 "<b>Lunch with BS:</b> Phee Teik Yeoh")
India in 2016. One of the most competitive aviation markets in the world with a large number of airlines, inexplicable and unpredictable rules, high costs of operation and a potential to kill for.
Gurgaon in 2016. A chaotic suburb of the capital where life is lived in fast-forward mode. Grappling with never-ending construction, garbage dumps and traffic snarls. An economy in transition unfolding before your eyes on a daily basis.
This lethal combination has made Phee Teik Yeoh, the 48-year-old CEO of Vistara lose all his hair ever since he came to live in India and set up the new airline, which is a Tata-SIA joint venture. He's joking of course because he didn't have much hair to start his innings in India with - something I can vouch for since I met him in 2013 soon after he landed.
He chats for a while with our hostess - a pleasant, young woman from Kohima - and then when it stretches and I look suspiciously at him, he clarifies he's not in recruitment mode.
Phee Teik moved, bag and baggage but without family, to Gurgaon (now Gurugram) in 2013. It must have been the most peaceful time for him in the country because post that period things have been virtually like a roller coaster. The year 2014 was a series of seemingly endless procedures and clearances to get the airline's SOP (scheduled operator permit). Nine months of forms, forms and a few more forms and finally in December 2014 - like an early Christmas present - the airline finally received permission to fly. Vistara was clearly expecting it since it lost absolutely no time in launching its services in January 2015.
Next year, Phee Teik realised what a cakewalk 2014 had been. "While I was setting up, I thought that was the most complicated job I have ever been thrown into. I clearly had no idea because running the airline is a different ball game," he exclaims. Unlike setting up a business where you had to take a defined series of steps and you knew you'd eventually get the go-ahead, the path to profitability "is not so well defined", he says, laughing. I tell him - based on my experience with the sector - it is far more elusive than he thinks.
I ask him how working for an airline in India is different from the way it is in, say, Singapore. It's pretty different, he tells me - mainly because it's a series of firsts. It's the first time he's working and living in India; it's the first time he's set up an airline and it's the first time he's running one.
He's never seen anything like the competitiveness of the Indian market. "Air fares are on a steady decline. Price wars have a different meaning in India. They can happen bang in the middle of peak season. To add to it, the cost of operating is high so it's a double whammy in some ways but what is also starkly different from other places is that the potential of India is yet to be unleashed." Which is why, he - and SIA - is here.
So he keeps telling his colleagues and friends, "If you can conquer the Indian market, you can conquer any market in the world." A bit like driving in India - if you can drive in India, you can pretty much drive anywhere in the world.
At a personal level, being the CEO has made Phee Teik look at things from a different perspective. "Earlier, I looked at most things from a personal point of view; my own career path and what I aspired to do." For the last 24 months or so, he's been spending a lot of his time thinking about the growth and careers of others - a somewhat humbling and learning experience.
A second important lesson he has learnt is that as CEO you have to be the first to admit your mistakes. For instance, he feels, Vistara failed to read the Indian market right and paid for it in terms of low load factors as long as it offered a larger business and premium economy section. After months of grappling with the problem, the airline decided to lower the number of seats in the premium class. Instead of refusing to acknowledge he had made a mistake, Phee Teik highlights this example at every given opportunity - "just to ensure we don't make a similar mistake again". This is the culture he wants to inculcate in the company. If the CEO can admit a mistake, so can other employees.
The "young and nimble" airline also corrected its pricing strategy to be more competitive while trying to command a small premium. There's no doubt the Indian market is price-sensitive but he thinks there is a growing base of consumers who can spot value and pay a tiny premium for it. The question is whether there are enough passengers who can see value and fill the planes.
So what kind of load factor does he have now, I ask. "Can be better, can be better," he laughs. In the July-October period there is usually a lull, a challenging time for any airline. But it's better than when Vistara started. Its load factor then was almost 40 per cent lower than that of competitors. Slowly things began to look up.
