Two unsuccessful experiments of my career.

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After more than a decade, I quit Oracle Financial Services Software Ltd. (OFSS). OFSS was my world for a long time¹.

The urge to explore & experiment.

I was associated with the banking industry. And, in particular, the core banking & universal banking systems from its early days. I can put claim to have created many large markets and probably defined this space in emerging markets like Africa.

However, the information technology industry was evolving and newer technologies, products, and business models were disrupting this industry. Because early investors made disproportionate returns, the community of PEs, VCs, etc. was vibrant. And, in many ways, the technology industry was growing with more investments.

Because the going was so good for me at OFSS, I was more of an observer of this technology evolution and disruptive changes like cloud, mobility, etc. that the industry was experiencing. Thus, I had an urge to explore.

After making the decision to quit, I neither looked for nor entertained options, because I was prepared to experiment. And, to experience these disruptive changes, I was ready to look outside the banking systems space. Also, India was booming. And, I was confident that there would be opportunities.

It is relevant to mention that I did not quit to experiment. Rather, after making the decision, I decided to explore.

The two experiments.

Opportunities came my way as soon as it became apparent that my decision to leave OFSS was firm.

1. Incubating a software business in an IT infrastructure firm.

The discussions with the founder of the firm led me to believe that I could potentially make an impacting & longterm contribution to the business. And, this firm had investments from multiple PEs at different stages. Thereby, communicating to me the latent strength of the firm’s business fundamentals.

Thus, I decided to join this firm, even though I had moved out of the IT infrastructure space many moons ago.

However, it became clear to me within the first six months that I will not be able to make any meaningful contribution. In consultation with the founder, I formally left the firm a little after a year.

2. Chief sales officer at an information terminal firm

Here, the PE was operationally active and the founders communicated with a lot of clarity their want for the chief sales officer from outside.

Even though I had limited or no exposure to this space, I gathered that I will succeed with the right people, structure & process, right risk & reward plans, and by inculcating a strong sales culture.

Because I was starting from a zero base in most aspects, I was effective in the first 12 months. Thus, everyone, including me, was upbeat. But, the optimism changed in the next 3-6 months. And, I quickly realized that I will not be able to help this firm in their growth journey. Likewise, the founder & the PE formed the same opinion. I formally left this firm a little less than 2 years.

Why was I unsuccessful in the two experiments.

The reasons of my lack of success can be explained as below.

1. Everything about my approach was wrong.

After making the decision to quit OFSS, my idea was to take a break. I wanted to explore and understand the role of the disruptions & the ecosystem and also familiarize myself with the dynamics of the Indian market.

• Opportunities came my way as soon as it became apparent that my decision to leave OFSS was firm and I was relocating to India. And, I started entertaining them. From thereon, my state of mind was that of a job seeker. At that time, I simply did not recognize this reality. This probably was the primary reason for being unsuccessful.

• All the opportunities that came my way were from firms with PE investments. Thus, my conversations were with the PE and/or the founders. This created a misconception in me. This misconceived co-founder syndrome attitude was another good reason for being unsuccessful. In the end, both of them were nothing more than jobs.

• Both the companies had PE investments and this communicated to me the latent strength of the firm’s business fundamentals. However, the firms had their own ideas to reach the next levels.
• Equally, I did the cardinal error of not going into depth of the what (are their offerings) and the why (do their customers buy). And, I made assumptions about the state of readiness to grow to the next levels.

2. My work attitude.

• My work attitude to be effective was incorrect. I have always been an intrapreneur. I credit my career growth & successes to this attitude. But, at these companies, I was everything but an intrapreneur.

3. Expectation mis-match of high magnitude.

• Because I formed a co-founder syndrome, I had wrong ideas about the nature of my contributions to these companies. I did have extensive discussions with the founders as well as the active PE, yet I got it all wrong.
• Equally, the founders & the active PE had wrong expectations from me. They also had limited ideas on how & where to leverage me and my experiences.

4. I set myself for failure.

• I had to make an impact in the Indian market, mostly. The market dynamics had completed changed. And, it did not help that I was away from this market for more than two decades.
• I joined on-going concerns with outside investments. That was the only thing disruptive about them.
• I did not provide for the learning curve required to not only understand the businesses better but also their products & services. I assumed. And, one can easily correlate the reasons for making assumptions to my wrong approach and incorrect attitude.

This is the story of the two unsuccessful experiments of my career.

Though unsuccessful, I cherish the many lessons I learned on this journey. The lessons learned helped me pivot and improve my effectiveness substantially. And, I gained valuable experiences on this journey.

Finally, I took the planned break three years after quitting OFSS. I spent my time to incubate a start-up during this break. After 9 months of 24×7 efforts, we realized that the planned business had legal restrictions to scale. Thus, the start-up became a non-starter.

P.S. to Two unsuccessful experiments of my career.

After close to four years of experimentation, I joined 3i Infotech as their EVP & Business head – ERP in October 2015. In 2019, I became the global sales head of 3i Infotech’s IT services business. This was in addition to being the global business head of its ERP product business.

For 20+ years, I have been in the software product space. Actually, I opted to be in the software products segment. Being accountable for IT services is, thus, another experiment of my career!

P.S. to P.S.: My urges to explore have neither exhausted nor tired or expired. Who knows in the future…

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¹ My association with OFSS is from 1998. Citicorp Information Technologies Industries Limited (CITIL) was OFSS’s name then. Later, CITIL became i-flex solutions limited. I formally joined i-flex in 2001. Oracle acquired i-flex in 2005 and became Oracle Financial Services Software Ltd. (OFSS) in 2008.