BENGALURU: When Indra Nooyi stepped down as PepsiCo CEO in 2018, people around her assumed that she would dreadfully miss her role and company which she had been associated with for over two decades. But surprisingly, Nooyi found herself enjoying her new life, delighted not to be doing what she used to do. “I’ve honestly forgotten that life. It’s now about teaching, enjoying time with family and looking to advising start-ups,” Nooyi said during an hour-long online session organised by Millennium Mams’, an organisation started by two men, Bishnu Dhanuka and Sanjay Bhuwania, that works towards financial literacy of women through classes on finance and investment.
Addressing an all-women’s audience Nooyi wonders if that was her life after all. “There were times that I was exhausted, but my father-in-law would say, ‘You are in a big job, you will be,’ and encouraged me. I am married to someone who is incredibly supportive, but more so, his parents and my parents have really been supportive.
My daughters may not appreciate it as much... but that’s how it is... full of trade-offs. You have to set aside guilt and juggle priorities,” she said, adding that she is currently working on her book, which is likely to be released next year. Nooyi let her audience in that as she reads her book, which is work-in-progress, and touches upon integrating work and family.
She recalled her early days in the corporate world when she was not just one of the few women in business, but also an immigrant woman of colour. “Even to this day, the number of women in meetings is about 30-40 per cent. It’s still not 50 per cent. We need to figure out how to support each other rather than compete with each other. It’s about competing with your competence and not with your gender,” she said.
Highly critical of herself, Nooyi had one piece of advice to women: Don’t be like me. “I was overly critical of myself. I would get the highest grading during appraisals and I would look at my boss and say, ‘I don’t deserve this’. We tend to put ourselves down.
At the same time, it’s easy to say don’t let critics get to you, but at some point, they do. I would agonise over it and that was my flaw,” said Nooyi, adding that she made sure she projected a composed and confident look, knowing that several people would be looking to her every morning as she walked into the office. “The life of a CEO is very lonely. You can’t come home and discuss issues... in the little time that you have, family wouldn’t want to talk about those,” she said.