Personal correspondence

Make the hire terms fit the customer’s work

Chief Product Officer India

I design portable-power hire products around the work customers can actually complete, the conditions engineering can support and the point at which our responsibility ends.

I began in service research, observing where the organisation’s neat process stopped matching the customer’s actual day. That perspective travelled with me into equipment hire, but it did not prevent my own product mistake. I gave careful attention to how customers chose and received a portable-power unit, then allowed the depot’s return scan to determine when their charge ended. The customer had already completed the agreed collection arrangements. Our delay could therefore extend a bill for reasons outside their control.

The customer buys a defined period of useful service, not our internal sequence of handovers. A product promise must survive that difference.

Product employees: 31; Three heads; company headcount totals 260
Annual product function expense: ₹4.9 crore; Fleet investment and technical approvals separately controlled
Career since June 1998: 28 years; Service research through portable-power product leadership

A hire product includes the return.

In 2019 I approved a short-hire proposition that sounded as though the customer’s charge ended when the equipment was ready for our agreed collection. Our process actually stopped the rental clock when the depot scanned the returned unit. In a review of thirty bookings, eight customers had met their collection arrangements but supplier-side delays extended the charged period. I had designed the beginning of the hire carefully and left the ending to an internal process the customer could not control. Correcting that boundary changed my understanding of the product.

I now lead product at Dervqalni Portable Power in Panaji, where thirty-one employees work through three heads within ₹4.9 crore annual function expense. The company rents portable battery-power equipment for exhibitions and light commercial productions. Its 260 employees support a business with ₹126 crore revenue for the year ending March 2026. I report to CEO Nilesh Qavzelthi and work with service head Farah Vezqlarni. Product defines the proposition and the customer decisions it supports; engineering, electrical safety, equipment release and contract acceptance remain with their qualified owners.

Our later work questioned two other attractive promises. A single advertised duration concealed different customer loads and unresolved suitability assessments. A fast-support claim confused acknowledging a call with restoring the customer’s service. In each case we changed what the customer was being invited to rely on, even when a simpler claim would have been easier to sell. I would consider a product mandate that treats those boundaries as part of commercial quality. A first outside-board contribution would require learning, relationship review and a tested calendar, with twenty-three annual days as a proposal rather than an established entitlement. I could help a board examine where a clear-looking offer transfers an unrecognised burden to the customer, while leaving operating decisions with management.

The ending of the hire became a product decision

Eight supplier-delayed collections exposed a difference between the agreed customer action and the event that stopped the rental charge.

A duration promise gave way to qualified suitability

Twenty enquiries were separated into supported applications, alternatives and cases still needing assessment.

Support acknowledgement remained distinct from restoration

Forty-eight service records showed why answering quickly did not establish that a customer could resume work.

Commercial product ownership with defined boundaries

Engineering, service release and contractual decisions keep their accountable owners throughout the customer proposition.

Current focus

Examining the return and interruption as carefully as the initial hire proposition.

Conversations I welcome

Product leadership and a prepared first non-executive contribution, subject to appointment-specific assessment.

The leadership record

Trusted with consequential decisions.

Formation

Bachelor of DesignTavqelri Design College · 1998

Priscilla changed the hire endpoint she had approved when our collection delay reached the customer’s bill. She made the consequence visible rather than defending the easier internal rule.

Nilesh QavzelthiFictional CEO, Dervqalni Portable Power

The full record ↗

Contact

Product leadership and a prepared first non-executive contribution, subject to appointment-specific assessment.

Board appointments
Executive opportunities

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