Best Advice: ‘Build businesses on trust, empowerment and empathy,' Capgemini's Ananth Chandramouli

What was the problem you were grappling with?

When I took up the new role, I was coming from an external organisation to lead a team that was cohesively built over a decade. In this backdrop, I was entrusted with two key goals—to accelerate the growth trajectory of the overall business and turn around a loss-making line of business (LoB).

Whom did you approach for advice and why?

I tend to hear out different perspectives before making a plan. Since I had a fundamental trust challenge to overcome, my first stop was an external HR coach. For growth, I bounced my ideas off an internal coach who had a great sense of the leadership I was inheriting. And, for the turnaround, I sought out a confidant, who helped me with deeper insights and refreshing ideas.

What was the advice you received?

The HR coach asked me to work with the team I was entrusted with, rather than augment it from my network. This subtly reinforced my confidence in them. The internal coach guided me to carve out a new LoB with a highly empowered team to focus on growth. Lastly, the confidant helped me see the root causes of the underperforming LoB.

How effective was it in resolving the problem?

Once the team started viewing me as a trustworthy and merit-driven person, truly exceptional results followed. The empowered team ensured accelerated growth of the new LoB in quick time, while the turnaround of the loss-making LoB took some more time. As I look back, it gives me immense pride to see my business become one of the most stable and fast growing in the APAC region, on the foundation of trust, empowerment, and empathy.