Bidding Good Bye to the Virtual Client's Team..... :)

Dear All,

After two year of exciting and memorable stint with you all, I am bidding adieu today to my organization to pursue other career opportunities. As I move on, I would like to take a moment to remember and cherish our times together. It's been great interacting and knowing each one of you.

Even though I will miss you all here I am looking forward to this new challenge and to start a new phase of my career.

This is not a goodbye, only "hasta luego" or "see you later". Do stay in touch.

My personal contacts are:
Email (shireeshmishra@gmail.com)
Can also be added to Linkedin, Facebook, Orkut network... :)

Hey mates....there is something more in the basket for each one of you. Read it through and feel the connection J

• James Coupel – I was bowled out by your business acumen and end-to-end thought process which had the requisite level of clarity and assertiveness. One thing I had observed that James is radically different while he is in the office atmosphere or out at party or in a pub.
• Gary Joesbury – A great Manager who knows how to manage expectations and communication across various levels of organization. Thanks a lot Gary, for trusting me and providing me a wonderful opportunity to work with the UK team and manage the work-stack solely. I was really nervous when I first landed in the BT office, but then the support and guidance I received from Gary and Nick was tremendous, that made me to stand up to everyone’s expectations.
• Paul Walker – An amiable and witty person with great sense of humor and attitude towards work
• Nick Hall – I really respect Nick for his unique ways of helping and grooming the team during the initial days of this project engagement. A dedicated worker who rarely used to pick my phone calls while I was based in London as I used to bug him a lot with all sorts of small and big queries. I really enjoyed the DVD collection of your son, they were nice J
• Joe Hayes – Though haven’t interacted much with Joes but seems to be a very busy guy; very difficult to catch him over call/messenger etc. etc.; have heard that he has good contact with BT Senior Management, especially when it come to getting booking in BTC for conference rooms etc.
• Richard Martin – awe-inspiring personality, great deal of technical skills and very down to earth, social/helping person, Hats-off to you dear….!! J
• Kam Gareja (Smita, Kiran, Meha) – Beers is the greatest necessity in his life, greatest motivator, biggest energizer. Would suggest BT to provide him gallons of Beers as Annual performance Bonus. Given said that Kam is really dedicated employee as well who goes the extra mile to get his work done, I have seen many a times when he used to work till late or even over the weekend, has cancelled many of his leaves/holidays for work. Also, his family is really sweet especially his daughters who keeps on teasing him for anything and everything. They really gave me a homely treatment and I have saved those memories in my ‘pleasant memories’ folder. Mate, there is one more humble request from you to take custody of my bag and keep it at your place for a few more months, I am gonna arrange something for sure (if that can be managed easily.. thanks)
  
• Phil Dawson – A nice individual, very fanatical and true professional; I still remember the bright sunny morning of July 2007 when I along with Deepika and Sushant went to BT’s Birmingham Office and was greeted by Phil. We used to be late most often, asked all sort of questions, weren’t that impressive during the initial days but Phil always managed to be co-operative, clam and helpful. I still have the ‘I love Birmingham’ mug in front of me given by Phil as a good-bye gift. It was a splendid experience.
• Simon Elwood – A great, sensible and pragmatic personality. We used to sit opposite to each other at BT’s Holborn office. I still have some faded memories of those time when in the late evening, I used to be the boss of Holborn Office, fifth floor after Simon used to leave and He used to tell me “Shireesh, you are the boss now.. JJJ”.
• Steve Strazzante – Very dedicated professional, used to work late evening, even over weekends and has exceptional technical skills to reach great heights. We used to interact/discuss at times around BTB data and various data sources. Further, Steve, thanks a lot for helping me out various times, once when we were supposed to courier one of the BT laptop to Birmingham office.
• Hayley Morrison - Miss.‘H’ (Hetch) JJJ, I still remember Nick Hall’s party at ‘The Old Nick, London’ when we interacted quite a bit. You are a lovely lady with all the wits and humor, always ready to help everyone.
• Jim Downes – A very polite and silent person though very friendly in his own ways. I remember the time when I accomplished a few quick ‘telephone matching’ tasks for you and you were really impressed, and the time when we together went to meet Chris and Dawn from ML where you introduced me as a data expert and BTB Analytics work-stack lead, it was really like a great compliment for me at that point in time.
• Carol Reeve – Sweet, young JJJ lady with a beautiful smile always on her face. She really sounded truly young at her heart in the first interaction itself and I was really impressed by her overall personality.
• Andy Sangster – A nice and witty person who always leaves positive vibes around everyone whom he interacts with. I still cherish while memorizing that February 2008 Morning at Croydon during the break-time of the training session when Andy himself walked towards me to get himself introduced. That was the first face-to-face interaction though we had chatted even before on conference calls.
• John De’Giovanni – John, we really miss your all the small and big favors you did for us and our team. I think you must be getting annoyed at times due to the high dependency of mine on you for various operational issues in BT such as Identity card activation, ordering head-phone system, order progressing, sign-in in BT office before I got my ID card, Accomodation etc etc. I remember the long discussion we had during the drinks party organized by Nick Hall at 'The Old Nick' :):). Truly a wonderful person to work with.
  
