Sometimes, in life, you'd be sailing, full and by, a slight breeze blowing and the weather looking promising for a smooth sail, but suddenly a storm builds up around you and you are stuck in the eye of it. What do you do, how do you sail by?
It was October, a month before my CAT. I was working in Udaipur and had not been home to Raipur in nearly 10 months, so, amidst my job and preparations, I decided to take a week's leave to go home for Durga Puja. There, I found that my father had developed a major back problem which he had been avoiding from sometime and required immediate medical attention. My mother had had a total knee replacement surgery 5 months ago and was still recovering and would not be able to take care of my father alone, so I decided to extend my leave to take care of my parents. However, between physiotherapy sessions and doctor’s appointments, my final preparations for CAT had taken a toll. Days became weeks and soon a month had passed. Meanwhile my father’s health had improved considerably and my younger brother had also come home after his semester examinations, so I returned to Udaipur just a day before CAT. I don’t remember how I felt on the morning of the exam, or what was going through my mind during those crucial 3 hours, but what I do remember vividly, is feeling lost after the exam as I knew 99 percentile was out of reach. I was satisfied with my decision of being there for my parents, but was also crestfallen with my performance. I had dreamed of the day I would get into a premiere B-school and now the dream felt too far.
Having been on leave for over 5 weeks, work had piled up at office and so December passed by with me spending even weekends at work. On one such evening, I got a mail from SPJIMR saying I had been shortlisted for profile-based interviews. I remember the joy I felt after such a long time. I had an opportunity and I would take full advantage of it. The interview was in 15 days, and for those 15 days all I recall is the long hours I spent brushing up on the current affairs and reflecting on my life. The day of the interview seems like a blur to me now, but I felt relieved and content with the way the interviews had unfolded. After that, the long wait for the results began. The anxiety and the nervous sleepless nights ended on 14
th March, as I read the mail I had so desperately waited for. It all felt like a lucid dream, the tears my mother had and the exuberance in the voice of my father.
From October to March, it felt a lifetime had passed. I was stuck in the eye of a storm, a storm through which I sailed feeling happy with my decisions and the sacrifices I made.
When I had received the interview call, in the midst of all the preparation, I had to purchase a business suit. I had always imagined of the day when I would sit in front of the panel, in a sharp crisp suit, answering the questions while maintaining my composure. That dream, which after CAT I felt was too distant to achieve, could be realized now as I had to purchase one suit for my interview. Going to the mall in Udaipur, I went to different shops trying on multiple suits and finally on wearing a particular suit, I looked at myself in the mirror and I felt I was looking exactly the way I had imagined. The suit was from Van Heusen and I loved the fitting and the quality of the fabric. Fashion is a form of change, and in my opinion, every time a person puts on a different clothe, he/she looks in the mirror and discovers a new side to their personality – and this is how I felt on the day of the interview. Looking back, I believe, the effect that the suit had on my confidence and the way it made me feel in control of my conversations, was a huge contributing factor to the way I handled the two rounds of interviews at SPJIMR.
Further, I recall the topic I had been given in the interview- sustainability and development. I had written in lengths about different companies trying to set themselves goals to achieve sustainable development, but what intrigues me is the sustainability goals that ABFRL has set for itself for 2020 and the responsibility it has taken towards being a sustainable accountable business. By not just focusing on its own operations and trying to plant the seed of sustainability across its up-stream operations, it is leading towards a cascading effect where its suppliers and vendors can have a further impact by creating a standard across their own market. With their Sustainability 2.0 and 2020 Roadmap, ABFRL has set themselves ambitious goals. The entire industry is talking about sustainable development and giving back to the environment, we at B-schools are taught about long term sustainability strategies, and here we have India’s largest fashion network actually working towards and making significant progress in achieving their sustainable goals. With initiatives like waste water recycling, zero waste to landfill measures, zero pollution packaging and being water neutral across own operations, I believe ABFRL has set a benchmark for sustainability across all industries in India.