“My passion is to understand the nuts and bolts of any industry”

Snehil Gambhir, Chief Operating Officer, Aviva India, walks down memory lane as he speaks about his experience during his first job at a fast food restaurant to his tryst with IT. All this enriching recollection of till his current responsibility of heading the IT function at Aviva India. Dataquest joins him in his flashback journey. Excerpts...

 

Initial days...Abraham Lincoln had said, ‘I do the very best I know how- the very best I can; and I mean to keep on doing so until the end.' That's that mantra I follow in life too. I do whatever I can, in the best possible way that I know, both in my professional and personal life. I have never done anything with the single minded goal of becoming just successful, I believe in giving my best to everything that I do so as to make a difference. Success just followed. From a fast food restaurant, Consulting, to Plastics, Research, Finance, Oil & Gas to Insurance, I have worked in different industries in varied roles. My passion is to understand the nuts and bolts of any industry.

First job...My first job was as a Manager in a fast food restaurant in Maryland, USA. I started working right after my graduation to fund my MBA. The experience of working in a restaurant was extremely rewarding. It was here that I learnt the top-most rule for customer service, ‘the customer is always right'. I also realised that the essence of a good customer service is forming a relationship with your customer- a relationship that he/she would like to continue. In order to build that relationship, you have to connect with different customers at different levels.

Connecting link...Soon after my MBA at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, I joined ZS associates, an international Management Consulting firm specializing in sales and marketing strategy development, and moved to Chicago, London and then Amsterdam. A different facet of learning here was the idea of moving mountains to meet a client deadline.

IT Connection...I forayed more strongly into IT whilst at GE where I got an opportunity to be a Digitisation leader. I was given the task of driving automation, and reducing costs by adoption of technology across various departments. The project was a huge success, and helped instill the importance of information and technology to make any business efficient. Over the next 10 years, I held various Operational roles in GE in different countries and worked with mainstream IT & BPO vendors and suppliers to drive improvements in processes within the organisation.

At Aviva...When I joined Aviva in 2009, my focus was to help the company become a leading insurance company with a strong focus on profitable growth, and quality, by using innovations in technology. We started a journey of IT transformation in Aviva, pioneering the online insurance platform and a significant sales channel for the company. This included developing an industry leading buying and issuance experience for our customers. Our recent IT successes include conversion of our core policy administration platform to CSC-Life Asia platform, and the launch of our first mobile application, ‘Aviva mobile'. Available on any Android, Blackberry/RIM and iOS based smart device, this application will help our customers get in touch with us at the click of a button.

Recounting facts...As an engineer by education, it comes naturally. Also, driving customer satisfaction is the ultimate redemption that you can get. However, the journey has not been smooth and I have had to face many adversities which I have tried to turn into opportunities at every level. Managing service delivery operations including IT has been the biggest challenge. Moreover, there is a continual pressure on cost, quality of manpower available, and expectations from the management. Having a broad experience and knowledge base helped me in connecting with lines of business, and I delivered the goals of the organisations that I led despite the obstacles.

My take...I am happy with the journey so far and would not like to change anything about it. I have had a global and multi-cultural exposure, which gave me a strong foundation of integrity, innovation and excellence. This has helped me in delivering value to the organisations and clients that i have worked for. I would just like to tell everyone that if you have the passion in you, and enjoy the work that you do, then no one can stop you from being successful. You need to lead by example and not let obstacles stop you in achieving your goals.

Second option...If not an engineer, I would have become a doctor. For me, the most important thing in any profession or career is to be able to make a real impact on people's lives. To be able to change people's lives in even a small way can give you immense job satisfaction.

My passion...Travelling to different countries has always been a passion since childhood. Till date, I have been able to retain that passion and have explored more than 50 countries. Even my children have inherited the passion to travel and love to visit different places. Apart from travelling, I like to surf for any technology related developments and participate in discussions on the same.

Destressing IT...IT is a high pressure job as you need to think of new ways to innovate and adapt to the latest technological changes. It is a very dynamic role to handle with new technologies being launched almost every other day. One has to be ahead of the game constantly and harness the right kind of technology so that the organisation has the most updated processes and systems to achieve its customer centric goals. The IT role becomes even more challenging in an industry like insurance where there are frequent regulatory changes, and one needs to make sure that all the systems have been updated in accordance to the guidelines. In such a scenario, it is important to de-stress oneself. I usually take short breaks, and play table tennis or badminton with my team in office. It not only acts as a good stress buster, but also keeps me fit.

Key Driver...Technology is a key driver to success in an insurance firm. Any process enhancement in the organization has to have the involvement of the IT team in it. A strong IT decision-making process is imperative for building robust processes within the organisation. I personally feel that technology, which is considered a support function, is crucial to our strategy of providing shareholder value and building customer loyalty.