• Kavita – The ‘NEW JOHN’ ……. I think it was a nice proposition to get you in place of John.. he he.. J JJJJ, very lively young lady with immense sense of humor. I am really envious as you have stolen my desk (at BT’s Holborn office) JJ, I guess it still has my name sticker pasted on the drawers.
• Louise Scott – Hey Louise, you are such a darling, always wearing a smile, a committed professional, a little low at excel/access and technical things but indeed very enthusiastic while learning new skills. So dear, are Phil and Kam still looking for Mr.Perfect for you? or they have given up….? I remember, Nishant, Sachin and Shireesh as a few names in their list.. he he he JJJ
• Adrian Churchill – Reminds me of any scientist, funny, committed professional.
• Nigel Murphy – A nice, soft spoken personality and always greets everyone with a smile on his face. Never seen him in tension even though there were lots of issues in the Seibel migration project.
• Bob Allen – Mr. Gatekeeper for all EDW access requests. Really hard to reach over phone or email but when you meet him in person he altogether a different personality. I remember a call when Bob called me and said “Mate, we need to fix this issue and would appreciate your assistance” this was related to some base build issues (SCARS I guess). Before this call, there was a kind of terror in my mind for Bob and I really used to get scared of him… JJJ he he JJ
• Kelly Brennan – A wonderful Project Manager and very enthusiastic person; She knows how to get work done and how to keep things moving. Thanks for your support during the ‘Welcome to Service’ Data Automation Project. It was a splendid experience working with you. All the very best for the new assignment of managing analytics workstack... :)
  

Please keep in touch and don't dare to forget me... (he he he - :) smile)

Cheers All,

Shireesh

An Interview Excerpt from the year 2019 .... - Feel the connection :)

MONDAY 3, JUNE 2019, NEW DELHI Business Standard

Q&A SHIREESH MISHRA, Exe. Director & CEO, DATACUMEN ANALYTICS, India

‘Fasten your seat-belts and stick to driver’s seat as the world changes’

The amiable Shireesh Mishra aka ‘Lucky’, CEO of Datacumen Analytics is one of a kind in the crazy corporate world. An electronics engineer and an MBA, having more than 13 years of corporate experience, is the co-founder of India’s aspiring–to-be-top analytics firm. The author of three books and various white papers on branding and strategic analytics sat down for a chat with Business Standard’s David Merholz at ‘The London Summit 2019’. Excerpts:

To start with, can you please tell me something about ‘Datacumen Analytics’?

Datacumen Analytics is a growing analytics firm which helps businesses in their strategic decision making using customized delivery models. The name ‘Datacumen’ was devised way back in the year 2009 when I used to work with Evalueserve (EVS), one of the leading KPO’s in India with diversified services portfolio. ‘Datacumen’ represents use of business acumen generated using data sourced from various business systems. In turn contributing to meaningful business insights and augmenting business decision-making process.

