When one is offered or selected for a prestigious position or role, most of us tend to appreciate the recognition. It takes an insightful person then, to realise that his or her skills would be more aptly leveraged in a different setting, and refuse the responsibility. But that is just what Tushar, featured as one of InsideIIM's Best 50, did. His ability to see areas that needed improvement, and to work diligently towards setting up a system in place to not just benefit his own batch, but also the future batches, ensures that he has a place as one of The Most Employable Graduates of the Class of 2018-20. Read more about his experiences in the article below!
The following is Tushar Garg’s set of responses to a questionnaire floated amongst MBA graduates to determine the top-50 most employable MBA graduates of the Class of 2020. Amongst the massive number of entries and responses being evaluated by the Founder of InsideIIM-Kampus Konversations, Tushar’s story and profile stood out. Here's his own story in his own words.
“I have completed my MBA (2018-20) from Indian Institute of Management Bangalore and B.Tech (2012-16) in Chemical Sciences from Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati.
During my time at IIM Bangalore, I worked with Boston Consulting Group as an intern on building PAN India sales excellence strategy for an Indian cement giant. Before joining IIM B, I worked at EXL analytics with a US conglomerate client. I look forward to helping organisations improve their performance leveraging the blend of industry knowledge and problem-solving skills. I love to follow and play cricket. I am a sports enthusiast and enjoy poetry and dramatics as well.”
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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.
“In my pre-final year at IIT Guwahati, my experience in various positions of responsibilities held over the past years led to me being offered the position of Department Placement Secretary. While the position was among the most challenging as well as reputable ones,I had something else in my mind. Treading through experience of global business case challenges and analytics internship with IIM Lucknow professors & further with the US multinational EXL Analytics, I always felt a lack of awareness about professional analytics and consulting domain at the institute.
Therefore, instead of taking up the position of department placement secretary, I decided on the inception of a Consulting and Analytics group at the institute which would not only introduce a fresh culture of Consulting & Analytics there but will also help the future batches to come. On this entrepreneurial task, it was challenging to decide the vision for the group, to prepare the content, and organize various sessions. Stepping out of my comfort zone, I interacted with industry professionals and experts through alumni, started organizing sessions and gradually spread the word across the student community.
With more students showing interests, I along with some junior students, organized 10+ sessions throughout the year. We also helped students prepare for many analytics and case competitions. In lieu of one year performance, the technical board officiated the group into a regular club. Another challenging task was selecting the right people to take the club forward. The current levels touched by the club are testimony to the teams that took forward this fresh culture across years. The club is now a 50+ strong team with participation across 20+ international competitions across institutes and hosting its own flagship international case competition - The Strategy Storm. The Summer Analytics course is one of the most popular one among not only the students of IIT Guwahati but students across institutes.
With this experience, I believe I took one of the best decisions in my life embarking upon an extremely challenging journey but highly enriching one. PS: Here is the link to the website of the club: https://www.iitg.ac.in/stud/gymkhana/technical/home/CnAHome.html.”
When was the last time someone relied on you? OR What did you do which was purely for someone else - a truly selfless act.
“Although I had multiple experiences of mentorship with students at IIT Guwahati as well as IIM Bangalore and with interns at the workplace, one incident stands out to me. During my final year at IIM Bangalore, I had some 100+ junior year students come for resume mentoring. But one of the candidates with an engineering background followed by a break of 2.5 years seemed to be really clueless about the summer placement situation at IIM Bangalore. It was very difficult for him as the competition was fierce. Looking at his profile, I felt that it is challenging to create a one page resume for some suitable work profile. With him feeling dejected and clueless, I decided to help him not just with the resume but also with the other processes to follow. I talked to him in detail about his undergraduate studies and what he did during the long break which was inexplicable in the resume. With his experiences in the physics research field and then preparation for Indian Administrative Services, we first created specific achievement points during these experiences and further included the relevant positions from IIM B. We discussed various profiles offered at the summer placement and accordingly shortlisted 2-3 according to his interests and previous research areas. The analytics profile came to be best in both respects. I also helped him with some of the analytics courses and get through online analytics competitions. With a decent profile build up and wonderful analytics interviews, he finally bagged an offer with the American Express. The whole process not only helped him but also gave me immense satisfaction.”
Tell us about a time when you disagreed with an opinion/idea/decision. What did you do about it?
“I was working with the Boston Consulting Group for a major Indian steel client. With the new year production planning under process, the client faced an important question of setting up a new plant for producing an intermediate material used for making steel. The 7-member high level committee formed by the steel plant CEO submitted the report that favoured putting up a new plant for increasing the capacity. On behalf of BCG, I and one other colleague were responsible for validating the decision. And this is the time when I really felt nervous disagreeing with the decision of the top steel makers in the country regarding setting up a new plant.
To reach this decision, we did thorough research and quantitative analysis on the production and demand data, and built a dynamic model that can take input values and accordingly produce results for required capacity. The analysis along with considering other business factors directed us to reach the conclusion that setting up a new plant at that time does not make sense.
We submitted the detailed report to the client suggesting them the alternative course of gradually diversifying their product portfolio, thus increasing the demand for steel and thus five years down, setting up a new facility for intermediate products made sense.
This was the toughest decision I ever disagreed with as it not only involved a huge sum of around 2 crore rupees but also involved the best decision makers about steel in the country. Once our decision was accepted, the entire process raised my confidence to a great extent and it felt easier in making tough decisions going forward.”
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?
“As I read this question, there was no doubt my answer would be CRICKET. This is one thing which I feel most passionate about. Since childhood, I was inclined towards the game of cricket and I was always more excited to go out and play rather than sit and watch it. Even today, I can spend days on the field without getting tired.
While I started playing cricket with the leather ball at a young age of 12, it was not easy to maintain the love for cricket with busy schedules at institutes and workplaces. But I did not have to put effort in to be associated with my passion as I used my weekends wisely and mostly to be seen on the field. I was selected as a member of the institute cricket team at IIT Guwahati participating in Inter IIT Sports meet. Similar to this, I was vice captain for the IIM Bangalore cricket team in Inter IIM Sports Meet. Spending years playing cricket at different locations as part of various tournaments, this is the one thing I kept learning more about and kept getting an inch better than before.”
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?
“With 10 million dollars in my account, I would like to divide it into multiple parts and use each one for a different purpose. I would like to use the money to invest in people or things that matter to me the most.
First, I will set aside half the money to invest and let it multiply using various market investment approaches. Along with investing in stocks and bonds markets, I would like to screen companies or entrepreneurs investing in technology and targeting Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities in India. I will diversify my investment as small investments into many such promising companies. This half of my corpus is prone to risk as I choose to invest it into multiple instruments.
Now, the other half will be used for various purposes. Apart from ensuring my and my family's stability, I will employ the money for uplifting poor people especially in small cities and villages. I strongly believe in giving back and would like to help the three particular causes : rural education, hunger and healthcare. I believe access to food and basic healthcare is a human right. Moreover, only education can help uplift the poor of the country. Thus, putting my money into these three causes wil be my priority. One other area I would like to put my money into is the sports management and talent scouting in India. I am passionate about sports and would like to use the money to invest in organisations like GoSports Foundation, Khel Khel Mein Foundation, and National Sports Talent Search that help find and nurture right talent in various sports.
Thus, investing in multiple causes important to me and "let money make money" is how I will put the 10 million dollars to use.”
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