From supporting an application to owning the technology commitment

Mandate

Make customer and colleague promises dependable across store, inventory and service systems.

Outcomes

• Corrected availability status for a 600-order collection rehearsal including 96 exceptions
• Retained a defined manual route for 100 unresolved return lookups
• Separated application-speed improvement from the observed customer-queue result

Decisions in context

I became CIO with responsibility for the technology function serving both stores and direct online activity. My present scope is 162 employees through five reports, with forty-five contractors separately and ₹96 crore authority for FY 2026–27. These current figures should not be read as the resources available throughout my appointment. I report to Devansh Karmelkar and work with Malvika Tervade to connect technical changes to their service consequences. The important decisions often concern a handover: when stock becomes promiseable, who resolves a missing order link or what a confirmed customer match permits. I present the resulting proposals to directors, including their costs and unresolved conditions, but I do not hold a seat. My continuing responsibility is to provide systems that let colleagues answer the next customer question clearly, with the authority for retail policy and operating choices still visible beside the technical result.

Reason for the move

Current executive appointment; considering a compatible external governance contribution.

Mandate

Connect store applications, customer records and support processes to a coherent enterprise investment account.

Outcomes

• Required proposals to identify the service problem before selecting a product
• Clarified continuing ownership of cross-channel record questions
• Made support and transition costs explicit in technology recommendations

Decisions in context

Enterprise technology widened my view from individual channel handovers to the investment choices supporting them. I led 116 colleagues through five reports and held ₹51 crore annual authority by the end of the appointment. The company reached 121 stores, 5,400 employees and ₹2,960 crore revenue in that final period. When the private-equity investor joined in 2018, I needed to explain programmes with greater clarity about purpose, cost and continuing obligations. I encouraged teams to begin with the customer or colleague difficulty rather than a preferred application. That made it easier to distinguish a technical weakness from an unresolved operating responsibility. It also exposed the support work a programme would leave after introduction. I moved into the CIO role in January 2020 with a broader remit, retaining the habit of asking which decision the system could implement and which one the business still needed to make.

Reason for the move

Promoted to CIO in January 2020, adding full technology-service and portfolio responsibility.

Mandate

Agree and implement the meaning of customer-facing states shared between store and online systems.

Outcomes

• Distinguished stock visibility from allocation and collection readiness
• Established operating ownership of cross-channel status definitions
• Linked interface changes to store preparation and support

Decisions in context

Channel integration taught me that a connected application can transmit a misunderstanding efficiently. Store and online teams could use the same word for different states, especially around stock and service readiness. I led sixty-eight colleagues through five reports with ₹19 crore annual authority, working with operating owners to clarify what a handover actually promised. The question was not only whether the interface ran. It was whether the receiving colleague could act on the result and explain it to a shopper. The company had seventy-eight stores, 3,600 employees and ₹1,620 crore revenue by the end of this role. I learnt to include store preparation and support in the account of an integration rather than treat them as work that would follow technical completion. The enterprise appointment in July 2014 expanded that approach to customer records, shared services and the wider investment portfolio.

Reason for the move

Appointed enterprise technology director to address shared records and service dependencies more broadly.

Mandate

Maintain store applications and make change and support arrangements usable during trading.

Outcomes

• Established named routes for unresolved store-system questions
• Planned application introduction with store preparation
• Kept continuing support responsibility visible after installation

Decisions in context

At Varneli I took responsibility for thirty-two technology colleagues through four reports and for the commitments our team made to stores. My authority reached ₹6.4 crore annually by the final appointment period. I learnt to ask how a colleague would use a change during a busy trading day and where an unresolved question would go. A programme could install successfully while leaving those matters unclear. I wanted the support route to be part of the design, with named responsibility after the implementation team moved on. Varneli had forty-two stores, 2,100 employees and ₹780 crore revenue at the close of this role; those figures describe the company, not a retail operating remit I controlled. I moved to channel integration in April 2008 to address the growing number of customer promises that depended on agreement between store and online applications.

Reason for the move

Moved into channel integration as the relationship between store and online systems became more consequential.

Mandate

Develop and support store applications with attention to the colleague's next service decision.

Outcomes

• Analysed item and service-record questions with store users
• Documented missing context behind technically complete screens
• Built practical application-support experience before entering management

Decisions in context

I started at Arunvaya after completing my computer science degree in June 1992. As one of seven programmers and analysts, I had no direct reports and no budget of my own. The work put me close to the questions store colleagues faced when an application supplied only part of the answer. I learnt to describe a problem in service terms before deciding which technical change would help. That habit came from listening to people who understood the customer conversation better than I did. By the end of my appointment, Arunvaya operated forty-five stores with 1,900 employees and ₹610 crore revenue. I left in December 2000 because Varneli offered a management responsibility encompassing support and implementation. I wanted to improve the arrangements that made an answer dependable across stores, rather than solve one application question at a time without owning what happened afterwards.

Reason for the move

Joined Varneli to lead a store-technology team and its continuing operating commitments.