In view of this highly volatile business world, what are the new marketing dynamics that come into play as analytics firms caters to companies who want more bang for the buck?

We as strategic partners to our clients always try to be closely aligned with their business to keep track of what is happening with them. When the economic slow down came in the year 2017, one of the first thing we did was to carry out a comprehensive survey across 500 top chief executive officers and chief marketing officers across the globe (especially focused around U.S.,U.K. and India) to map the macro-economic environment in the near future through our consulting strategic partners. Such value-added offerings leading to industry focused business acumen blended with technical expertise are helping us address our client’s needs.

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"If you wait to be happy, you will wait forever. But if you start to be happy, you will be happy forever"

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What is your motto in life? How would you define life?

“Dream as if you will live forever and live as if you will die tomorrow” – this is my idealistic quote and I always try to live with this motto. Regarding defining ‘LIFE’, then it’s a tricky question and I am still exploring this mysterious lady called ‘life’. Life has always been a marathon for me striving hard through out to achieve my dreams. It’s well said that "No one can go back and change a bad beginning, but anyone can start anything anytime and create a successful ending“. So we can start planning and implementing things at any stage of our lives. It’s the sustained ability to change that really counts.

Further, I would like to add that "If you wait to be happy, you will wait forever. But if you start to be happy, you will be happy forever"

Bring me through one of the most constructive experience that were formative and that helped you get to where you are now.

I still remember the evening of December 2, 2006 when I was interviewed for EVS which gave me the real exposure to this corporate world. There used to be a guy named Muthu working with EVS as a team lead, who later started his own venture and currently based in U.S. I still remember the discussion we had during the interview where he mentioned that he is looking for a guy with technical skills as well as business acumen and I was that best fit there. The first project I worked on was for a Pharma client and I was asked to lead a team of 4. Later EVS rolled out to be a very good platform with ample learning opportunities in terms of technical skills and people management exposure. I went through various phases of ups and downs within a short tenure of 2.5 years and came face-to-face with the real corporate world. There was a time when I started hating this side of the world but that was the true experience which gave me the right skills and acumen to fight back and reach where I am now. I worked on various projects and under the guidance and flagship of various senior and middles management personnel's such as Manoj Madhusudanan, Pratyush Prabhat, Muthu, Bhavya, Atanu, Anubhav Tripathi, Vikram Saraswat, Irfan Ahmad, Nitin Gupta etc. During my tenure with EVS, I worked with a UK Telecom giant for a significant time period also went abroad for six months which transformed me into a new individual altogether. I remember the bright sunny morning of June 2008 (as far as I remember) in London when I met Marc Vollenweider (CEO, EVS) and was really impressed by his overall personality and clarity in his each word/communication/thought process. I still remember those wonderful days where there was work, fun and friends. For most of my business acumen, communication, knowledge, skills, I credit to my time spent at EVS. But all good things must come to an end. It was a very tough decision to bite the bullet and leave EVS, my work place, my colleagues, my friends, my memories. However, I don’t regret it. Had I not made the move then, you might not be sitting here with me in this ‘Business Leaders’ Summit’ having this exquisite coffee over this conversation.

What did you learn from that experience? Anything specific you would like to share with us.

It was, how to manage tough client situations, expectation management within the team, with the client and with the top management, how to talk and act smartly about you had never heard the previous day, about how to crack nuts. Operationally, I became very good, in terms of attention to detail. Back then, I rarely had good things to say especially during the later half of my tenure. I never said, “Wow! Things are moving awesome”; I learned how to motivate people during a tough time and keep the team spirit intact. I learned how to keep my own wits and not to panic. If you panic, everybody goes with you pretty fast. I learned to strike a balance between various levels of communications and to stay cool and motivated during tough times. I would like to suggest everyone that one should be have long terms goals in mind and should act accordingly. If you are working for a company with a motive of learning new things and then probably will move-on in a couple of years, in such cases we shouldn’t take much tension about management issues and should concentrate on work and strive hard for other learning opportunities within the organization. On the other hand, if you have long term plan with the current organization then ‘NEVER TAKE PANGA FROM YOUR BOSS’. I remember one of my subordinate in EVS (in the year 2009) named Sharad Sharma who told me the golden rules of corporate world i.e. “Rule#1 – Boss is always right; Rule# 2 – Boss is always right; Rule#3 – If Boss is not right, then go to rule no. 1”

