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Two Ins And An Out
The Citi never sleeps. That could explain why Citibankers are in demand in the 24X7 economy. Still, one would have expected possible defectors to the new-e to have been discouraged by the back-to-banking move witnessed late last year. After all, Piyush Gupta, arguably the most high-profile banker to head a dotcom in India-he's been described variously by headhunters as one of Citibank's top 40 managers and former Citibank CEO John Reed's blue-eyed boy-quit the Hindustan Times-Chase Ventures promoted Go4i.com to return to the bank. And as he mentioned in his last interview before jetting off to Hong Kong: ''I have no regrets. It was a great experience, but in the end it was a question of whether to continue on a hope and a prayer or to get out of.'' But the lure of the surge economy, it would appear, runs deep. For what else can explain the defection of two more high-profile Citibankers to dotcoms. The second, and the more publicised one, was Deepak Chandnani's surprising decision to move to Yahoo! India. Surprising because Chandnani was the man behind the bank's mass-banking project, Suvidha, which was doing none too badly. And Yahoo! India appeared to be cruising along just fine without a CEO. The gentleman involved in the first, was Rahul Swaroop, who moved from the bank's tech arm, to access-plus-portal dotcom Sify as Chief Technology Officer. Maybe B2B doesn't work too. Postscript: we think Swaroop made a smarter move; there's a cadence to Sify never sleeps that Yahoo! just can't match. The Believer (In Numbers)
Dressed in immaculate white, his sparse hair combed back, Bala V. Balachandran would pass for a southern star of yesteryears. And more. For, the 64-year-old is a man of many colours. Back in Chicago, he is the distinguished professor of accounting at the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management. And when in India-sometimes four times a year-he's an advisor to Andhra Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu; international faculty member of the upcoming Indian School of Business; a devoted worker of Shankaracharya's Kanchi mutt; and a fellow crusader at friend Sam Pitroda's Action India. Despite his pre-occupations, Bala-one of the finest minds in management accounting-has sponsored 18 Kanchipuram scholars to debate and document their knowledge of the Vedas. The dream closest to his heart, however, is to make India fully literate in another 15 years. Says Bala, who's also working on a cutting-edge concept of electronic value added (EVA): ''The biggest payoffs come from investing in people.'' Coming from an accounting whiz, it sure adds up... A Select Club
Fine, the lady spent just a day in office before being unceremoniously told to quit, but Deena Mehta, who was the first woman President of the BSE, can take heart from the select 'shortest-reign' club she now belongs to. Richard III had amongst the shortest reigns as King of England, and he spent two years in office. William Henry Harrison's tenure as President of the United States was shortest still, 32 days (his inaugural speech was the longest, if that was any consolation). And John Pepper, who served the shortest term as P&G's CEO actually spent 18 months in the corner room. If the other 'shortests' mentioned here seem fairly long in comparison to Mehta's 24 hours, may be she should be looking at the shortest-lived proton emitter known to mankind. It's the 33rd isotope of thulium, otherwise called thulium 145 and its half-life is a mere 3.5 seconds. A day is long. |
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