What does he think of the aviation talent in India? Mind you, I tell him, it's a relatively new industry. Does he feel there is a lack of managerial or other technical talent? That's something many CEOs complain of.
Not really. He quotes a Southwest Airlines CEO, who had once said Southwest essentially operates in the service industry; it just so happens that it also has an airline to run. "If one looks at it from this point of view, I'd say one needs service-oriented people that India has in plenty." He says there is a dearth of technically skilled personnel in India - especially in view of its double-digit growth - but he often finds the ab initio staff (first-timers in the sector; Vistara has almost a 50:50 ratio of first-timers and experienced hands) very eager to pick up the ropes. Experienced hands are good to have but not "necessary" as long as you can get the team to understand the intricacies of the sector.
After Singapore, doesn't he find living in India difficult? He's alone (his wife and son are in Singapore) and has the travails of Gurgaon to contend with on a daily basis. Family is very important to him and they visit often. "Short bursts of quality time," he says, spent eating Indian food (he loves cooking and eating), which they also enjoy immensely. He's just back from a week-long holiday with his son to Hokkaido, Japan, meant to be a father-son bonding trip, something he plans to make an annual feature. He spends the next few minutes describing sea urchins and crabs - delicacies of the region. This probably explains why the food served by the airline gets rave reviews - the CEO is a complete foodie.
He looks at India philosophically. "Behind every cloud there is a silver lining"- yes, Gurgaon is chaotic and one does despair at times ("taking so many U-turns before you finally reach your destination") but the good news is things are abuzz and moving ahead. You don't feel time is standing still like you would in many Western towns and cities.
As we come to the end of our long, relaxed meal - we both skip dessert - the topic of his hair - or the lack of it - comes up again. Witty as always, Phee Teik points out that Aditya Ghosh, CEO of IndiGo, is in the same boat and Ajay Singh of SpiceJet is fast catching up.
So it probably does have something to do with running an airline in India.
Gurgaon in 2016. A chaotic suburb of the capital where life is lived in fast-forward mode. Grappling with never-ending construction, garbage dumps and traffic snarls. An economy in transition unfolding before your eyes on a daily basis.
This lethal combination has made Phee Teik Yeoh, the 48-year-old CEO of Vistara lose all his hair ever since he came to live in India and set up the new airline, which is a Tata-SIA joint venture. He's joking of course because he didn't have much hair to start his innings in India with - something I can vouch for since I met him in 2013 soon after he landed.
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We are meeting at the Westin's Eest restaurant, an Oriental and Thai food specialist. I find Phee Teik already seated when I enter. He's studied the menu and knows what he wants to order: unagi don, a Japanese dish of eel on rice. I stick to boring but high-quality green Thai curry with rice. We share a crispy vegetable dish to go with the mains.
He chats for a while with our hostess - a pleasant, young woman from Kohima - and then when it stretches and I look suspiciously at him, he clarifies he's not in recruitment mode.
Phee Teik moved, bag and baggage but without family, to Gurgaon (now Gurugram) in 2013. It must have been the most peaceful time for him in the country because post that period things have been virtually like a roller coaster. The year 2014 was a series of seemingly endless procedures and clearances to get the airline's SOP (scheduled operator permit). Nine months of forms, forms and a few more forms and finally in December 2014 - like an early Christmas present - the airline finally received permission to fly. Vistara was clearly expecting it since it lost absolutely no time in launching its services in January 2015.
Next year, Phee Teik realised what a cakewalk 2014 had been. "While I was setting up, I thought that was the most complicated job I have ever been thrown into. I clearly had no idea because running the airline is a different ball game," he exclaims. Unlike setting up a business where you had to take a defined series of steps and you knew you'd eventually get the go-ahead, the path to profitability "is not so well defined", he says, laughing. I tell him - based on my experience with the sector - it is far more elusive than he thinks.
