The physical question behind a convincing stock record

My first retail work involved finding an item that a colleague believed should be on the shelf. Sometimes the record was wrong; sometimes the item was in another place; sometimes the movement had happened but the explanation had not followed it. I learned that those situations needed different responses. An accurate-looking total was not much help to the person answering a customer if nobody could connect it to the physical stock. That practical frustration drew me towards operations before I had authority over a network or its investment decisions.

I completed a commerce degree in 1996 and joined Bervqani Retail Services as a stock assistant. I worked within a seven-person team preparing records and checking approved movements. I did not supervise colleagues or approve purchases. Senior staff retained client commitments and stock adjustments. The work taught me to describe a discrepancy without deciding too quickly why it existed. It also showed me how a small ambiguity in a unit or location could travel through several otherwise conscientious teams. At that stage my contribution was to make the evidence usable for someone who could authorise the next action.

In 2002 I became a shop-services supervisor, leading eight colleagues with ₹86 lakh annual service-delivery expense. Clients still owned their merchandise and commercial policies. I was responsible for organising the support we had agreed to provide and for making unresolved work visible before the service report was signed off. Supervising people changed my understanding of a standard process. An instruction that sounded simple at a desk could require time, space or information that the colleague doing the work did not have. I became interested in operating responsibility inside one retailer, where I could see the consequences of changing the process.

Kelqashi appointed me regional operations manager in 2009. I led sixty-four colleagues through four shop managers and worked within ₹4.8 crore annual operating expense. The role connected the stockroom, selling floor and replenishment timetable. I learned to hear a shop manager's request for more stock as a question about the whole flow rather than a self-evident solution. More merchandise could improve availability, but could also make finding and checking the right item harder. I began bringing hub colleagues into regional discussions so that a local improvement did not silently become additional work elsewhere.

As operations director from 2016, I coordinated 188 colleagues through three leaders within ₹13.5 crore annual operating expense. This was the period when I endorsed an annual-count account that treated too many apparent differences as settled conclusions. The subsequent investigation separated movement timing from gaps that still required explanation. I sponsored a limited cycle-count pilot with finance rather than announce that one control could replace every other requirement. The experience made my leadership less dependent on a single impressive completion event. I wanted managers to know how a result had been established and what remained unresolved after the report.

I became COO in 2021. Today my 248-person remit covers the shops, hub and operating support, while the company employs 326 people overall. The founding family holds 60% and employee shareholders hold 40%; my own interest is 0.6%. I report to CEO Arun Vervqali and work with CFO Leela Derqnavi, whose financial authority remains distinct from my operating responsibility. I present proposals to directors when invited, but I have not taken a statutory seat. Those discussions require me to explain the resource commitment and the alternative, not merely defend the operational preference my team finds easiest to implement. I ask the affected shop and hub managers to explain the proposal in their own terms before that meeting, because agreement at executive level can conceal a different understanding of the work.

The receiving-unit repair and break-pack investment developed that approach further. A technically valid product identifier still needed the right interpretation of the quantity received. A smaller shop order still needed someone to open, check and repack the merchandise. I want future operating work to value those practical connections and to let managers correct an assumption they previously supported. A possible outside contribution would draw on that experience while requiring a different discipline of oversight. I am preparing for that distinction rather than treating an executive title, a shareholding or invited board presentations as sufficient evidence of readiness.

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