In our list of India's Best 50 - the 50 Most Employable Students from the Class of 2020-22, we feature MBA students who have walked that extra mile and done that little more to stand out. One of those featured in today's story, Shakshi Sodhani, has shown an incredible amount of passion to achieve her true potential. Read on and find out her story!
The following are Shakshi Sodhani's set of responses to a questionnaire floated amongst MBA graduates to determine the top-50 Most Employable MBA Graduates of the Class of 2022. Amongst the massive number of entries and responses being evaluated, Shakshi's story and profile stood out. Here's her story in her own words.
Name an instance where you wanted something and went out of your comfort zone to achieve it OR Tell us the biggest risk you have taken so far in your life.
If you're comfortable where you are you're not growing or learning. Growth happens outside your comfort zone. I recall my early articleship days when I was assigned an insurance company to audit. It was my first client and there were several questionable items in their books. While I felt it was my duty to mention the same on the report, I was strictly advised against it. My seniors asked me to let the matter slide. At the risk of losing the client and getting a bashing from my seniors, I confronted their CFO with questions.To my surprise, even he was unaware of some of the accounts and was glad I brought them to his notice. While the stakes were high, I was glad I took an ethical stance in this situation.
When was the last time someone relied on you? OR What did you do which was purely for someone else - a truly selfless act.
There is no better sense of satisfaction than being able to add value and make the lives of those around you easier. There is an old clerk in my grandfather's office who is nearing retirement. He has barely completed his schooling and is not very good at financial planning. I started taking care of his savings during my undergraduation: opened a bank account for him, got him an insurance policy, a loan for his house and some investments for his wife and children. When his kids are entering college now, he is a lot more financially stable and can afford their higher education. I am glad I could help him with what I knew about money management.
Tell us about a time when you disagreed with an opinion/idea/decision. What did you do about it?
I believe it is important to voice your opinion and share your views openly. I was part of a growing community that worked actively towards guiding young women towards their career goals and mentor them. While I was mostly involved with content creation, event hosting and mentoring, I began to notice how the object of the community was getting skewed towards highlighting only the contributions of women, completely disregarding the help men have been in making everyone feel safe and progress. I took it up in our meetings several times but it was always left after some debating. Many members were of a very different opinion. There was a time when I was considering leaving the community but then I decided to not get bogged down and reached out to some members on an individual level, explained my stance, got them on board with my views of how we can create more inclusive content and activities and then pitched it again.This time my ideas were not only appreciated but also accepted and implemented.
What is the one thing you can claim to have some level of expertise or depth of knowledge in - it could be anything - a subject, a sport, a hobby, a venture, an initiative which has led you to do deep work in that field?
Owing to my educational and family background, I have always been interested in markets and investments. I started putting money into stocks at a very young age, dealing with my family's investment and even helping with tax plannings. I realised while interacting with my peers from a different field both inside and outside of MBA, how there was a lack of awareness as to how one can make better use of their money through sound planning and investing habits. My peers and relatives always come to me for advice on these matters. Since I felt so deeply about the subject, I pitched this idea to my college and opened an Investing Club at my B-School. This club has held sessions, sent out materials and even received support from alumni along with faculty and batchmates. I'm glad to be doing my bit in helping people understand this space a bit better.
If 10 Million Dollars (approximately INR 75 Crores) is given to you to use it any way you deem fit what would you do with this corpus?
If I were given this amount, I'd like to put this into creating a one-stop solution for all the financing and investing needs of individuals. It would span from providing diverse products like stocks, cryptos, nfts, MLDs etc to services like retirement planning, tax planning, real estate planning along with courses and mock trading opportunities to create more and more awareness about the potential of the markets in the Indian context especially for people outside of the finance domain and lacking the requisite technical or educational background. This shall be aimed at Tier 2 and 3 cities mostly and then spread to the other rural areas. Just like the government is promoting banking habits, I would like to promote investing habits among one and all.
Read the stories of the other Employable Graduates here!