Dream big

Ranjan Das, Managing Director, SAP Indian Subcontinent has lived in the fast lane and never shied away from dreaming big. He talks to Akhtar Pasha about his journey from Guwahati to Harvard Business School to heading SAP India

Ranjan Das grew up Guwahati on the picturesque hills of the eastern flanks of the Himalayan mountain range where he spent the first 12 years of his life. He moved to Indore thereafter. His father, who passed away last year, worked for the Government of Assam and his mother is a homemaker and lives in Guwahati. He has two younger siblings. Das said, “There is no substitute for hard work and this is what I learned from my parents. They taught me the importance of hard work, integrity and education, and instilled in me a sense of curiosity.” He was inspired and encouraged by two other people—Mr. Dungerpuria and Mr. Ansari in school who encouraged him to dream big without fear. In professional life, he has learned about leadership, teamwork, customer focus, innovation and execution from mentors such as Dennis Moore, Bill McDermott and Shai Agassi. He credited his better half with helping him develop a deeper level of self awareness.

Harvard Days

He did his early schooling in Guwahati and was good at academics, which is why, at the age of 12, he won a Government of India scholarship to attend Daly College, a residential public school in Indore. After finishing the 12th grade, he joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the US with a full scholarship, where he got his Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science and Engineering, and also studied creative writing and films. Later he went on to do his MBA from Harvard Business School. He also attended an executive education program at INSEAD in France.

During his college days, he aspired to become a professor of theoretical computer science but destiny had other plans. Das recalled, “My advisor recommended getting some industry experience so I took a job as a software engineer with a company in Boston. The plan was to attend graduate school after a year. However, I ended up liking the corporate world and never went back to academia.”

Career graph

Das started his career as a software engineer at InterSystems Corporation, where he worked on developing a distributed database system. The next job was with Kenan Systems after which he moved to Oracle Corporation because they had a policy of paying for the green card applications of foreign workers. He worked in various roles at Oracle in consulting, sales and marketing. In 1999 he left to attend Harvard Business School and while at Harvard he started a software company called Patkai Networks in Silicon Valley with venture capital funds.

After closing Patkai because of lack of funds, he joined SAP to co-found the xApps business. He led the field team for emerging solutions and was Senior Vice President for the Platform business. In August 2007, he decided to move to India as the Managing Director for SAP Indian Subcontinent. Das said, “The biggest challenge at SAP has been to demonstrate to CEOs and board members that IT can be a critical enabler of business objectives. We have addressed it through the value engineering methodology, which helped us craft a long-term IT roadmap for our customers, one that is aligned with their corporate strategy.”

In his current role as Managing Director of SAP India, he leads all the market-facing functions for SAP in the Indian subcontinent. Further, he is responsible for crafting the go-to-market strategy, driving customer satisfaction and managing the P&L for all revenue-generating functions such as software sales, consulting, support and education. Das said, “The desire to realize my full potential and the fear of failure have been my strengths and motivating factor for success.”

Das underscores four things to foster teamwork and help people realize their full potential. First, you need to share a vision which inspires people and connects with them at an emotional level. Then you need to show a structure (e.g., go-to-market strategy, organizational model, values, policies, etc.) which enables them to realize the vision. Third, you have to enable the people through training, compensation, governance model, etc. Finally, a leader must energize people with his words, action, commitment and energy.

Hobbies and passions

Das is a fitness freak and hits the gym regularly. He is also a die-hard fan of most European football clubs. He also dabbles in writing short stories and essays, some of which have been published in the US and India. Das aspire to become a producer soon. He said, “I recently collaborated with a filmmaker friend to write a movie script, and hope to produce it this year.” He enjoys reading, both fiction and non-fiction.

He is a strong advocate of using the scientific method—believe in something only if there is direct or indirect evidence to support it. The scientific method can explain fundamental questions such as the origin of the universe, life and human beings, without resorting to miracles, divine intervention and supernatural forces.

Business outlook in 2009

Das agreed that the economy remains tough in 2009. He added that companies will continue to spend less and more selectively and demand much faster and tangible returns. “However, I do expect them to continue to invest in business software to become more efficient and agile, cut unnecessary costs and gain better insight and risk assessment,” he said. To address the above challenge he suggests using IT to solve those problems that can quickly provide significant cost savings. Better cash management, superior collections, accelerating savings in procurement, saving through optimization of IT, etc., are some processes that can be implemented immediately.

akhtar.pasha@expressindia.com