On 26th September, 2014, Mr Shreekanth Ramaswamy, Business Head of Kirloskar brothers (Thailand) Ltd., visited Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies (KIAMS). He was there to share his insights of the corporate culture and to discuss competencies that enable employability of a student. Mr Ramaswamy has several years of experience in Kirloskar, handling strategic positions and growing into the role of Business Head in 2007.
He began his lecture with the importance of right attitude and right approach to work, “In order to survive and grow in and with an organization, we as professionals need to adopt an attitude and approach that is incremental and positive”. He went on to discuss corporate culture and its elements, “We, the employees, are the ones who define the culture of the organization we work with”, he said, pointing out how human resource is the most important asset of an organization.
Mr Ramaswamy used experiences from his life to elucidate the importance of reading and travelling to expand one’s horizons. He said that networking is the key to success and knowing right people makes a lot of difference to the business. “If you are guided by passion, and further, it is backed with long term vision and well-stated objectives, you are sure to succeed”, he said. Another factor that he thought was important for a professional’s performance is creativity and the aptitude to leverage it.
Kirloskar publishes an in-house magazine – Cascade. Mr Ramaswamy has published an article in it entitled our culture is our organization’s culture and so are our values. He often referred to the article while discussing corporate culture with the students. He then touched upon the need for Business Development professionals to ingrain and probe the history of a region/place when stepping into international business scenario since culture of a place evolves from its history.
The floor was then opened to questions and the students did not let the opportunity slide. Mr Ramaswamy answered all queries addressed to him, satisfying and impressing the gathering. He averted the oft asked question of choosing between salary and company by saying, “your own passion, vision, and mission can answer that question for you”.