India's leading cricket broadcaster, on the importance of physical fitness and the need to know about achievers from outside traditional management cubby-holes. "To a slightly immature, slightly uncertain, but hugely enthusiastic young man from a family of academicians, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) was both terrifying and reassuring. It was terrifying because I came from what I considered a soft engineering course and found the work ethic totally alien, even scary. And it was reassuring because professors were respected and had a similar work ethic themselves.
"But IIM-A did more than just provide you a fantastic environment. It told you that you belonged, that you could survive. Many years later when people walked up to me and asked me belligerently how many Test matches I had played, IIM-A was the coat of armour I wore. My IIM-A diploma was my Test cap. It was that kind of place. I have never seen more talent in one place anywhere else. I could not have asked for more than the pride it gave me.
"So what more could IIM-A have given me? It has been said that it taught us to look for readymade solutions, to try and slot all problems into neat cubby-holes, and that can happen. A case study is meant to generate a problem-solving attitude in people but it can never replace, or indeed mirror, reality. It has also been said that IIM-A created managers who could fit into nice hierarchical work places, that it did not stimulate entrepreneurship.
"To that I will add one more. Within some of us it placed dreams of prosperity but, without overtly meaning to do so, generated a certain loathing towards getting our hands dirty. It created fine thinkers, not always equally fine do-ers; no wonder corporate India is so good at strategic thinking, not as good at execution.
"IIM-A was an excellent introduction to the pressures and the stress that seem, sadly, such an inherent part of modern work culture. But it didn't tell us how to manage stress, it didn't teach us how to relax; and I believe, in today's achieving society, you need to be able to relax hard. There is a silly romanticism about working late, about handling many projects and about being able to take the burden; as silly as the machismo that accompanies being able to handle a drink.
"That gets ingrained very early. But among the many things I have learnt from sport is the need to keep the mind fresh for a contest. A jaded, stressed mind is an under-achieving mind. They don't tell you that at management school.
"Bright young boys and girls who go to the IIMs these days are far more focused, far more willing to go the extra mile than many of us were 20 years ago. Teaching them to be driven in the pursuit of success isn't an issue anymore. Telling them that they are long-distance runners, that they need to pace themselves like a batsman scoring a double century, is an issue. Cigarettes and alcohol, cholesterol and triglycerides, fatty food and 38-inch waistlines aren't an ornament to anybody.
"Indeed, I would go so far as to teach, actually teach, the importance of physical fitness to future managers. I would teach them the importance of body language and I would exhort them to understand themselves better. The best coaches in sport do that. It would prevent an introvert from getting stuck in a high-pressure sales situation. I would open their mind to achievers from outside traditional management cubby-holes.
"They need to know what drives Sachin Tendulkar, Lance Armstrong or Tiger Woods; how Edmund Hillary conquered Everest; why Amitabh Bachchan and A R Rahman are such icons. I don't remember having my mind opened to such diverse success stories.
"I think we need to glorify honesty and perseverance in an era of such muck in public life. Business leaders have a great opportunity to do that but these are values that need to be ingrained very early. When the end counts for more than anything else, the route is often crooked.
"I would have loved a debate in classrooms on campus on ethics in business.
"I wasn't taught how to handle money. It pains me that money in various roles, whether as fees or as salaries, occupies such an overwhelming mindshare in business schools and in newspaper reporting of placements.
"Management schools build careers, not incomes; the money you make is a by-product of the success you achieve. That is why I find the Australian approach to sport one worthy of being taught.
"Australia's top sportsmen are often taught very early that the process is supreme and the result irrelevant. If you focus on the result, you lose the process and in doing so, lose your way; you get anxious, you put too much pressure on yourself. If, however, you make the process supreme, it is amazing how often the result becomes inevitable.
"I believe the relationship between the process and the result is the same as that between building a career and yearning for the pay-cheque.
"Allan Border once told me what he told young Australian cricketers, "take care of the runs and the dollars take care of themselves". I would love that line to be inscribed in every B-school.
"At Ahmedabad, we had a little course on oral communication. I wish we could have done more because as people grow in companies their communication skills become vital. Otherwise, they will be like so many of our maths teachers who could solve every problem in the book, but could only rarely teach us how to do them.
"Structuring presentations and delivering them impressively become a critical part of a manager's activities. The B-schools could do more.
"The IIMs are outstanding institutions and we must be proud of them. Their curriculum must be a "work in progress". But they can fulfil their objectives only if they are left alone to excel.
"They made me a different person, they did that to many others, but they can continue doing this only if they are allowed to. I wear my "Test cap" with enormous pride. We must ensure that every student who passes through those gates feels the same way.
