“The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but

that it is too low

and we reach it.” - Michelangelo

Systematic discrimination against excellence by the society laid the foundation of my early life:
Though mediocrity and complacency as diseases envelope the globe, they were legendary in my country
(India) during my formative years. I got decidedly disenchanted by the education system where “excellence”
was not even understood, let alone encouraged. To most people, standing-out, being an outlier, or pushing
boundaries was as alien as were aliens themselves. The idea that one can be unique, experiment with life,
make mistakes, fail, succeed, and thereby learn success-lessons was heretical. Life could be hell for a more
informed person―more knowledge and information meant complicity in guilt; ignorance was indeed bliss
and had a certain dignity. No school, college, or university ever tried to make one ready for the battle of
life―the most essential success ingredients: courage and risk-proneness, tough decision-making, emphatic
communication, candor, empathy, rational thought, ability to sell, flawless command of the language etc.
were avoided like plague―the only measure of success was success in the battle of grades, which were a
direct result of robotic memorizing and not of holistic understanding. India was perhaps the only country
where most Masters of English Literature could not write a grammatically correct paragraph and most Civil
Engineers could not tell the composition of concrete. This telltale apathy towards (and discrimination
against) excellence provided me with enough grist to be disillusioned by the ‘system’; I had to hoist my own
pirate flag.

Geoff Colvin rightly asks in his book Talent is overrated: why don’t most people manage businesses like
Jack Welch or Andy Grove, or play golf like Tiger Woods, or play the violin like Itzhak Perlman? Why is it
that most people aren’t awesomely, amazingly world-class at whatever they do?” Though I read this book
only in 2008, I have always been intrigued by the essence of these questions? By the time I was 18, I had a
concrete answer: India didn’t have world-class institutions of learning where uniqueness and greatness were
promoted, where being crème-de-la-crème was the norm, where mistakes and failures were not flayed,
where speaking one’s mind was not synonymous with a scandal, and where success in life (and not success
in getting grades) was the perceptible objective.

Talent / Intelligence: I have been extremely selfish in choosing the right company of people, people who
are intelligent, street-smart, ingenious, risk-prone, and witty. I thrive amidst exceptionally talented people;
being together with ambitious and talented people is pure adrenaline, always bringing out the best in me. But
until the completion of my undergraduate studies, such people were conspicuous by their sheer absence.
Desperate for such a peer group, I gropingly applied to the best Business School in Asia (The Indian
Institute of Management at Ahmedabad, India), hoping that eventually I would have the right set of people
to interact with. Although the Admission Test to the IIMs (The Common Admission Test) is considered
possibly the toughest Aptitude Test in the world, I could clear it with 100 percentile marks twice―in 1995
and once again in 2002―even without preparing for it, thanks to my lifelong investment in mathematics,
logic, English vocabulary and grammar, extensive reading, communication skills, and general knowledge.
Just to check my caliber on International tests, I also wrote the GMAT and the GRE in 1994 and scored 800 /
800 and 2400 / 2400 respectively.

The cosmic conspiracy continues: It was design; it couldn’t have been an accident. The so-called best
business school in Asia unarguably had some of the best brains in the continent but there was almost zilch
interpersonal learning; everybody was conditioned to battle for grades, grades that could open doors to the
best consulting and financial centers of the world. Even the curriculum laid no stress on leadership,
entrepreneurship, excellence, branding, raising an exceptional organization etc.―far too much emphasis was
on Quantitative Subjects. The message was clear: the school was raising efficient managers who could do
things right, not maverick leaders who could take on the world. In the first week itself, I decided to drop out.
I discussed the idea of leaving with my faculty and managed to raise hackles among one and all; mere
mention of dropping-out was preposterous for everyone around me. Everybody implied as if I were making
the most monumental mistake of the century. I was referred to the disciplinary committee, which comprised
industrialists, bureaucrats, politicians, and the school director.

I was asked the reason to leave the school. I said, “I don’t feel obliged to tell you because legally I don’t owe
any explanations at all. I am not pleading to you to admit me. I want to leave the school. And nobody within
his or her constitutional powers can force me to answer this question.” This was possibly the most shocking
thing that these eminent people had ever heard from any student. But I knew I was right. Once the dust
settled a bit, I was requested to explain my stance. I said the following points:

1. “The school doesn’t offer me what I want from a globally renowned B-School; it is a complete
anticlimax. It creates robotic managers, people who cannot run big enterprises all by themselves. The
school, by dint of its pedagogy, was making every attempt that no student could ever become the
next Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Jack Welch, or Larry Ellison.”

2. “I don’t mind making mistakes but once I realize I have done so, I never cling on to them. I take
corrective action immediately.”

