SAS Intelligence Enterprise Awards

The spirit of winning

Sudipta Sen explains the importance of capitalising on the opportunities that are inherent in each and every problem that we face.

Sudipta Sen

For a company that provides Business Intelligence solutions, it is not difficult to understand why it would want to be associated with the Intelligent” Enterprise Awards. SAS India sponsored this set of awards at the Technology Senate. On this occasion, Sudipta Sen, Managing Director and CEO of SAS India, spoke on the spirit of winning.

The presentation was rather different with Sen integrating India’s biggest passions, movies and cricket. This presentation aimed at explaining to the audience the importance of playing the game right and in the right spirit.

Sen quoted the example of Aamir Khan’s character, Bhuvan from the film Lagaan. He started by explaining Bhuvan’s courage when he accepted a challenge to play cricket, a game that he was completely unfamiliar with having never played it in his life. He equated this to the challenges faced by enterprises today. He started by explaining that companies face several problems vis-a-vis business strategies, defining goals et al. The C Innovation O’s, CIO’s, role is to look at innovation in technology and not technology for its own sake. “To focus on issues which are impacting the customers and the bottom line is primary for today’s scenario,” said Sen.

He then spoke of Bhuvan’s team-building efforts. He highlighted three important aspects of Bhuvan’s process, which were structure, staffing and skills. “It’s no longer the structure based on yesterday but it’s a structure based on today’s reality,” said Sen. Speaking on team spirit, he said that one needs to build skill sets looking at the opportunities at the physical and mental level.

He said that every problem has a solution. He also mentioned the importance of the opportunities that each problem provides and to explain this he quoted the example of the character of Kachra. He spoke of how Bhuvan used Kachra’s handicap to his advantage. “Whatever problems that are coming in your way are actually opportunities to succeed,” said Sen.

“Over confidence can be extremely harmful,” added Sen. He also explained the importance of good communication skills. “Making a complex task simple is key to success rather than making a simple task complex,” said Sen.

He said that often we create so much complexity that instead of solving an issue we create a challenge. Thus he was of the opinion that it was important to create value and this had to be communicated across organisations. That’s how you will get the acceptance from the peers and the business and also sustain the executive sponsorship.

“At the end it’s not the challenges that are thrown at you or those that come in your life which are important but the attitude with which you face these and move forward,” said Sen.