is decided every Friday based on the Box Office reports. And this is where the foundation of the business plays a big part. Akshaye’s company has been involved in the business of film exhibition and distribution for more than 3 decades now.  He may have become an integral part of this business in August 2010, but the company has already been running a chain of cinemas across Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh & Chhattisgarh under the banner of Rathi Group of Cinemas.

Reasons for Joining Rathi Group of Cinemas

A family business acts like a double-edged sword for the kids in the family. With most family members involved in the same business, the kids hear about the same stuff regularly. They are either going to get excited about the opportunities that the family business provides, or get irritated with having to deal with the same business concept that they have heard all through their childhood.

In case of Akshaye, he was always in awe of the family business. It helped that he had a considerable amount of interest in movies, which went a long way in him developing a significant taste for cinema and understanding the need of the masses.

As per Akshaye, Indian movies are meant for the masses and multiplex cinema halls do not seem viable for them. He believes that while the multiplexes do provide an enhanced cinematic experience, they are not meant for the average Indians who love to clap and whistle while watching their favourite stars or movies in the cinema halls. It is the single screens that can provide such an entertaining experience for the masses at pretty affordable rates, and hence Vidarbha Exhibitors has been catering to this audience, which forms majority of the movie-viewing public in India.

According to Akshaye, he understood it pretty early that his family was in the right business, and his long term goal was always to take this business to the next level. With such clarity he mind, he first completed his BMS from HR College of Commerce & Economics, Mumbai in 2009, and then gained valuable experience as a Consultant for media and entertainment advisory services, E & Y.

Even while he was studying, Akshaye did work for Rajshri Media Pvt. Ltd. on content acquisition / management and for INX Media Pvt. Ltd. on production of TV reality shows as well as events.

Challenges Faced and Related Solutions

Akshaye was having a wonderful time at E&Y for about a year. However, the challenge for him was that his goal was to go back to his family business some day. And he didn’t wish to delay his official entry in to their family business. So, he took the plunge in 2010.

However, it wasn’t just a random move. Akshaye knew what he was doing and joined Vidarbha Exhibitors at that time, with the purpose of implementing the  family business management techniques & skills that he was going to learn from his FMB course at SP Jain, which he enrolled for during the same year.

Akshaye mentions that the design of the course helped him to take the plunge as it allowed him to learn for a while and practise the learning in real-time (for his family business) during the tenure of the course itself.   

And Akshaye came across one of the biggest challenges of a family business- the generation gap. He realized there were differences in the thinking of his father, uncle and his own. Importantly, he required to stay patient and not come across as someone who just enters the business and starts dictating terms.

Akshaye found out that being a good observer and listener during the early days proved to be a masterstroke. He gave himself enough time to not only understand the nitty-gritty of the business, but also to come to terms with the thinking of others who were associated with the business for a long period of time.

He realized that to be a successful business owner, he will first have to work at the ground level and understand the end-to-end workflow in real-time. He took his own time to prove his work and develop a sound understanding of the overall business.

Role of FMB and Value Addition to Business

In an attempt to bridge the generation gap in most family businesses, the SP Jain FMB course played a big part in helping Akshaye and his classmates realize the importance of effective communication. Communication (or lack of it) between new entrants and old timers can make or break a business. And Akshaye was able to practise this learning in real-time for Vidarbha Exhibitors.

The family business dedicated course did help Akshaye to mingle around and align his thought processes with people belonging to different industries (all family businesses). SP Jain proved to be a platform where most relevant real-time family business problems got discussed and solutions for the same were being suggested / implemented as well. Such level of networking and on-the-job learning proved highly effective in Akshaye’s journey from being a novice at Vidarbha Exhibitors, to becoming a responsible decision-maker.

As per Akshaye, his most important learning from the course was the importance of branding and brand connect for any family business. He realized that for Rathi Group of Cinemas, a strategic alliance with a known brand could make a huge difference in increasing the footfall for their single screen theatres across India. This led him to take the strategic decision of collaborating with India’s first international exhibitor, Cinepolis, in 2016.

According to this alliance, Cinepolis started operating 10 single screen theatres spread across eight cities. Akshaye termed this as a win-win partnership for both the companies, especially for Rathi Group of Cinemas, as it allowed them to look at a broader picture of the industry. This association helped his screens to be rebranded as Fun Cinemas, which is a known cinema brand in India, encouraging a shift in the context of renovation and adding amenities to properties that would eventually help in increasing footfall.

Akshaye credits this move to the learnings from course that allowed him to see the bigger picture behind associating with a brand name, and was able to get positive results almost immediately. 