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“… my tenure in EVS had been somewhat of a roller coaster ride……………… fight over .. evaluations ….wrangle for the team …. struggle to get team party slot …………

in short,

it taught me to bond!”

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I understand that you re-joined EVS in the year 2012? What were the key drivers?

I never wanted to quit from EVS but the circumstances were such that I had to take that step in 2009. I left the organization for my personal growth especially in terms of acquiring technical skills which I thought was really important if you want to grow in your career. I joined a mumbai based start-up firm ‘Cequity Solutions’ under the flagship of S.Swaminathan, Ajay Kelkar and Nagaraj Kulkarni. These key individuals were the building block of the firm and had the right blend of skills to take the company to great heights. I really appreciate the exposure I got at Cequity and my personal contribution to grow and stabilize the organization using what I had acquired during my tenure at EVS. In response to your specific query, I re-joined EVS as I really appreciated the organization for it’s good things and there was an opportunity matching my skills.

It’s very interesting, would you like to share with us some of your faded memories during your initial tenure with EVS? May be some of the individuals with whom you have spent quality time may be reading this article.

Yes, of course, in fact I would like to thank you and Business Standard for making me to refresh my golden memories of the past.

The two and half years of my tenure in EVS had been somewhat got so much affection and respect.

I remember some of key individuals like Muthu and Pratyush for their unique style of people management and for trusting me on critical assignments. Ankur Shanker, Nishant Awasthi for their knowledge and skills; Aman, Deepali, Bidisha, Priya, Abhishek, The funny bone - Davide, Rishi, Shonit, Ravi, Deepika, Debarati, Amit, Meghna, Stuti, Sushant as the old timers. Among the new generation I still have a warm memories of Aditya, Ankur, Animesh, The Red Phone Box - DJ, Govind, Sakshi, Sangeeta, Arghya, Shalini, Abhishek, Rupali, Ankit, Anuradha, Amit G, Sachin, Nishant, Manish, Gunjan, Ekta, Mitul, Megha, Nupur, Nitika, Aneesha, Rajeev etc etc from the DA Gang. Also from our Business Research counterparts I still have faded memories of the power-puff girl ‘Baldeep’, Rahul (s), Ashish M, Prenul, Abhinay, Anjali, Saurabh C etc etc.. Oops! there was one more charming young lady whose name I just can’t recall.. hmm… hmmm…. Sorry can’t remember, but even I really had a crush on her JJ. Actually she should be shot point blank J in the public interest as there were lots of guys who were crazy about her and hence lots of issues and complications. Furthermore, I had a few friends non-DAians such as Aneesh, Anand, Rupali V, Pooja K, Garima, Pooja Singh, Himanshu J, Geetu, Jaya, Nidhi etc. etc.

As I got off the roller coaster ride I realized how important role the place and the people play in our lives. But I always look back and am thankful to EVS which has given me so much in terms of opportunities and growth.

Any tips for the vibrant and aspiring new generation as a success mantra?

I would just to like to say that “Fasten your seat-belts and stick to driver’s seat as the world changes”. To remain competitive in the current environment one needs to acquire all the right skills which includes, technical expertise along with business acumen. They should always keep on growing their knowledge base around all the related areas and should keep track of ‘what’s hot in the industry’.

One last Question, if you weren’t the CEO of Datacumen, what would you be doing now?

Dreaming, Painting, Sketching, Roaming, may be a Politician or a Teacher…. U never know.. Life is so uncertain…………………….!! JJJ