From reconciling the record to questioning its commercial meaning

Mandate

Keep commercial units, service horizons and contracting responsibility explicit in the financial account

Outcomes

• Corrected twelve invoices through ₹23 lakh credits after reviewing the billable population
• Supported a defined five-year service instead of an unfunded indefinite-access promise
• Separated consortium scope and tested usage commitments and settlement discounts on their actual assumptions

Decisions in context

I became CFO in February 2020 and lead twenty-two colleagues through three managers, reporting to the CEO. My function expense is separate from the enterprise's revenue and operating profit. The role requires financial stewardship across project digitisation, software licences and support, and repository services, with technical and contractual owners retaining their responsibilities. I have to make the commercial measures understandable enough for management to use without quietly changing their meaning. The billing case includes a control I had approved, and the service-duration case required a different proposition rather than a more flattering forecast. I present financial matters to directors but hold no statutory seat. A possible outside contribution would build on these habits while requiring a new company's context, collective duties and relationship assessment, rather than extend my authority as CFO into another enterprise.

Reason for the move

Continuing finance leadership while exploring a carefully scoped first outside appointment

Mandate

Build a financial account that distinguishes project delivery from continuing service and partner scope

Outcomes

• Brought service duration into commercial-planning discussions
• Distinguished company commitments from the broader programmes in which it participated
• Developed the management perspective carried into the CFO appointment

Decisions in context

The head-of-finance role widened responsibility to sixteen colleagues through three managers and an annual expense of ₹2.4 crore. The enterprise's ₹86 crore FY 2014 revenue described a growing mix of project and continuing work. I needed to understand how a one-time commercial event related to obligations that continued after the first delivery. I also examined partnerships in which the combined programme looked larger than the work our own company had contracted to supply. Those questions required input from commercial, technical and legal colleagues, not just a more detailed finance spreadsheet. I learned to make the distinction usable in the management conversation before a headline gained authority through repetition. The later CFO appointment built on that discipline, adding broader responsibility for how the enterprise compares its commitments, cash timing and resource needs without presenting every favourable number as an achieved result.

Reason for the move

Promoted to CFO in February 2020

Mandate

Establish financial control around different project, software and service obligations

Outcomes

• Moved commercial-accounts experience from print into digital-collection services
• Learned the difference between producing files and maintaining continuing access
• Connected finance records with technical scope and client-rights owners

Decisions in context

I joined Qevsuli in September 2006 and moved from Amritsar to Surat. Ten finance colleagues worked through two managers within ₹1.2 crore annual expense, and I reported to the CEO. The business required me to learn new commercial objects rather than apply print-service definitions unchanged. A digitisation assignment created files, a software agreement supplied particular rights and a repository service involved continuing activity. The customer's ownership and access interests did not become ours merely because the work was digital. I worked with technical and commercial colleagues to understand those distinctions before arranging the financial record around them. The role developed my control responsibilities while keeping professional boundaries clear. Finance needed an accurate account of the promise, but it did not decide preservation methods or interpret every client-rights question without the owners qualified to assess them.

Reason for the move

Promoted to head of finance in June 2013

Mandate

Connect production quantities, commercial terms and customer billing through a usable review process

Outcomes

• Added staff and expense responsibility to accounts work
• Separated routine reconciliations from decisions requiring commercial authority
• Developed billing discipline before moving into technology-service control

Decisions in context

Managing commercial accounts brought eight colleagues and an annual team expense under the CFO. I had to keep billing moving without allowing pressure for a quick close to settle unresolved quantities or terms. A familiar customer relationship could make a difference seem too small to document, but repeated informal decisions would leave the next person unable to explain the account. I worked on a process that distinguished ordinary reconciliation from issues requiring the commercial owner, with the basis of the charge preserved. This was a management role inside the finance function, not authority to change a customer's agreed specification alone. The experience prepared me for a controller appointment where the units and service periods were more varied. I carried forward the habit of asking what the amount represented before treating a clean reconciliation as a complete answer.

Reason for the move

Joined Qevsuli as finance controller in September 2006

Mandate

Prepare supervised accounts records and reconcile billed quantities with job documentation

Outcomes

• Applied the accounting degree to production-linked records
• Learned to distinguish sheets, sides and finished copies in commercial calculations
• Built the foundation for later accounts-team responsibility

Decisions in context

I began in July 1991 after completing the commerce degree that June. Working under the accounts manager in a five-colleague group, I had no staff or expense authority. My tasks involved preparing records and following quantities from production documents into invoices. I learned that a total could be arithmetically correct while the price had been applied to a different object from the one the customer agreed to buy. A sheet, a printed side and a finished copy each described useful work, but they did not automatically share a billing basis. I raised differences with the responsible colleagues rather than decide the commercial answer myself. That early experience gave later finance work a practical starting question: before asking whether a number is reliable, understand what it counts and why that quantity belongs in this particular account.

Reason for the move

Promoted to commercial-accounts manager in April 1999