Following the recommendation into continuing responsibility

Mandate

Make growth assumptions, connected relationships and restricted choices visible before commitment

Outcomes

• Examined common ownership behind distribution brands
• Recommended a staged alternative-channel evaluation
• Compared exclusive reach with a smaller nonexclusive route

Decisions in context

I lead fourteen employees through three heads, with ₹4.6 crore annual operating expense for the strategy function. The company’s capital approvals, insurance decisions and commercial agreements remain with the relevant authorities. My role is to bring their assessments into a recommendation the CEO and directors can examine. The channel-ownership review showed why twelve brands were not enough to describe the independence of the distribution base. The later exclusivity comparison showed why 600 outlets were not enough to describe the value of a proposed agreement. In both cases, the attractive count needed a second account of dependence or restriction. Since October 2023 I have also served without remuneration on the board of an adult-learning foundation. That appointment has a separate six-day annual allocation and is disclosed alongside my executive work; it is not presented as insurer board membership.

Reason for the move

Current role; exploring strategy leadership and one additional assessed outside contribution

Concurrent appointment

Unpaid non-executive director of Deqvazhi Learning Foundation since October 2023; six annual days, separate from insurer employment

Mandate

Connect segment assumptions to an investment recommendation that can withstand challenge

Outcomes

• Withdrew my incorrectly averaged growth paper
• Reopened the associated programme spending logic
• Kept scenario calculations separate from realised performance

Decisions in context

Twelve employees and ₹3.1 crore annual function expense supported strategic analysis and investment recommendations. My 2017 paper exposed a weakness in my own review: two segment percentages received equal weight despite very different starting bases. Finance corrected the calculation before approval, but the larger leadership task was to reopen the recommendation built on it. I withdrew the paper rather than preserve the programme request behind a revised headline. The subsequent work distinguished an illustrative forecast from a result and showed why the original ₹18 crore request needed a new case. That experience changed how I prepared for wider responsibility. A strategy head should invite a challenge that can alter the decision, including when the challenged assumption came from the head’s own work. Promotion to CSO widened the commercial choices I considered without removing the need for that discipline.

Reason for the move

Promoted to CSO with CEO reporting and broader distribution choices

Mandate

Assemble business choices without erasing professional assumptions and unresolved concerns

Outcomes

• Coordinated finance and distribution inputs
• Separated strategic recommendation from professional approval
• Followed planning decisions into operating reviews

Decisions in context

Moving inside the insurer made me responsible for a continuing planning process rather than the end of an advisory engagement. Eight colleagues worked within ₹1.8 crore annual function expense. I learned the differences between premium measures, operating resources and the authorities that could approve a particular commitment. Underwriting, finance, distribution and operations brought assessments that could not be reduced to a single attractive growth story. My task was to identify where their assumptions agreed and where further work was needed. I also saw what happened after approval: terms could narrow the available choices, and an apparently broad partner base could depend on a smaller set of decision-makers. Those observations later shaped the ownership and exclusivity reviews. The role prepared me to lead strategy by showing that a recommendation remains accountable to the conditions through which the organisation must carry it out.

Reason for the move

Promoted to head the strategy function

Mandate

Explain the conditions that turn a market direction into a practical choice

Outcomes

• Led commercial comparisons with explicit boundaries
• Distinguished client approval from advisory recommendation
• Examined contractual and relationship constraints before presenting options

Decisions in context

I led ten colleagues and controlled ₹92 lakh annual delivery expense for our assignments. That was not authority over client investments. The work required a recommendation to explain more than the size of an opportunity. An option could become less useful when commercial restrictions were considered, or several proposed routes could depend on one controlling relationship. I learned to bring those conditions into the main discussion while the client could still choose differently. It was also important to acknowledge the limits of an advisory engagement. We could help frame the decision, but the client’s professionals had to assess the actual commitments and management had to execute them. Joining an insurer offered the opportunity to follow that process beyond a presentation and learn how the organisation revisited choices as operating evidence developed over time.

Reason for the move

Joined an insurer to take continuing responsibility for planning and follow-through

Mandate

Make comparisons traceable to the population and period they describe

Outcomes

• Prepared research tables under supervision
• Checked the definitions behind apparently comparable figures
• Escalated missing context before a recommendation was circulated

Decisions in context

I joined after completing economics studies in May 1988. In a six-person research group, I assembled information under senior supervision and had no authority to approve client recommendations or spending. The work taught me to look behind a comparable-looking label. A percentage could describe a different starting base, an annual figure a different reporting period and a partner name a different legal or ownership boundary. I was expected to make those distinctions visible to the colleague preparing the argument. Later responsibility did not make me immune to forgetting that discipline, as my own growth-average error demonstrated. I value this early experience because it gives a practical standard to return to: the comparison must still mean what the reader is likely to assume it means. It is a research habit that belongs in senior decisions as much as junior tables.

Reason for the move

Promoted to engagement leadership