A big, big thank you for all the kind words. A big thank you to Rotary and all of you here.
A big, big thank you for all the kind words. A big thank you to Rotary and all of you here. Thank you so much, Sir. Thank you to the Jain family for bestowing me with such an honour. I am feeling very overwhelmed at the moment. I don’t know if I’ve done enough to deserve this yet, but it truly means so, so much to me. Today is also extremely special for me because all of my favourite people are in one room, which is very rare because everyone is so busy and has such crazy travel schedules. So, my parents are here. My grandmom is here.
The Rotary family and my family, we go back so many generations and my grand mom has done some work with polio. My dad, my mom, my grandmom, and then I have my best friends here: Akshita, Anshrita, Anushka, Kausar as well, and without whom none of this would have been possible.
The little that I have done so far at the age of 38, I would have been nowhere without any of your support. So this one is for my family, for all of you, and for my best friends and my team. Thank you so very much. It truly means a lot to me, especially coming from people who have done such inspiring work. Saving lives is the highest form of giving back, which is then the highest form of getting.
And I am very, very inspired and I feel very humbled that all of you thought that I was deserving of this. So, thank you so very much again and a big thank you to my family and my best friends who are also family to me. None of this would have been possible without any of you. Love you all so much.
I just wanted to add that sitting here on the stage with my family, my parents, and my grandmom down, was very, very awkward. So if I was fidgety, looking a bit red in the face, it’s just because I’m not used to it and I don’t want to ever get used to it. It’s a horrible feeling. I much, much rather have it the other way around, always and forever, so yeah.
Rotarians Ask
You come from a very illustrious industrial lineage of this country, and I guess you’re taking the baton forward. I just wanted to ask. I believe you also ventured into the restaurant space with Hakkasan and Yauatcha; what are your plans in that area?
So, actually I think I would like say something from my heart and you know it’s that I think it’s myself, my brother and my sister, hopefully, all three of us would be taking this, taking the legacy forward in our own ways. And all the hard work that’s gone behind Jolie’s, Hakkasan, all the restaurants, is all my brother. I have nothing to do with it, and I think my father also doesn’t have much to do with it. It’s all my brother who is studying very, very hard at Harvard and is going to be graduating soon. I don’t know much about the restaurant business. I’m a very homebody, so I can’t imagine setting up a restaurant like the way he has. The only restaurant I go to is his restaurant. And then, of course, special events like this, if we come out. So, it’s all my brother, it’s all my brother.
You have successfully blended businesses, music and social impact. How do you decide where to focus your energy and what drives you to keep pushing boundaries in such diverse fields? And also, as a young entrepreneur leading the Birla legacy, how do you balance innovation with tradition while scaling your ventures in today’s fast changing market?
Thank you so much. 2 two different questions and hard ones. The first one was, I think, more about priorities and time management, something that I am not very good at, but I am learning. I think I have a fantastic team; across the board, I have fantastic teams and that really, really helps.
When it comes to starting up, there are different stages. So, of course, during putting the team together and having the vision in place and all of that, you know I have to be completely focussed on that particular venture or two or three that are happening at that time. However, after that, once the business is up and running, I try to solve a problem a week per company. So that’s how I sort of… So if you think about it, 52 weeks in a year, right? So I try to solve 52 problems a year for each company and that’s how I go about prioritising depending upon which company needs what from me.
My goal also and this is still part of your first question, is that everything should run very, very smoothly without me being there as well. So it’s about empowering my team, it’s about delegating because I don’t what’s going to happen tomorrow and what I’m building, I hope will last hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years, much beyond any of our – my life, for sure.
So, the goal is to build things that last and have a lasting impact without me, so empowering my teams. And yeah, just it’s about problem solving and trying to see with putting in less and getting more. How do we just increase our ROI by putting in as less possible in terms of time, in terms of resources, being as efficient as possible, that’s the first part; I hope I was able to answer that.
The second part of the question, I can only hope and pray that all the work that I’m doing and that I hope that I will continue to do, has a positive impact on the legacy.
I’m extremely grateful that I have very, very supportive parents, grandmom and best friends and a team. I think, the balance is very important, like you mentioned, of knowing when to take a step back, because I do realise that I have a lot more to learn and there are people in the room who are way, way, way more experienced that I am. So, when to so to hear everyone out. But to make sure that I speak my truth and give my opinion, regardless of whether I think that may be right or wrong. So, I try to keep judgment out of it because I think it’s my duty to say to give my piece, and then regardless of the answer that I get back in a boardroom, it’s again to take it without judgment, it’s not personal.
And just to keep learning, I think that’s really important is just to keep learning. And I have such amazing role models in front of me. So, it’s a daily process. And I think one more thing I do is I try to approach everyday with a beginner’s mindset so, I don’t know anything and that’s where I start. I like to ask questions, I like to learn and I always, always, always get people on board who think are much smarter than me, because that’s the point of having a good team according to me. Thank you.
