In this, the third part of our series LEADERBRIEF | Lessons for a lifetime – Ramesh Narayan, we follow the story of the distinguished and inspirational Narayan’s story. The series is based upon Ramesh’s remarkable and significant book, A Different Route To Success (It Could Be Yours), in which he narrates his ‘very different success story’ from a distinguished career, combining interesting anecdotes, honest insights and more for a very different look at success.
In his usual, pithy and engaging fashion, this is inspiration from Ramesh Narayan – respected leader and evangelist in the space of Advertising, Management and more.
It is a truly inspiring story too, because it is, after all, about a little-fancied candidate who had never studied management or advertising, but built a successful advertising agency over 24 years. Who excelled in everything he attempted: writing, photography, business, industry initiatives, and more. Who wrote about advertising in columns for leading publications all his working life, and then retired at the age of 50 to start life anew as an industry person and in the social space. That’s a small part of Ramesh Narayan for you.
This series will have 31 rewarding parts. In each chapter, Ramesh opens up on his life, what success means to him and what got him to where he reached. He also offers a host of practical learnings gleaned from his experiences.
Read, reap, revel.
Firstly, I experienced the paradox of Indian agriculture. We keep reading about unemployment and disguised unemployment in agriculture. I just couldn’t get people to work on my farm.
Maybe it was because the new international airport was coming up a mere twenty minute’s drive away, so laborers preferred to work on construction sites with a higher daily wage and also enjoy the bright city lights and the pleasures it offered, to working on a quiet and lonely farm.
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Secondly I was forbidden to move to Bengaluru as our son was in the final year of school. And I realized the handicaps of being an absentee landlord.
Thirdly, the phone rang one day and Pradeep Guha said friends were pushing him to take on the mantle of President of the India Chapter of the International Advertising Association (IAA) and he wanted me to come on board as his Vice President.
I protested saying I was now very distant from the advertising industry. I had no stake in it. I was completely out of touch with the goings-on and so on. But Pradeep can be as persuasive as he can be short. He recalled the time in the nineties when he was the Hon. Secretary and I was the Hon. Treasurer of the IAA which at that time had all of 50 members and met for Managing Committee meetings over lunch at the Trattoria restaurant. Nostalgia can be very soothing.
It’s difficult to say no to him. So the compromise reached was that I would not hold any position, because I insisted on that, but I would be on his Managing Committee and would help him to make things happen, if I could.
And I was back in the industry I was so fond of.
Lesson learned: Life has its own way of charting a course. It is best if you accept the changes with grace and go about adjusting to them, rather than resisting them. Yes there will be the uneasiness that comes with uncertainty, but who has seen tomorrow? True happiness comes with the ability to revel in the uncertainty of tomorrow.
As a knowledge-driven service, MediaBrief.com likes to help enabling and empowering its large audience of professionals with insights, wisdom and inspiration from the experience of leaders, experts. Our deep-dive stories with and for the community, as also our two popular podcast series, The Master’s Voice and MediaCast, stem from that mission. LEADERBRIEF | Lessons for a lifetime – Ramesh Narayan is from the same place.