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The late bloomer

Vikram Talwar is one of those few corporate daredevils who chose the rough road of entrepreneurship at a rather ripe age of 51 and set up EXL Service Holdings in 1999.

Vikram Talwar is one of those few corporate daredevils who chose the rough road of entrepreneurship at a rather ripe age of 51 and set up EXL Service Holdings in 1999. Today, the Nasdaq-listed firm is a major BPO player with 12,500 employees and serves its predominantly US clients in the insurance, banking, capital markets, utilities, travel and transportation sectors. A go-getter and firm believer in India?s skilled manpower, Talwar tells Sudhir Chowdhary that one is never too old for a new adventure in life

After a long and distinguished career with Bank of America, Vikram Talwar could have spent the rest of his life playing golf. Instead, he chose to set up a company that today is one of India’s largest business process outsourcing (BPO) firms. The executive-chairman of EXL Service Holdings, which has over 12,500 employees and a market cap of over $500 million, has a simple philosophy in life: ?it’s never too late to take control of the steering wheel of your life. Have the patience to find out what you want. Answers do not always come in books. Patience in discovering your answer and persistence in pursuing your goals will draw you closer to discovering your sense of purpose. And, on the way there, remember no matter how smart you think you are, remain humble?.

Without any doubt, patience, persistence and humility have been instrumental in shaping Talwar?s personality and success in the work world. ?They also guide you to being happier at work,? he feels. ?Both of my parents worked when I was growing up, which was rare in India at that time. They taught me the biggest lesson I learnt as a young man: how to work with people. I learnt by their example how to deal with co-workers in a way that is real and natural. No one should see you as arrogant or artificial, no matter their level.?

On completing his MBA in 1970, Talwar started his career with Bank of America in San Francisco. ?I arrived on my 21st birthday, probably the most exhilarating time of my life. I worked for the bank in the United States, in India and in nine other countries in Asia. In those days you didn?t jump jobs every few years.?

At the bank, Talwar held several senior management positions in over nine countries in Asia. Among the more important of these were the head of Asia division marketing in Tokyo; head of Asia division operations and technology in Hong Kong; country manager in Indonesia; regional director for south-east Asia in Singapore and country manager for India. He was among the youngest senior vice-presidents of the bank in 1991 when he was named CEO of the bank’s extensive Indian operations, which were among the largest global businesses of the bank in terms of profitability. During that period the bank was ranked the number one foreign bank in India.

After 26 years with the bank, Talwar told his wife that he wanted to retire and was going back to India to play golf. Being an executive recruiter, it wasn’t tough for his wife to find him a job with Ernst & Young. Talwar left Bank of America in 1996 and for the next two years worked with Ernst & Young Consulting in New York. He was assigned as CEO and managing director at Ernst & Young Consulting, India, and was also Ernst & Young?s Asia director for its global operate business (outsourcing). Ernst & Young wanted to move aggressively into the outsourcing space, but eventually shelved its plans. And so Talwar, a firm believer in India’s skilled manpower industry, decided to do it on his own.

?But 51 is not an age when people get into entrepreneurship, do they?? he questions. He recalls how in the early 1990s, Rohit Kapoor (his partner in EXL) and he used to entertain a lot of entrepreneurial ideas in the US, starting with a plan to establish an Indian financial services firm that could loan capital to small and medium-sized enterprises in India. The duo produced a business plan but could not get it funded.

In 1999, Talwar teamed up with Kapoor to set up EXL Service Holdings, a BPO firm. Like Talwar, Rohit had also earned his MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, but they did not actually meet and become friends till both were working for Bank of America in India. Like many of their company?s executives and managers, Kapoor and Talwar were educated in India but spent much of their professional lives working in multinational companies both in India and abroad.

?But our company went through some difficult times,? Talwar confesses. ?When we started in 1999, Gary Wendt, the former chairman and CEO of GE Capital Services, joined us as our chairman. We were a pioneer in setting up shop as a third-party service provider in India, which was a huge risk. We couldn?t find funding, and Gary helped us find it. When he became chairman and CEO of Conseco and tried to direct a turnaround there, he decided to outsource work to India.?

To achieve that, Conseco bought EXL in 2001. A year later, Conseco filed for bankruptcy. ?A majority of our revenue came from the Conseco operations, so we lost our major client and most of our revenue and had no way to pay our employees. It was then when we, along with Oak Hill Capital Partners and FTVentures, bought EXL back, found new clients and never fired a single employee. That has helped our image in the marketplace, particularly with potential employees,? he says.

The company was listed on Nasdaq in 2006. Today, EXL is a major BPO player and primarily serves the needs of Global 1,000 companies in the insurance, banking, capital markets, utilities, travel and transportation sectors. EXL has its corporate office in New York and operations in India, the Philippines, Czech Republic and Romania.

True to his words, Talwar feels there is no substitute for hard work. Adopting the right culture and adhering to it is important. ?We have a strict corporate code of conduct, we have policies that allow openness, we allow our people to express themselves. A leader has to be seen; a leader can?t be sitting in a room passing orders. No one can motivate anybody more than a leader. And you can?t do that by issuing orders or sending odd videos. It can be done by standing out there and doing what they are doing at the same time and at the same place.?

Last October, the EXL management announced that Talwar would transition to the role of non-executive chairman of the Board of the Company effective April 1, 2011. ?The past six months have allowed me to transition my responsibilities to Rohit, who is about 15 years younger than I am. We manage by consensus. I have never said, ‘I am older; I am more experienced’.?

The other important aspect of being a leader is to know when to leave; in fact, it is probably, the toughest and the most important part of being a leader, knowing when to leave, feels Talwar. ?How many people who consider themselves as leaders want to leave??

No wonder, succession has been very easy, which is usually not the case.

?Also remember you are never too old to embark on a new adventure in life,? he says. But quiz Talwar on whether he is gung-ho on yet another stint as an entrepreneur and his response is crisp: definitely not. ?Life is never perfect. You make plans, they have to be changed. But you keep moving, keep flowing along. I myself am trying to figure out how to reinvent myself from next month onwards,? he signs off rather philosophically.

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First published on: 25-03-2011 at 03:55 IST
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