It would be wonderful to know a little bit about the ventures that you’re involved with and some of the work that you’re doing. So, if you could share that with us.
Yeah, Svatantra is was a pure play microfinance company when I started it at 17, I’m now 30. We are the second largest now in the country, just behind Grameen Koota. Our total disbursements since inception has touched about 50,000 crores, 45 million lives touched. The idea behind Svatantra, I think it’s very important to have a why, for me personally, behind each… Behind what I do. I realise that as soon as you make a woman financially independent, she can have a happier life, a free-flowing life, and she’s not dependent on anyone around her. And men as well. It’s just that in microfinance the model is tried and tested with women, so I thought I shouldn’t really… I tried to lend to men as well, but it didn’t work out, so I was like I should not try to reinvent everything.
So that was the idea behind Svatantra and kudos to my team. For us, it was a huge acquisition. And the team size and the AUM size doubled overnight. The team was very mature. They handled it really well and I think it came at the right time, funnily, because the microfinance industry hit a really bad slump. We are the only ones – if I’m allowed to say so, and I say this with a lot of pride because it’s all my team’s hard work – that we’re still standing tall, we’re still very profitable through it all.
Our collections, you know, have taken a little bit of a hit, but nothing compared to the industry and that goes to show, also, that hopefully our customer feels a part of the Svatantra family and I think that’s the biggest achievement that I could I could have. That’s a little bit about Svatantra.
Ikai Asai is a very small niche design brand that I’ve started. It’s handmade Indian handmade for the 21st century household. And it’s more B2B at this stage. So that’s Ikai Asai.
I started ABF (Ananya Birla Foundation) during the pandemic. I was stuck in LA, my family was back here. I felt a lot of guilt for being away because there was so much suffering in India and LA, literally, it was like a holiday. And that guilt really bogged me down and I said that it’s time that I want to do something. And attaching my name to that was very, very embarrassing for me. But after a lot of thought, I said that I’m not so profound as to not want to leave a legacy behind. I do want to leave a legacy behind and that’s of change of being on the side of solution. And so, at ABF we work with daughters of sex workers to prisoners; it’s all about giving voice to the voiceless, and with animals, with the LGBTQ community, with people who have severe mental health disabilities. I truly believe in equality, and I think everyone deserves a chance. I’m born in a lot of privilege and I think that it is my duty to give back whatever little I can. So that’s ABF.
Recently launched Contraband, which is a perfume brand. We have 3 new fragrances coming in in two months. You can think of us as a discounted Hugo Boss. Our competitor is… they are slightly cheaper than us in terms of cost – Titan’s Skinn. So Contraband has actually done really well so far. Now time will tell; we’re introducing 50MLs and 100MLs very soon. We’re launching a pure-play cosmetic colour brand very soon and the idea is to take up 3 to 5% of market share. That’s a huge target and a mission in mind, but I truly believe in product and I believe in the brand and the story that we are trying to sell. So that’s a little bit about what I do. Of course, Papa has been kind enough to put his children on the Board of some of our main companies. I am on the Board and I don’t think I can contribute. There are many, many senior people who already know what they’re doing much better than me. This is more about me learning at this stage.
Birla Estates is something that I’m involved in. I cofounded Mpower with mother, but now she handles it entirely herself. I don’t have much to do with that anymore. She’s just got that done amazingly well, so that’s a little bit. And then, of course, music. Sorry, it’s like I’m giving my resume. So that’s what I do.
Apart from the family who’s here, whom you have drawn inspiration as an individual leader? And how would you describe your leadership style and what do you say today to future leaders, young leaders? What’s your advice to them.
I think leadership style I’ll have to ask my team. What my leadership style is, I don’t know, to be honest with you. I think it’s still evolving. I believe in providing a providing a conducive environment for my team to bring their best. I really believe in high performance, so I keep my teams quite lean. But they totally have freedom to do whatever they wish to do, you know, within certain guardrails. So, we’ll have to ask them about my leadership style. As for advice, I would say, please don’t take advice from anybody. I would literally say this to young leaders because we all have our own. We all have our own stories and we all have our own struggles and what we see is literally just the top of the iceberg. We have no idea what – I don’t know what you’re going through and you don’t know what I’m going through – and that’s the truth, right? There are so many layers that we all have as human beings. And that complexity is what makes life so beautiful.
And so, unless they know enough about you, I would tell young leaders not to take advice from anyone and just to follow their own gut to do the right thing over the easy thing. To have a value system that they stand by and do not take any shortcuts – which I’ve learned from my father. And something that I’ve learned from my mom is that Rome wasn’t built in a day, so you have to be patient. And… And just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, yeah. Yeah.