Akshaye has come a long way ever since he first joined Rathi Group of Cinemas, and owes his success to the guidance he has received from his elders as well as to the enriching learning experience at SP Jain’s program for Family Business.. It goes to show that an established family business has plenty of scope to improve and expand, provided the upcoming generation is willing to learn, listen, and implement smart business strategies.

Written by Mr Tejas Savla in association with Akshaye Rathi

Bkind:The story of Vidhi Shah

 

It’s well said that when a woman decides to bring a change, she definitely does. Vidhi Shah, an entrepreneur and creative director at b:Kind not just brought a change but a cult and wave in style and fashion. b:Kind is a brand which is quite well known for womenswear, got introduced in India through M-square Clothing(India) Pvt. Ltd. The brand focuses on the quality and keeps the range quite reasonable and affordable. It launched in 2010 and Vidhi Shah joined in the later phase. She did face few struggles when she joined the company as she was very new to product development. But she eventually got familiar with the various working areas. The competitive vibe turned out to be good and challenging. She did her FMB course from SP Jain, Mumbai, which was an add on to her skills and helped her in business. She has a great sense of fashion and style with the maturity of handling the business and progressing Vidhi Shah succeeded in breaking the stereotype of a male dominant business. Her parents are her biggest inspiration and they were her main supporters during her highs and lows. She was pretty much sure of getting into the business world right from the beginning and she is happy with her decision.She happily says,”I was inclined towards business since the very beginning.”

The biggest unique selling point is the use of Indigo yarn which is not available in most of the brands. Also, the cost and quality is something that a customer would love! ”Our major focus is the quality,” Vidhi says with the confirmation in her voice. Her dedication and focus is noteworthy. Family business has its plus points and one of them is the level of understanding and that’s purely reflected by b:Kind. Vidhi Shah aims to progress more and more by bringing more to b:Kind and helping the customers and clients. Creativity has its own energy and aura.

She takes each day as an experience and learns something new. Her growth as an entrepreneur is relevant and she thinks each day helps her in this growth.  The innovation and creativity keeps on growing and blooming with great ideas. She loves the fact as to how friendly and comfortable it is to work with the team and the amount of love and support she gets is commendable. She says with an exciting tone, “We work as a happy team.” Her father played a key role in her personal and professional life. “My father is my mentor,” she says. The environment of the workplace does matter a lot and which is quite vibrant and positive around the family and that usually happens in a family managed business. She also finds herself fortunate enough to have supportive in laws. Being an Indian woman and a mother of a 14 months old kid finds a balance between personal and professional life easily. Her advice for Indian women is to set the goals and  pursue their dreams and to have faith and confidence in oneself. Vidhi Shah is truly an inspiration for the youth.

 

Written by Amrata Joshi in collaboration with Vidhi Shah

 

 

Mysore Deep and the Journey of Ankit Agarwal 

Mr. Ankit Agarwal born on 2nd July 1985 joined his family business - Mysore Deep Perfumery House (MDPH) in 2004. The company is a 25 year old group dealing in:-various products viz Agatbattis, Deodorants,Tea,Coconut Oil, Mustard & Soya Oil ,Heena cones etc.

Group MDPH has 29 Regional Sales offices and 2000 distributers in India with Head Office in Indore (MP) .Apart from leaders in domestic market it exports to over 10 countries.

He pursued Post Grad in FMB from SP Jain in 2006-2008.

Ankit decided to join the family business especially after amicable family separation in 2004-2005. It was an emotional moment for the family where he took the call to support his father.

It was during one of those meetings with suppliers one of them referred that instead of joining a full time program it would be ideal for him to join Part time MBA in FMB specially. This suggestion was further endorsed by other few alumni who happened to be his business partners. Ankit too was happy that along with fetching a degree, it would be possible for him to look after his dad and the business too. Classes happening in weekly blocks were aptly designed to create time for learning.

During the course duration, he did not find difficulty in managing time. Infact, class room learning became an interesting platform to resolve real time business problems as the group discussions were based on experiences and experiments as undertaken by others (batchmates).

He remembers Prof Advani to whom he suggested that it would be excellent if made into a single working week thereby avoiding weekend at Mumbai  and saving some family time as well.

Ankit recommends that, those keen to extend their network and utilize it for expanding existing business, must choose Customized MBA in Family Business over regular full time programs.  

