MD of Aarvi Encon Awarded as One of India’s Greatest Entrepreneurs

When the Great People Manager Awards 2019 were announced in July of this year, there was a name that received standing ovation from the audience. Mr. Virendra D Sanghavi, Co-promoter and Managing Director of Aarvi Encon Limited, was the oldest entrepreneur to have been recognized as a great people leader. Aarvi Encon is an engineering and manpower outsourcing services company established in oil and gas, refinery, petrochemicals, cross-country pipeline, power, infrastructure and telecom sectors.

Great Manager Institute just released its report mentioning the core reasons behind Sanghavi’s selection. Here are some excerpts from different sections of the report by Great Manager Institute, “Virendra D. Sanghavi is one of the most inspirational entrepreneurs we have evaluated. He is known for youthful celebrations while maintaining the dignity and respect a leader of his stature commands. His practice of recommending different books in different sessions as per the context of the session makes these sessions even more enjoyable for the team. He has an ability to look at the minutest of details of a task while not hampering the empowerment of the task owner. He is a coach and a teacher even before he is a leader."

As part of this Study of Great People Managers, Great Manager Institute takes both quantitative and qualitative feedback from the team members of the managers, besides taking direct inputs from the managers themselves. One of the anonymous feedbacks by a team member shows how a leader can be active on ground at the age of 75, “I was facing an issue where customer was not accepting some clauses in the agreement. Shri V. D. Sanghavi personally intervened, studied the case and guided me to either modify or remove those clauses in order to pave the way for further discussion."

Mr. Sanghavi has not only led Aarvi Encon since more than 32 years, he has also been an active humanitarian and educationist. He has been a visiting lecturer of ICT (Institute of Chemical Technology), formerly, UDCT (University Department of Chemical Technology), his alma mater, teaching piping engineering, his favourite subject, to third year students. ICT counts Mukesh Ambani, chairman of the Reliance Industries, Padma Bhushan Bal Dattatreya Tilak, and Padma Vibhushan Raghunath Mashelkar as its notable alumni, besides Mr. Sanghavi. His desire to teach is also reflected in the way he nurtures his managers at Aarvi Encon.

Great People Manager Study claims to be India’s largest study on people managers. In 2019, it evaluated more than 5000 leaders to come up with its final list that was published in Forbes India. Registrations for the Great People Manager Study 2020 are now open.

Great Manager Institute (GMI) Raises $283K from Clutch of Investor-Advisors led by CXOs of Technology Firms

Great Manager Institute (GMI), has raised funding of the amount of 283,000 USD, from a clutch of investor-advisors led by CXOs of technology companies. It was founded in 2017 by Dalreen Patrao, Prasenjit Bhattacharya, and Ashwin Srivastava. Bhattacharya and Patrao are domain leaders while Srivastava is a technology entrepreneur.

The investors include Ramesh Shankar, ex-EVP of Siemens and a veteran HR professional, Bala Malladi, CEO of ACT Fibernet, and Srikanth Karra, CHRO of Mphasis. Karra and Shankar have joined the technical advisory committee, while Malladi has joined the India Advisory Board of Great Manager Institute.

[caption id="attachment_136866" align="alignleft" width="324"] Dalreen Patrao, cofounder, GMI[/caption]

GMI is a lifetime coach and profiler for people managers, using artificially intelligent coaches and a community of experienced human mentors, to provide personalized sustainable learning to people managers. It claims to solve the “how of high trust performance”. It plans to raise another round of investment at a valuation of 15 million USD or higher in the coming months, to help propel its global growth even further. The current raise is expected to go towards branding, technology and research.

Karra, who has previously also been an entrepreneur and angel investor, says, “The new age economy is redefining business models, organizational structures, and delivery models, with a renewed emphasis of leadership. In the middle of these disruptions, the role of a manager is undergoing a change like never before. Collaborative platforms and agile methodologies are redefining the skill sets and roles of the management layer. Great Manager Institute has come out with a timely model of engaging and reskilling the managerial layer which in my view is the spine of an organization.”

Shankar elaborates on the reason of his association, “It is people managers who make the difference between good and great organizations and not technology, brand or anything else. That’s why I decided to be a part of Great Manager Institute.”

Srivastava, cofounder of the company, says about the investors, “It is our honour to have such stalwarts on board to help us create a new ecosystem of people management. They are not with us for their money, but for their value as great leaders who believe in the importance of building trusting relationships.” Patrao, the other co-founder adds, “Amongst the jobs that are definitely going to be there in the future, people management is amongst the top. This is why what we are doing is so important”.

Google Veteran Suryanarayana Kodukalla Joins Digital Coaching Institute Great Manager Institute

Mumbai-based digital coaching institute, Great Manager Institute™ (GMI), has roped in Suryanarayana Kodukulla, Director of Partnerships for Google India’s Next Billion Users project, in its Advisory Board.

GMI works towards building its lifetime digital coach and profiler for People Managers across the globe.

An alumnus of IIM Lucknow, Kodukalla, popularly known as Suri, has moved between managerial roles himself, and understands People Management like no one else.

In the past, he has been the Director of People Operations and Sales at Google India. He has also headed the SMB vertical of Google India prior to the same. Having worked in the B2B Space, leading sales, human resources, products and marketing teams, his technical expertise in Product Management and People Operations is what makes him a great fit for the Great Manager Institute™ team.

Speaking about the startup ecosystem, Suri says, “Start-ups grow on ideas and try to solve for user needs. While money is critical to take an idea to the market, building a robust culture from Day 1 would help start-ups scale up and execute faster. I would love to get involved in start-up organizations”.

Prasenjit Bhattacharya, founder of Great Manager Insitute™, adds about the reason of association with Suri, “Suryanarayana brings with him a unique combination of customer experience and employee experience. Suri has successfully led Google India’s initiative in recent years to build and sustain a high-trust and high-performance culture. No wonder, he is leading the Next Billion Users project of Google India. Suri understands markets and customers and is an accomplished People Manager himself. There is no one who brings all these areas together as Suri does. I am delighted to welcome him into the Advisory Board of GMI."

Mentioning further about this association, Suri adds, “Imagine if every manager were a great manager. We would have a culture of coaching where teams could maximize their potential and operate in a safe environment. Happy teams create happy customers. GMI’s vision of enabling People Managers to grow into Great Managers is critical for creating an inclusive workplace of tomorrow that brings in diversity of thought and fosters innovation."

The association involves the transfer of options to the Advisor against a discounted rate from the current fair market value of Great Manager Institute™.

Next Billion Users by Google is one of its most prominent and ambitious projects globally, building products and services to onboard 1 billion new internet users.

Here’s what Great Manager Institute™ does. They recently launched the Great People Manager™ Study with a vision to give every individual the opportunity to work with a Great People Manager™. Through a survey administered to a manager’s team, feedback is captured to generate his People Manager Effectiveness Score. These results are further used to develop the manager via the Great Manager Certification App, an AI-backed platform with a library of learning modules and action planning templates. Through digital coaching and mentoring, the manager is developed to get certified as a Great People Manager™, and will feature in Forbes India among other such managers. More than 200 companies are already associated with Great Manager Institute™.