3. “All my decisions depend on my gut; no matter what the reputation of the school or the social or
professional repercussions of my decision, when my heart says NO, I can’t do anything even for five
minutes. For me it is just like leaving a movie-theater in between if I don’t like the movie. Only
others think I am doing something unconventional or taking a risk. I don’t think I am doing either; I
am just following my heart.”

At this juncture, the two books that had been my forever favorites came in handy: The Fountainhead and
Positioning. The lessons from these two books have driven my professional career so far in life. Insanity
about one’s work, an attitude for excellence, strong and unconventional convictions, belief in the economic
engine, right positioning, and passionate execution can enable anyone to take on the whole world.

Professional journey: Given my passion for talented people, I decided to become an entrepreneur. In any
other corporation, nobody could have guaranteed that I would get to work with only exceptional people.
Choosing the domain didn’t prove to be a problem; it had to do with Education and Training. Some intensive
research revealed that “Improve-our-primary-education” was the most-touted panacea professed by the
intelligentsia of the country to the ‘lack-of-excellence-as-a-way-of-life’ conundrum. I have always
disagreed. Good primary education is essential; it is indeed a necessary condition but definitely not a
sufficient one for a culture of excellence. The trouble starts when people achieve just enough to manage a
comfortable existence; they just stop dreaming high―complacency enshrouds their whole existence. I
wanted to address this issue. In concrete terms, I wanted to make a difference in the following few areas:

1. I wanted more and more people to study in the best universities in the world. I started training for the
GMAT, the GRE, and the SAT; I also guided people in the final admission process. Nothing has been
more fulfilling than being instrumental in sending people to the best universities in the world. I
continue to do so even today.

2. I find a clear lack of general reading and thus a clear lack of basic-knowledge-across-subjects as
ubiquitous problems in India. To this effect, I have run various general knowledge workshops
throughout my professional career. The topics have been as wide-ranging as: Creating Great
Organizations; Global Biggies; The Biggest Corporate Failure / Turnaround Stories; Leadership and
Entrepreneurship; Global Economy Roundup; Capital Markets: The Remaking of Capitalism; Recent
Market Collapses: US Recession, Dubai Recession, European Debt Crisis; Creating Customer
Evangelists: Positioning, Branding, Marketing, and Advertising; The Dynamics of Governance;
 World History Roundup; Global Political Equations and Global Power Chessboard; Current Political
Flash-points; Modern Human; How to Tell Your Story; Different MBA Specializations and Their
Scope etc.

3. I am a personal attitude coach for success in life. I have helped over 300 people (in personal sittings)
to ‘go-out-there-and-achieve-it’.

4. I wanted people to know the ingredients for success in life. I ran two projects: one was called
“Parallel School” (one of the most ambitious school-level projects ever done in India) and the other
was called “Transcend” (for working professionals), which became a rage in North India.

5. I wanted people to become entrepreneurial (if not entrepreneurs) in their approach to life: I have run
various courses under different brand names, the latest being 5X.

6. I wanted to let people working in the other companies realize their true potential and become
entrepreneurs, in turn. Keeping this in mind, I have taken up many freelance Corporate Training
Assignments throughout my working life.

7. I wanted my thought process to reach out to people. To this effect, I have been writing on various
subjects for many years.

8. I have done four projects with McKinsey in the past as an external domain consultant in the field of
‘Public Education’ for various governments. Working with foreign governments has been an
extremely enlightening experience.

I am a hands-on leader / entrepreneur. I get involved with every aspect of my business: right from day-
to-day operations (Product Design, Training, Marketing, Advertising, Finance, HR) to Strategy,
Futuristic Roadmap, Technology etc. I must confess that I have been fairly successful in most of my
professional ventures (though not without my fair share of failures) and that my best is yet to come.

One thing you would be surprised to know about me: There have been many professional
achievements to count but of the personal achievements that I am most proud of is that I had learnt
almost the entire Oxford Advanced Learners’ Dictionary (about 55,000 out of 57,000 entries) and
Chambers English Dictionary (about 1,50,000 out of about 1,60,000 entries) by the age of 14. I still feel
that my English Vocabulary skills are the best among all my skills.

My selfish ambition: I have had a deep-rooted ambition for a long time: ‘in future, whenever I want
like-minded (intelligent, street-smart, ingenious, risk-prone, and witty) friends or colleagues, I should
bump into myriads of them. There should be no dearth of such people around me.’ This intrinsic desire
has always fueled all my professional efforts thus far in life. I hope to succeed sooner than later but the
journey has been OUTRAGEOUS FUN.