Could you give us a brief idea about how life has been post-TCS?
While I would have liked to believe that post-retirement life would entail sitting on my verandah, sipping some freshly brewed filter coffee and enjoying a science magazine (yes, I do read that for relaxation even now!) it is quite the contrary! I retired from TCS in 2014, having completed four decades, but my engagements with several other independent boards, educational institutes and NGOs continue. And if this wasn’t enough, I was appointed by the Government of India to steer their Skill Development initiatives across India, a real need of the hour, when they appointed me in the rank of a cabinet Minister in January 2011. It was an offer I could not refuse.
While most people look at winding down their hectic schedules and enjoy a game of golf or travel for leisure, I was travelling sometime to two or three cities in a week and certainly not spending time of a lush green golf course! But let me tell you that I wouldn’t have it any other way. I have always enjoyed a busy and hectic schedule, combined with the rush of a challenge that needed to be addressed. The challenge of skilling a million youth was certainly a daunting task, but I knew that I had to approach this strategically and look at bringing technology and transparency to the existing system. Even today, I wake up each morning wanting to make a difference, wanting to influence something, wanting to learn something new, wanting to interact with different people on different aspects, challenge myself and challenge the people I work with.
Your contribution to the skill development in India has been admirable, and quite evidently quite close to your heart. How important is this to the country’s growth, and in particular, the IT industry?
I firmly believe that Education contributes to economic growth by imparting basic attitudes, moral values and specific skills, which are necessary for variety of places. Importance of the educational system is to produce a literate, disciplined, flexible labor force via high-quality education.
Unfortunately, these days, the value of education is just earning a degree without a goal, and we should ask ourselves why this happens? The reason is lack of training facilities that result in the loss of hope of employment. The nation does not need pointless, goalless youngsters, instead it needs mindful, talented, skillful youth to comprise the dynamic society and improve the status of our country. While the Government’s primary responsibility is to provide educational and training avenues that give hope and set stage for the youngsters of India, it should be our collective endeavor, of both the Public and the Private sector to join hands to design and develop job oriented courses for the youth.
Drawing on the same parallel is the way TCS is preparing the groundwork to hone and develop engineering minds through programs like IGNITE or Bridge IT which is a unique project that provides digital literacy in school, adult literacy through a computer based functional literacy program and creates entrepreneurs armed with digital tools to enhance their business opportunities. Unique methods like a quiz platform is an effective supplement to computer science, TCS IT Wiz, the biggest inter school IT Quiz program in India and Rural IT Quiz, Govt. of Karnataka’s flagship program, aims to build awareness and improve IT skills of young students. TCS is also supporting the development of the GAINS (Girls Advancing in STEM) Academy, which was established in Pune in October 2014. Another TCS initiative called Avasara aims at providing girls twenty-first century skills such as exposure to coding and critical writing, to promote holistic learning.
Digital / IT is at the heart of almost everything we do. Therefore moving with the times where training also needs to be integrated with technology is most essential.
What is your vision for the TCS Alumni group? How do you see this evolving?
For most of my time, TCS, was the first job and it was a lifelong learning experience. Many of us worked during the very exciting time of pioneering the software industry in India and finally putting Indian software expertise on the world map. Over a period of years, while many of us stayed backed in TCS and eventually retired, possibly an equal number chose to join other companies around the globe. Today the former TCS employees constitute a very large number of IT professionals and if brought together under an “Association” they could give back to society in a very mutually rewarding manner.
During my travels and over time, I have bumped into many former colleagues who have very fond memories of TCS, who excitedly recall experiences at TCS that shaped their careers. The experience gave them confidence and competence to work with the best in the global industry.
An organization of the former colleagues, run along the lines of a university alumni, can not only provide a networking platform but also to build knowledge based communities which could work with startups, academia, skill development, government bodies etc.
The members themselves may benefit by keeping abreast of technology through various chapters and forums.
What advice would you have for members of Fortess?
Keep learning new skills and technologies, try and mentor and help younger members, and startups, with universities by experience sharing. Also, enjoy your spare time in pursuing hobbies and new interests, something one could not find time to engage in during full-time employment. Most importantly, spend time with family, elders, and youngsters.
When/why/how did you join TCS?
I was one of those lucky enough to go to America to do my Master’s in computer science at UCLA in 1969. After I completed my Master’s, I joined NCR in 1970 as a diagnostic programmer. From a learning perspective I enjoyed the job. I was based in Los Angeles while my office was in Hawthorne, so I used to get up in the wee hours of the morning in order to get to the office early and get computer time to run diagnostic routines. Soon, however, I was faced with a difficult choice between a career in the US and going back to India. Compelling reasons on both the professional and personal front made me decide to return to India after a few years, unlike many of my contemporaries who stayed on in the US. I had been the first in the family to get an American education. I was also the first to have decided to come back to India, leaving a lucrative career behind.
On the personal front, my parents had found me a pretty young bride, while on the professional front I had the opportunity to join TCS, at that time a division of Tata Sons Ltd., perhaps the most prestigious industrial group in India at that time. It was a difficult decision to make, but back in those days an opportunity with a Tata company was considered a better option than a job in the US. At the time, America was the destination of choice for quality education. Politically, however, in the post-Independence years India had leaned more towards the USSR, which was considered an ally. Political relationships with the US were still rather nebulous, probably because of underlying suspicions in the West about Jawaharlal Nehru’s liking for the Soviet socialist model. Ironically, however, with the US leading the first mainframe and then the mini-computer revolutions, relations between the business communities of both nations had begun to warm. America was the land of innovation and I was fortunate to have received the best education in one of its best institutions. This I felt would be a great asset back in India, where I would have the chance to create my own future. Whatever I did in India would never have been done before. The idea of treading an unknown path and applying the knowledge I had learned in the West excited me. A job with the Tatas was the icing on the cake. I joined TCS as an assistant systems programmer and analyst in March 1972.