I ask him how working for an airline in India is different from the way it is in, say, Singapore. It's pretty different, he tells me - mainly because it's a series of firsts. It's the first time he's working and living in India; it's the first time he's set up an airline and it's the first time he's running one.
He's never seen anything like the competitiveness of the Indian market. "Air fares are on a steady decline. Price wars have a different meaning in India. They can happen bang in the middle of peak season. To add to it, the cost of operating is high so it's a double whammy in some ways but what is also starkly different from other places is that the potential of India is yet to be unleashed." Which is why, he - and SIA - is here.
So he keeps telling his colleagues and friends, "If you can conquer the Indian market, you can conquer any market in the world." A bit like driving in India - if you can drive in India, you can pretty much drive anywhere in the world.
At a personal level, being the CEO has made Phee Teik look at things from a different perspective. "Earlier, I looked at most things from a personal point of view; my own career path and what I aspired to do." For the last 24 months or so, he's been spending a lot of his time thinking about the growth and careers of others - a somewhat humbling and learning experience.
A second important lesson he has learnt is that as CEO you have to be the first to admit your mistakes. For instance, he feels, Vistara failed to read the Indian market right and paid for it in terms of low load factors as long as it offered a larger business and premium economy section. After months of grappling with the problem, the airline decided to lower the number of seats in the premium class. Instead of refusing to acknowledge he had made a mistake, Phee Teik highlights this example at every given opportunity - "just to ensure we don't make a similar mistake again". This is the culture he wants to inculcate in the company. If the CEO can admit a mistake, so can other employees.
The "young and nimble" airline also corrected its pricing strategy to be more competitive while trying to command a small premium. There's no doubt the Indian market is price-sensitive but he thinks there is a growing base of consumers who can spot value and pay a tiny premium for it. The question is whether there are enough passengers who can see value and fill the planes.
So what kind of load factor does he have now, I ask. "Can be better, can be better," he laughs. In the July-October period there is usually a lull, a challenging time for any airline. But it's better than when Vistara started. Its load factor then was almost 40 per cent lower than that of competitors. Slowly things began to look up.
What does he think of the aviation talent in India? Mind you, I tell him, it's a relatively new industry. Does he feel there is a lack of managerial or other technical talent? That's something many CEOs complain of.
Not really. He quotes a Southwest Airlines CEO, who had once said Southwest essentially operates in the service industry; it just so happens that it also has an airline to run. "If one looks at it from this point of view, I'd say one needs service-oriented people that India has in plenty." He says there is a dearth of technically skilled personnel in India - especially in view of its double-digit growth - but he often finds the ab initio staff (first-timers in the sector; Vistara has almost a 50:50 ratio of first-timers and experienced hands) very eager to pick up the ropes. Experienced hands are good to have but not "necessary" as long as you can get the team to understand the intricacies of the sector.
After Singapore, doesn't he find living in India difficult? He's alone (his wife and son are in Singapore) and has the travails of Gurgaon to contend with on a daily basis. Family is very important to him and they visit often. "Short bursts of quality time," he says, spent eating Indian food (he loves cooking and eating), which they also enjoy immensely. He's just back from a week-long holiday with his son to Hokkaido, Japan, meant to be a father-son bonding trip, something he plans to make an annual feature. He spends the next few minutes describing sea urchins and crabs - delicacies of the region. This probably explains why the food served by the airline gets rave reviews - the CEO is a complete foodie.
He looks at India philosophically. "Behind every cloud there is a silver lining"- yes, Gurgaon is chaotic and one does despair at times ("taking so many U-turns before you finally reach your destination") but the good news is things are abuzz and moving ahead. You don't feel time is standing still like you would in many Western towns and cities.
As we come to the end of our long, relaxed meal - we both skip dessert - the topic of his hair - or the lack of it - comes up again. Witty as always, Phee Teik points out that Aditya Ghosh, CEO of IndiGo, is in the same boat and Ajay Singh of SpiceJet is fast catching up.
So it probably does have something to do with running an airline in India.