Gautam Munshi had been a banker for many years, having worked with HSBC and Standard Chartered Bank in roles as varied as sales, strategy and analytics. He then went on to head Product Analytics at Marketics Technologies, which was acquired by WNS in 2007 for $65 million. The image of hamsters in a wheel finally got him into entrepreneurship, and he started Redwood Associates in 2008 with the sole vision of imparting smarter decision-making skills through courses that are affordable to all those who want to learn analytics.
Over six years, www.analyticstraining.in has conducted programmes for over 20,000 participants and 200 companies, through both online and offline programmes on MS Excel, VBA, R Studio, SQL, Data Analytics and Machine Learning. Over time, they’ve developed a career analytics product, www.maslwoed.me that enables professionals to choose a role or company that suits them best.
Munshi had a relatively comfortable life growing up in the 80s and 90s. “It was an era where getting a landline connection took seven years, a job with an average salary of ` 10,000 was a celebrated achievement and a career meant either Medicine or Engineering. This got me thinking that something was wrong with the way we make career choices. A spiritual outlook made me believe that everyone had a unique place in the universe.” He considers himself extremely fortunate to have parents who allowed him to choose a career path for himself.
With an Economics (Hons) degree from St Stephens College, New Delhi, and an MBA from the Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi University, Munshi actively participated in public speaking and debates, in an education system where extracurricular activities are pursued only within constraints. These constraints made him think about data-based decisions for careers, because our education system was just not equipping individuals to make the right choices. “Decision making shouldn’t be like groping in the dark — analytics ensures intelligent decisions. We believe that analytical skills are for everyone.” Munshi and his team invested in this idea to provide a range of services to facilitate access to cutting-edge analytics training for all.
Two lessons that Munshi picked up during his career were scalability and process orientation, which have been incorporated in both their service offering and their analytics product. He has forged a number of relationships over time, ranging from encouraging bosses, insightful peers, enterprising colleagues or even the students that he has interacted with, and considers each of them mentors in some way. His advice for budding entrepreneurs is to have the courage to follow one’s passion and be strategic about the road map one has to take to achieve one’s goals. Visit www.analyticstraining.in for details.
rohit@learnbizsimulations.com