How was your first day at TCS?
My first day at TCS, February 23, 1972 was rather uninteresting and had me fill my day mostly lost in thought of how things would go from here. I began my day with the commute from Altamount Road in Mumbai, where I was living with my brother’s father-in-law who then worked for Gammon India. I think the highlight of the day was actually my travel by bus as I took in the sights and sounds of ‘Bombay’ as it was called then.
I came to the 10th floor of the now iconic Air India building at Nariman Point and sat at a desk. The office then looked like a typical government office that was rented. At that point, all the computers were in the adjacent building known as Nirmal.
Like any new entrant, I still wasn’t sure of the work I was supposed to do and therefore chose wisely to use this time to make some friends. It wasn’t until a week, that I actually had the opportunity to meet Mr Kohli, who was heading TCS then. I think, the best part was that the friends I made then are still a part of my life even today!
How long was your TCS career?
Spanned four decades,
How was your last day?
I woke up on 6 October 2009 with a sense of great excitement. It was my sixty-fifth birthday and the day of my so-called retirement from the position of CEO and MD of Tata Consultancy Services. It was also my first day in my new life, a new beginning. I had decided several months ago that on 6 October I would officially vacate my office and welcome Chandra into it. My staff had ensured that we had cleared the premises of all our belongings the evening before, leaving only the official papers for the next CEO’s staff. It was neat, clean and precisely planned. At 10 a.m., I reached TCS House and walked up to my second floor office. I took in a sweeping view of the paintings on the office wall, the now empty desk and the view of the Oval Maidan (a public park) and the large gulmohar tree whose branches almost touched the glass windows. It was a beautiful office where I had spent some great moments—and now it was to have a new resident.
It was here that we gathered that day, the entire corporate team of TCS including Chandra, Maha, Jayant and Phiroz. There were speeches to be made, cakes to be cut and photographs to be taken. I spoke briefly about TCS, Chandra as the new CEO and the future looking bright. Chandra made what can be technically called his first speech as CEO. I was quite matter-of-fact throughout the brief ceremony, not letting emotions run high; if they did we all tried not to show it. By 12 noon my office members and I left for Banyan Park where we had decided to have a temporary office until my office at Bombay House, the Tata headquarters, was ready. I had several meetings planned for the day and that’s how I wanted my new life to begin.
As I drove to Banyan Park in the suburbs of Mumbai, I found my thirty-seven-year-long journey at TCS flashing before my eyes. Looking back I was proud of the institution we had all built together, the people who inspired me, who supported me from the time I started as a programmer in TCS to the time I reached its highest echelons as CEO and MD. I felt fortunate to have witnessed and been a part of the great transformation of the global and Indian IT industry with TCS playing an important role in it. I had seen technologies come and then fade away, losing the battle to the next wave. I had been a part of the globalization that has swept our world. I had seen new markets emerge. I had witnessed young people join TCS and rise to become leaders in their own right, some starting their own companies which are doing well today.
Could you share a best moment/memory/anecdote of your TCS career?
There are many best moments and too many to recall. When I took over TCS was a top 50 IT Software and Services Company. I decided that when I leave it should be in the top 10 lists in the world. At that time we were $150 million in revenue. Nobody would have believed that in the 10 odd years, TCS would catapult from top 50 to top 10. I knew I had inherited a good team, work culture, capacity to learn latest technology, and above all an appetite to be reckoned as world leader in software technology and services. We started with several brain storming sessions to chart out the road ahead. We crafted a mission vision statement to “be in the top 10 by 2010”. Every three months we would meet. Initially the team was large. In time the team became smaller and more focused. We engaged a leading Harvard Business School professor of Strategy – Pankaj Gemawat to act as a mentor. At first the target seemed unreachable. But by breaking the target into smaller and more achievable goals we kept at it quarter after quarter until finally the goal was in sight and we achieved it. When I retired TCS was a $6 billion company, with a global reach, and yet one had many personal relations from full spectrum of TCSers.
Can you share one incident at TCS that no one knows till now?
The Burroughs B 1728 computer was imported in 1974. It was the second machine to be rolled of from the Burroughs manufacturing plant at Goleta, CA. Naturally we faced many problems in the installation with only the Burroughs hardware manuals to rely on. I remember that day, when we were struggling in the computer room on the 10th floor of Air India building, when Mr Kohli dropped by and asked about the progress. We explained that the power supply was giving us headaches – so he took the manuals home to apply his experience of the power sector from his Tata Electric days.
That really energized us, and we applied ourselves to the problem with renewed vigor. Unfortunately, the vigor went overboard, and one of the electricians turned on the power when I was handling a live cable. To this day I will not forget the shock of 600amps, which ran through my body and threw me back some six feet or so. I cannot repeat what I said to the apologetic electrician but my whole team was stunned and inspired to fix the problem. We worked overnight and were able to power up the machine by morning!!
Mr Ramadorai (TCS 1972-2014) is the President of Fortess. He served as the CEO and Managing Director of TCS from 1996 to 2009 and as Vice-Chairman from 2009 to 2014. Read more about him here.