Written by Prof Vandana Tripathi in collaboration with Ankit Agarwal

 

 

Graphisads and the Journey of Alok Gupta

Alok Gupta, the young director of Graphisads, speaks with maturity that belies his age. As he describes it, “Graphisads is a 4 decade old family run business started by my father Mukesh Gupta in the field of advertising and media. Our’s is a 360 degrees advertising agency and a leading outdoor advertising media owner dealing in print/electronic media, creative designing, events and exhibitions and digital media”. A second generation entrepreneur, Alok candidly appreciates his father’s wisdom in not pushing his children into their established and flourishing advertising and media business. “While growing up, I was always certain that I would never work for someone, as in a full time employment. I always knew it was business that I wanted to do. After completing my education, I immediately took the plunge by joining our family business. Not content with the work, I always wanted to start something of my own. Dad was always supportive and I started independent/ unrelated business of e-commerce/ Home Shopping, burnt my fingers, started a business of electric bikes and eventually learnt to see value in our family business. While I was never away from our traditional media business, post the failures, I joined back family business voluntarily and happily. Dad allowed me to taste failure and in hindsight I believe it is better to fail early on”, he said. Talking about his induction, Alok says,”Family business is a learning curve. Getting the tuning right with your employees and bringing new changes in the organization becomes a challenge. Whenever a young family member joins an organisation, his quick growth through the ranks is considered as a given. But in my case, I was trained in all aspects of the business, and then thrown in the deep end of the ocean to swim to save myself. Dad felt that it was necessary for me to work with and work like other employees to understand their point of view.”

Looking back at his journey of last ten years, Alok feels that the biggest challenge was communication, despite the fact that they are in the business of communication! “It is far easy to prepare market communication strategies for clients than actually communicating with father, uncles and old employees” he said laughingly. Alok’s attempts at professionalizing the work culture and setting up systems and processes was resisted and attempts were even made to drive a wedge between him and his father Mukesh Gupta. “It was Dad’s faith in me and our strong family values that helped us bring in the desired changes. Some employees took it positively and co-operated while some left us. It was tough but necessary to pave the way for a modern flexible business”, Alok said.  These changes made their team agile and flexible gave them the ability to diversify not only into allied areas like digital media, events and exhibitions but also set up new verticals in construction, waste management. Asked which business is closest to his heart, Alok says that a big drawback of small businesses is that they get emotional instead of being rational towards their business. “I am passionate about all my businesses but at the same time I am detached. The world today is dynamic and fast paced. There is no point in holding on to businesses that have so scope in future.”

Talking about the most important influences on his career, Alok cites the strong family values imbibed in his childhood and the education he received at University of Birmingham, UK and SPJAIN, Mumbai. More than the education, it was the exposure of staying independently in UK and then in Mumbai which was a great experience. He feels that his grandfather’s insistence on all the family members meeting for the Sunday lunch to be a very good family initiative that promotes sharing and discussion amongst all the branches of his family. This practice was started by his grandfather after Family Business was mutually split between Alok’s father and his two brothers into three segments consisting of outdoor media, TV production, and print media. The business had grown and the common understanding of the three brothers was that it is best to split the verticals amongst them and grow them as independent businesses. Somewhere along this, the three brothers also moved with their families to separate and bigger houses. All these happenings made his grandfather institutionalize the Sunday lunch meeting practice to ensure that the family bond remains strong. These weekly lunches ensured that the brothers and their families retained close ties and complemented each other’s business strengths. As Alok puts it, “Our grandfather started a family tradition that whole family should sit together every Sunday. Now it has been 20 years that we have been following this. Though he recently passed away, we feel that it is now our duty to carry forward his legacy and maintain the same harmony. This particular tradition has helped us create a very strong family bond internally. Every Sunday we all meet, discuss each other’s problems, business and family developments and new business opportunities”. When the government policy[1] on hoardings and billboards changed in 1997, it was this family understanding and support that helped Mukesh Gupta to shift his core business from outdoor media to print publications, which was already being handled by one of his brothers. Alok goes on to say that instead of any feeling of rivalry and competition, he and all his cousins happily pass on work to each other’s firms and pitch in to help as required. Another very important factor that has led to the second generation cousins being very close to each other is the family business course all five of them did at SPJAIN. In Alok’s words, “Because of MBA in FMB, now all of us are more or less aligned in our thought process. This is a great space to be in. Usually families get on to a self-destructive mode between 2nd and 3rd generation. Ours is just the complete opposite”. Thus the three branches from the original business started by Alok’s grandfather and his sons are now flourishing with third generation trying to step in big shoes!

Written by Dr Minu Mehta in collaboration with Alok Gupta.
AIFMB ,2016

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] http://www.cpcb.nic.in/upload/NewItems/NewItem_119_Delhi_outdoor_advt_policy2008.pdf