How ABG has contributed to my life?
The fact that the Aditya Birla Group has survived through the generations and is still going strong bears testimony to the value system on which the business has been built and also their understanding of the customer’s pulse. That is one of the reasons why customers can blindly trust the products belonging to the Group.
The Aditya Birla Group has played an important role in my life in more ways than one. I will narrate the strongest influence one of its brands has had on my life. Previously, I used to be a brand agnostic person when it came to formal clothing. I used to visit a shopping mall which had multiple brands and select clothes based on looks and how well they fitted me. And slowly, I understood that there was a pattern to my purchases. I found that Van Heusen clothes fitted me the best and in spite of having so much choice of brands at my disposal, I managed to pick out Van Heusen clothes. You may call it a coincidence or a choice. From then on, I decided to not waste my time by going to a shopping mall and rather go to a Van Heusen store for buying my formal clothes. No prizes for guessing that the business suit I bought before joining college was from Van Heusen.
The Group’s focus on sustainability and innovation also resonates with me. Its commitment to sustainability by adopting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and to innovation by forming a separate private company for facilitating innovation, will go a long way in making sure that the business stays ahead of its peers in the industry in which they function.
How I overcame challenges to achieve something?
Though the problems and odds that I have faced would probably dwarf in comparison to others, I would still like to go ahead and narrate an instance from my life where I stood against all odds and got the work done. I was told by everyone that I might have to pay up a bribe in order to get the police verification done for my passport. But I had made up my mind that I would get it done without paying a single rupee of bribe. When I went to the police for verification, the policeman asked for all sorts of documents (when only one would have sufficed as per the rule) just to extract something out of me. But I stayed steadfast and handed him whatever documents he wanted because I had nothing to hide from him. He couldn’t find any loopholes with the submitted documents and had to proceed with the verification. I felt a sense of triumph that I managed to get my passport done without paying a bribe.
But there was another challenge in store for me. There was no one at home when the postman had come to deliver the passport. So, I went to the post office to collect it myself where the postman asked me for a bribe to hand over my passport. I told him that I was not going to pay up, and that he could deliver the passport whenever he wanted and walked away. As soon as I reached the gate of my post office, I heard someone shouting out my name. The postman understood that I wasn’t going to crack under pressure, he changed his mind and handed over the passport to me.