FUTURE MEMORY ARTICLE

This article is about the person most of you are familiar with. He is good at multi-tasking, be it counseling, or writing, photography, or event management, but neither of these is his profession. Magazines have called him an ad-maker par-excellence, a world-class campaign designer, and even a genius beyond comparison. However he is a philanthropist and an evangelist by nature. One of the youngest faces of the Indian ad industry, he is the CEO of Eternal Designs, and winner of many national and international awards. That person is me.

But, many of you wonder, even as you look at me in awe and amazement, as to how I have risen to the top in such quick time. Was it as easy as it looks, or did I face failures too? Was it a bumpy ride, or a walk on the path of roses? And finally, was it as ethical as it seems, or were there aberrations? I have tried to answer these questions as honestly as possible in this article. I hope these answers will give you a true picture of the happenings in the last five years of my life.

I started my career in the field of advertising with JWT, after I passed out with a diploma in marketing management from Institute of Management Technology, Ghaziabad. I joined them as Assistant Manager (Relationship and Account Management) at their Mumbai office, and, since then, rose steadily up the ranks before quitting to join Eternal Designs. I was the nationwide strategy head when I quit JWT about 8 months ago.

Since I joined, I focused on achieving excellence in every activity, big or small. However the focus on excellence was never at the cost of values and ethics. JWT has always prided itself in ethical conduct in its business, and ad-making. However, I ensured that this focus became part of the work culture there; an organizational mission at JWT within India. I was responsible for JWT not taking up many important projects, since they went against my inner value system. However, with my talent and some luck, I made up for it there, and showed how to be the best while still being uncompromising.

I started out, as the AM (RAM), but soon grew to head the department at the regional level. I took a lot of key decisions, and brought JWT a lot of new clients which helped this growth. Some of my major successful decisions included the launch of the Vodafone campaign, and the repositioning of Ford in India, both in the year 2009. However, there was also the failed Nestle campaign, which was the only major blur in my career at JWT.

My growth from the regional head (RAM) to country head (Strategy) was a matter of envy for others, and pride for me. This growth was brought about by a few factors – my innovative profit-making strategies, internal recognition by top management, and expansion of JWT. However, at no stage did I stoop low, or go back on my values. In fact, I was awarded “the most ethical businessman of the year” award, twice in a row. That was, by far, the greatest achievement of my professional life. Since childhood, I had dreamed of going up on stage and looking the world in the eye, with no regrets and no guilt. And twice, my dream came true.

Thus my growth, as phenomenal as it may seem, has never been at the cost of values, ethics and beliefs that I have held and nurtured through the years. It has been a success, built slowly and strongly, with every failure being a learning experience. Recently, I was nominated as the “MTV Ideal Idol” for today’s youth. I don’t know about being an idol, but yes, mine is a success story, which is rich in experience and learning, a story that is worth more than just reading – it’s a story worth emulating.

this article was to be submitted by me (an aspiring student manager frm IMT Ghaziabad) as part of an assignment to be used for course evaluation. this is supposed to be an article published in a leading magazine 5 years hence....

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