Say 'power' and the last name that'll come to mind is Vinita Bali. And that's not because Bali, 50, has been Britannia's CEO for just over a year. Rather, the woman Chairman Nusli Wadia hand-picked after a global search seems severely designed to exude anything but power. She is about 5-feet, 8-inches tall, but has a frail frame, wears rim-less glasses and almost no piece of jewellery, speaks with no undue urgency and has a kind face that could well belong to a school teacher.

But then, like they say, looks can be deceptive. And in Bali's case, they lie shamelessly. For, the Delhi-born and brought-up Bali is the Indra Nooyi (the hi-profile President & CFO of PepsiCo) who never sold herself. Starting off her career in marketing with Tata group company Voltas in the late 70s when there were few women marketers, Bali was handpicked a couple of years later by Cadbury India's then CEO C Y Pal. After several global stints with the confectionery giant, which took her to places as far off as the UK, Nigeria and South Africa, Bali showed up as the top candidate in Coca-Cola's search for a global head of strategy in the mid-90s.

From then on, it was a quick rise to the top for her at the Atlanta-based cola behemoth. When she left Coke in 2003 to join the consulting firm set up by her friend and mentor and Coke's former but legendary marketing head, Sergio Zyman, Bali was the Vice-President of New Business Initiatives, based out of Atlanta. Just prior to that, she was President of Coca-Cola's Andean division, spanning Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Peru, and clocking more than $1 billion in annual sales. "You know, I have never actually looked for a job, I just stepped into them," says she. Apparently, she never planned on leaving Cadbury, but Coke made her an irresistible offer; she was happy at Coke, but "Sergio used to call me every day until I said yes"; she was mulling returning to India to take care of her mother but not too seriously, when the Britannia offer landed on her lap.

Cookie Queen

Bali may blush at the tag, but hers is the biggest and best-known biscuits brand in the country. Since taking over as CEO in January last year, she hasn't spoken about Britannia or what she plans to do with it. For this story too, Bali refused to talk about the company, except to say that "we are doing a lot of exciting things in the coming months". Such discretion may be precisely the reason why Wadia picked her in the first place. Bali's swashbuckling predecessor Sunil Alagh was ousted in a very public and ugly battle in 2004, amidst allegations of mismanagement. His sacking split executives at Britannia into two camps, and the company itself ran without a CEO for nearly a year. So Bali's priority would have been to steady the boat, rally around employee morale, and focus on growth.

Today, the people part seems to have been accomplished. But Bali still has a tough job ahead of her. Sure, the company is growing-its net sales grew 10 per cent to Rs 1,586 crore last year, and earnings 25 per cent to Rs 149 crore-but there has been a spate of new entrants in the industry, including giants like ITC and regional players like Surya Food & Agro (Priyagold). Their entry has meant pressure on pricing and greater spend on promotions. Britannia, long used to only one other competitor Parle, has had to respond by reinforcing its brand image and launching new products. Last year, it launched new products like 50-50 Pepper Chakkar, Marie Gold Doubles, Greetings and Tiger Cream. Thanks to the new launches, net sales for the nine months to December 31, 2005 grew 9 per cent to Rs 1,318 crore, but net profits dropped 14 per cent to Rs 119 crore. Says a Mumbai-based analyst: "With more players entering the market and an aggressive ITC, Britannia needs to expand beyond just biscuits."

Not just Dalal Street analysts, but Chairman Wadia will be keeping an eye on Bali, who works out of Bangalore. With the lady opting to keep quiet about her future plans, it's hard to say with any accuracy how things will unfold at Britannia. But some signs of future strategy are emanating from the market. For instance, Britannia may want to go slow on fresh biscuit launches (it already has a dozen biscuit brands) and instead focus on the organised snacking segment, where market is clipping at 50 per cent plus a year.

"You know, I have never actually looked for a job, I just stepped into them"

Easy Rider

Things will likely get tougher in the industry, but Bali won't be the one to lose her cool. One reason will, of course, be the high-pressure jobs she's thrived in markets as varied as the UK, Nigeria, South Africa, the US and Chile. The other reason will be her approach to life-she takes life as it comes. Consider how she resolved her post-graduate dilemma 28 years ago. After finishing her degree in economics from Delhi's Lady Shriram College, Bali had four options: Get a master's from the Delhi School of Economics or the Jawaharlal Nehru University, or do an MBA from IIM Calcutta or Mumbai's Jamnalal Bajaj Institute.

"I was seriously thinking about JNU, (in which case) I would have probably ended up as a jhola-carrying communist," she jokes. But then one day, her cousin from Mumbai came down and urged her to come to the business capital because she would have a blast in the city. "And that's why I went to Bajaj, and I did have a blast," she reminisces.

Over the years, Bali made sure she had fun doing whatever she did. At Coke, she spent half the year travelling and so far has visited, by her own count, 45 countries. She says her schedule is a bit easier now, but it still involves a lot of travel within India. Recently, she visited villages around Muzzafarnagar in eastern up, and among the things that excited her was the scene at a village school, where there were as many girls as boys. "You can talk about women in powerful positions in business, but the real changes are things like this, which didn't happen 50 years ago," she says.

Now you know where the next Vinita Bali could come from.