MANAV GARG | EKA SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS

Three year growth 90.5% | 2010 Revenue Rs.37 Crore

 

There are no Stupid Ideas. Everyone should pitch in.

If you try to describe Manav Garg, CEO of Eka Software, don’t use words. Try numbers instead. Garg is all of 37 years. He began with a million- dollar seed fund. It took him five minutes to convince his then boss to invest. Today, he wants five more years from his investors, most of them worth a billion dollars. If they give the nod, Garg will take his $10-million firm to a new height— the $100-million mark. Eka Software may have conquered UK and the US, but Garg’s primary target is India. He wants to be the country’s largest product software company. 

AS TOLD TO ROHINI BANERJEE 

 

I grew up in a small middle-class town called Moga in Punjab. You don’t get everything you want in such places. That’s a good thing sometimes, because it teaches you a thing or two. It taught me the need to be disciplined. On school days, I would be up by 4:30am. The early morning habit has stuck on. Now I wake up by 6:15am. The first thing I do is get up and switch on my BlackBerry I don’t feel the need for any coffee or tea to kick-start my day. It is business from the word go. 

 

Since Eka Software has offices across continents, my team and I work according to various time zones. On usual days, I talk to the head of production, based out of London, in the mornings. That’s his time to turn in. It makes sense to have a quick chat about his day and plan mine accordingly. The quick chat lasts about 15 minutes. After the call, it is time to exercise - another childhood habit I believe in the wholesome benefit of a quick jog, a round of lawn tennis or badminton. 

 

Breakfast means cereals, milk shakes or home-cooked poha or idli. I love cooking elaborate dinners for my friends and family on weekends. On weekdays, I like to stick to light food. 

 

My son and daughter are six and three respectively. My schedule allows me to spend a little time with them in the morning. I make it a point to either drop my daughter or son to their schools. I commute 40 minutes to reach my office. The school detour takes me 20 minutes. The rest of the journey is spent on calls or listening to classical music. 

 

l am one of the first five to arrive in office. The rest of the office is in by 11am. I am strict about discipline, but that’s only as far as delivery is concerned. I believe that promises should be kept. Eke is, otherwise, a relaxed space to work in. Our office is an open, quirky, boomerang-shaped place. We don’t have cubicles. The design and culture of the office go hand-in-hand. We have tried to establish a sense of space and harmony. Everyone’s allowed to be individualistic and bounce ideas off each other. But in the end, everyone is part of a larger whole. We are all passionate about R&D. My mantra is—there are no stupid ideas. I believe everyone has the right to make errors. Eke works on certain principles. We call them the ‘seven senses’. They are innovation, team work, discipline, growth, fun, community and environment. 

 

I began with a five-member team. Today, Eka has 220-odd people working for it. I have a massive pre-sales team. In a fast-moving industry like ours, it’s important to constantly innovate and interact with clients. On a usual month, our pre-sales team engages with nearly 90 customers. ‘They are an important part of my team as they know the pulse of the folks on the ground. I spend an hour with that team every day, trying to think long-term and looking at key aspects as product differentiation. ‘The idea is not to intervene. I just help them brainstorm.

 

When we had a smaller team, l used to involve myself in every nitty-gritty I have learnt to let go now and let senior folks handle all that My main task is to manage talent and strategise.

 

We are also trying to fortify Eka’s marketing and business strategy. We want A-list clients and for that you have to constantly travel, network and meet people. Meetings take up a pretty large chunk of my time. I usually call CIOs or CEOs of client companies every week, or go and meet people whenever I can. It’s a great way to receive feedback and keep tabs on the ground reality Connectivity is very important and we have been looking at Linked ln and Twitter to improve our web presence.

 

We all break for lunch around 1pm. I am famished by then. That half an hour is dedicated to food, sports and political news. Post-lunch hours are usually packed with work so we make the most of this time. Usually, the UK office begins work after we’re done with lunch. From 2pm, we start making calls both to the US and the UK. By 7:30pm, I am ready to call it quits for the day. 

 

I try to be home by 815pm to tuck in my daughter. By nine, I am at the dinner table for a light meal of soup and sandwich with my wife. Then it’s me and book time. Right now, I am reading the Swedish crime thriller called The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I hardly watch films or TV. Of course, everything depends on business calls. If there’s one, this evening routine goes for a toss. 

 

I love unwinding after a fully-packed workweek. Two days every week, I sit down with my daughter to learn Hindustani classical music from our guruji. I absolutely love this session. It’s something I had wanted to do for a long time. My wife and son are exempted from the classes. 

 

I am usually in bed by 11pm. However, what man proposes, work disposes. At this phase of Eka, I have to travel to our offices in London, NYC, Venezuela and Australia. And, there’s no way you can faithfully stick to a regime when you are travelling. 

 

My business trips are special to me. The idea for Eka had sprung up during one such trip. I mustered up the courage to tell the chairman of GP Groups, where I was working then, of my plans. He agreed to loan me $5 million. Promptly, I spent a large chunk into launching Eka. That was one milestone crossed. Whether the next one will be an acquisition or reaching the $100-million mark or being known as the leader of the vertical, I still don’t know. But these don’t seem like wishful dreams anymore. They are achievable plans. When I go off to sleep, they’re all I can think of.