Born a dyslexic child in West Virginia, John Chambers, chairman emeritus, Cisco, transformed himself into one of the world’s best business leaders. A Silicon Valley visionary, he is credited with turning around Cisco, from a simple router company into a global technology giant with revenue of $49.3 billion in 2018. This past week, he was named for the Padma Bhushan award by the Government of India. Excerpts from an interview:

If you look at the global economy, let me start with the best country that is India. It has the strongest economic growth and is actually accelerating. India’s GDP is growing four quarter more faster than China and it will grow in the next decade. The U.S. is not doing that great so you see the stock market slightly skittish.

Federal Reserve has to be more creative. It is good not great. Europe is struggling with the Brexit going on and France is strongest in the group. Now, the global economy is doing okay, not great and that’s reflected in the financial markets overall. But if one country is doing best, you have to give credit to India.

Great question. In 2000 I was the first one to see that recession was going to be much more severe than the dot.com bust. I used to term this as the 100 years flood. At Cisco, we realised that the whole economy is going down. I got surprised when our 70% growth came down to 30% in 45 days. It was impossible mathematically. However, in 2007, I saw the data in the U.S. from the financial institutions and from my customers that slowed the ordering.

When I saw the financial markets, I was concerned that something was not right and that a problem was coming. Everybody said John will go wrong but you know in nine months there was a great recession.

At the present time, I do not see the same warning signals. There are challenges all around because of government inaction, non-constructive action. Inspite of what is going on around you, India is solid. There is slowing growth scenario reflecting in the markets but I do not see the same types of warning signals. At least, this time, we perhaps are solid than earlier.

I think India is more independent than any other country. You have agriculture and the number of jobs you are going to create and due to your internal consumption. You are hugely aided by foreign direct investment in job creation that India actually controls its destiny better than any countries.

Protectionism, in the long run, never ever worked and [is] not good for the economy. The leaderships must rise on their approach and interdependency between countries is very important. The most strategic relation with India and the U.S. is the India-U.S. strategic partnership.

We should be the most strategic partners in the world, both economically and in job creation, innovation and I, as the chairman, want that kind of partnership.

If you look at the economy over the last four and half years, if you look at the tough decisions that the Modi government had made and if you look at the business results that they got, they are really good. This is better than any other country. Out of my investment in 16 start-ups, eight are from first and second generation CEOs and founders from India. The tough decisions that were made on the GST, demonetisation, the IBC are really good. If you look at the business results in the terms of number of start-ups, the funding was 100% over a year ago. It takes time for a start-up to create jobs. Now, you started to see the more number of unicorns in India. 18 unicorns last year against eight the year before. You suddenly see the M&As and investments by foreign businesses in the Indian economy right next to China in terms of 20% higher than China. U.S. investors were most optimist than they were ever been on India believing on the changes that are occurring.

One has to understand that start-ups will be job creators five to 15 years from now. Giving Uniphore as an example, it has just160 people. But it is sitting in its inflection point. In the next three years we will go from $9 million sales to $100 million. But in the next three years, their head count will rise to over 500 people. So, as you begin to get into later stage, because of the changes made by the government and good execution by the investors’ side, you got to see headcount increase in the next two years. Another start up I am involved with is Lucideus. They have under 200 people and $3 million in sales and they will add more people in the next seven years. In India people need to have patience, it takes time to create jobs. The crop of start-ups that now you see and growing at a tremendous speed will leverage in their inflection point because they are growing at 30% a year. The population in India must understand that more jobs will be created in the future. Overall, the government has done a very good job and I will be very surprised if NDA changes.

You have got the best economy in the world, you are creating jobs in general, you are making changes that many counties are not willing to do and I will give pretty high marks.

One thing I do pretty well is that I never undo moves on chess boards, I play all the way up to the end. And that is the way I tend to approach business.

So, when I left Cisco, the board asked me what I would do next and I said let me experiment with start-ups and make investments and inspire them. Formally, JC2 was started two years ago. It has been exciting so far and out of my 18 start-ups, 60% are going to do well. They have problems every week and that is what start-ups are all about.

Ratan Tata is a good friend, a very good man and very successful. To be the same thing as Ratan Tata is an honour. I am very much aware of his involvement, investment and focus on start-ups. I am doing this four times. I am a coach, I am a strategic partner, I help in strategy, innovations, I work on the leadership team, I work on culture and into communications with customers. So, I come more as strategic partner and we also invest in unique business models. Ratan is an amazing man.

Absolutely. I will be very disappointed if India will not rival Silicon Valley in technology and start-ups in the next 10 years. There are role models in Silicon Valley that people all over the world follow. But India does not have that. If we can create one role model in India, then others will follow. I had lot of coaches who helped me, Jack Welch, Jamie Dimon, George Bush, Bill Clinton. Also people from Oracle and HP helped me to build my company but those role models are not in India and that is what we are going to do.

Many things that India is doing is absolutely okay. When you get a problem to this government, they try their best to change.

They should continue to do what they are doing well. Five to six years ago, India was viewed as not so innovative, very bureaucratic, very rigid and very difficult to work with.

India today is a fast innovator, it takes the risks.

So, [for] the first 10 years, continue to do what you are doing. The angel tax, which makes no sense, must go. Here it is not easy for a start-up to do an IPO. There are multiple areas you need to improve.

Business-wise, being the chairman of U.S.-India Strategic Partnership Forum, I play a small role in helping to change the country and doing things in an inclusive basis. I am also giving back.

My wife is the chairperson of Hewlett Packard Charitable Foundation and I am giving back through her.

In personal life I have a son and daughter. My son John handles JC2 Ventures.

My daughter who builds houses has her own start ups.

She has built 48 custom made houses. And I have two grand kinds who are just amazing. I love to hunt & fish. My personal life is family first. And then I have a great team and am part of that.

I am leaving with two thoughts. I love India, I love the people. I think you would be the fastest growing economy in the world. And if you do it right, you will double the per capita income every 10 years. And it would be very impressive.

I think you need to dream bigger. For young people in particular, you have to be patient as some things do take time. You must make sure that you are doing things right and you don’t change the course of action.