Vardhman Group CEO keeps communication lines open
Pulkit Vasudha
Ahmedabad, July 01:“I channeled all my energies into getting the gold medal of my IIM-A batch in 1989. When I got it though, I realized it had not been worth the effort,” said Sachit Jain, the CEO of the Vardhman group, India’s largest integrated textile producer.
Sachit Jain’s personal and professional journey began after he graduated from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. A brilliant student in school, Jain passed out of the Indian Institute of Technology with a single aim in mind – to be the gold medallist of his IIM-A batch of 1989. “My health deteriorated in those last months at IIM and my parents were extremely worried about my high stress levels,” he says. “Until then I had been working towards achieving the medal but then I realized that it is the effort I put in which was more precious to me than the medal itself.”
Since he joined the family-run Vardhman group in 1989, Jain has helped it grow from a 300 crore business to a whooping 2,400 crore company. “With a work force of 6,500 workers, it is interesting that we have no union. When I joined eighteen years ago, the salaries of our workers was lower than those of our competitors but our productivity was 50 to 70 per cent higher.”
The company, which is at par with Japanese standards of production, is considered the benchmark of quality among textile industries. Sachit Jain’s policy is to recruit only freshers and hone their skills to suit the culture of the company.
“The concept of recruiting workers with zero experience was unheard of in the textile industry in India until I started the trend in Vardhman. I trained the workers myself and found that it helps build a relationship with the employees,” he says. Jain faced the peculiar problems of joining family-run businesses. “Initially, it was very difficult to maintain the distance between personal and professional lives. In order to succeed as a family, and as a team, it is essential that everyone learns that trick quickly.”
Jain had to establish and create a niche for himself in the company to dissociate himself in the family web. “I had to prove my professionalism despite the family connection. I also wanted to create a new culture which could become a driving force for progressive changes in the company.”
Jain’s practice was to make himself available to every employee. In a company as large as the Vardhman group, one of the primary challenges is to keep the communication lines open. “Communicating with the employees is integral to team work and handling different working styles,” says Jain. The policies of the company are built along a value system which Jain refuses to give up on. “Since the group wishes to stay away from corruption, we also stay away from all businesses which will require government cooperation. We have not ventured into the telecom or electricity production because we realize that money changes hands in any interaction with the Indian government,” he says.
“Thoughts, words and actions are the key words to keep in mind, personally and professionally,” says Sachit Jain. “Both in Indian and western philosophies, the emphasis is on sustaining quality in one’s thoughts, actions and words. For entrepreneurs too, it is these three elements that should be top priority,” he said.
He remembers his days in IIM-A as the beginning of a lifelong spiritual journey. “Each day, we learnt important lessons about hard work, team building, confidence, logical skills, expression of ideas and deadline orientation. Not every entrepreneur can be a success, but I believe that failure shows the courage to try new things. True entrepreneurs chase dreams and realize them, money is just a byproduct of the pursuit of the dream then.”
Source: Indian Express