I like meeting famous people. And successful people. Like Satya Nadella. I met him at his father's residence which is getting pounded by OB Vans and mediapersons like some thunderbolt created a lava in their home in Hyderabad. I find the media attention and references to his alma mater quite banal and predictable, a typical Indian way of extolling the man or woman from all the beginnings - this is where he studied, that is where he played marbles, this is where he bought his eighteenth pair of glasses, that is where he used to hung out for vegetable cutlet and chicken biryani. What's the point? Precisely. Thats what I am asking. What's the point? It is an archaic way, an Indian way of praising the result and forgetting the effort. We cannot accept that any overnight success takes an investment of more than a handful of individuals, besides family members and institutions into the making of that individual including contribution by self. We need to talk it up like a 30-second facebook movie so it sounds dramatic - we have to say "HPS" or "Manipal University" and undermine the role of his parents, well-wishers, peers, mentors, associates, customers and even competition or for God's sake even Bill Gates into what brought him to this stage. We keep doing this everytime an Indian makes it to the apogee on world stage. We did it when Indian origin scientists won Nobel Prizes. We did it when Manoj Syamalan made it to the list of Hollywood greats. We did it when Anshu Jain or Vikram Pandit leapfrogged to the top positions in MNC Banks a few years ago. When success comes, we hunt it down to the schools and city connection. When failure stares an individual as in the case of Rajat Gupta, we blame it on the individual. Wrong way of projection.
From the coverage, it is clear we are not talking about the Microsoft culture which thrives on meritocracy and leadership. We are not talking about the business systems and the work ethic about the Americans here. We are not talking about the killer instinct of an Indian who made it to the top post by relentless hardwork, innovation and focus. Nobody is talking much about the rigorous framework of performance appraisals spread over two performance cycles over so many years in Microsoft which weeds out the inefficient people by ruthless bottom-scraping. And no, nobody talked about the importance of value-systems or parenting or the dining table conversations that the family of Nadellas used to have everyday before Satya packed off to the US. It is not just about adrenalin and alma mater or being born to an IAS officer and being married to your school sweetheart in a poetic fashion. It's about digging for a story that is not a headline story.
Everytime an Indian makes it big outside of India, we should stop looking for singularities that will make "breaking news" headlines. The way Satya Nadella got covered, many will forget his or his family's efforts sooner than making a beeline to collect tokens at HPS or Manipal University. Thats where we Indians are erring in delineating the obvious while missing the wood for the trees. The Americans, the Jews, the Mexicans, the Chinese, the british, the Latin Americans, the Africans or even the Icelanders do not go overboard as much as Indians do in celebrating individual successes and then forgetting the "DNA by design" principles that can spawn more successes.
The way TDP is canvassing Satya's success or the puerile way in which local papers cover his ascent is quite hilarious and average. No, Satya's climb to the position does not mean Gachibowli Center will become the biggest employer in AP for our unemployed youth. No, Satya's success will not mean that the school he studied from is the go-to school in India. No, Satya's position in Microsoft doesn't say anything about whether more Indians will be employed in Redmond. It is business as usual and it is meritocracy which will drive measurements of performance.
For Microsoft which has been under a cloud (pun unintended) for a while, it is still a 400-metres dash whether they will leapfrog into the huge divide that exists in the chatrooms about which are the four companies that will rule the new world, whether Microsoft will join the likes of Amazon, Google, Samsung dominating the planet or whether it will become a monolith like IBM, Cisco, Yahoo and Nokia (now part of Microsoft). Microsoft has been a company that not just made software products but changed the world of workplace that we all grew up and do. It believed in making people more productive so they could achieve their highest potential. It may have lost a lot of momentum in giving way to competition stealing a march with products that were popping out of the cubicles of Microsoftians years before - social networking, search engines, tablets, smartphones, all were thought before but dropped because of sub-optimalities that could not be finessed. But what the helll, Microsoft still generates close to $80 billion in revenues and makes an obscene cash profits that will continue even if they shelve their workforce to near zero.
It's time to recognise that culture, that ecosystem, the vision of the man Bill Gates who saw just beyond what Steve Ballmer may have typically seen like a CEO - numbers, competition and products. Its time to talk about the parenting approach of Mr BN Yugandhar and his wife - their emphasis on reading, honesty, integrity, community sharing, kindness yet incredible focus.
I met Satya for half-hour when he was visiting his parents a few years back. I didn't know he was coming. His father and I have been book-friends since 1996. It was my turn to give Naipaul's book "Letters between a father and a son" to Mr Yugandhar as he was unable to get it. I gave him the book and then he called his son and introduced me. We spoke about Hyderabad, his classmates (one of his classmates was my former boss too), Microsoft@Hyderabad, Markets, and Banks (even as I was uncomfortably weaning him away from the last topic). He was slightly over-weight but confident and convivial. He has a hearty and accentuated laughter like his father. He had his own charishma and not the slightest gait of an IAS Officer's son or a budding CEO at a company soaking him in paydirt of central bank proportions. He has since that meeting taken to ways of fitness, now heard even runs marathons and looks a generation younger and fitter than even founding fathers like Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. Its good to see an Indian like him do so well - it brings a lot of Indians out of poverty for a few days and even airlifts the cynical civil society, businesspeople, politicians, working class and glitterati into an atmosphere of patriotic groundswell. But thats not enough to sustain us to consistent glory. Especially if we are talking about points not making up the story. I wish Satya Nadella a grand debut as a CEO and all Indians at Microsoft an opportunity to play catalytic roles in future. But let all Indians take a deeper look - what do we need to do to have more Satya Nadellas in our midst thrive on a mass-scale?
