The Hindu Business Line : Teaching biz

Job-hopping may be commonplace today, but saying goodbye to a well-paying job at Ranbaxy more than a decade ago must have been a difficult move. But for IIM-Bangalore alumnus Satya R. Narayanan, who did sign the resignation letter and went on to set up Career Launcher — an education services company, it “looked as exciting as going on a trip in the lap of the Himalayas. I was blissfully ignorant of the ‘risk’… I do not recall having too many a pprehensions,” he says.

“It all began with an idea to be a teacher and an entrepreneur at the same time. As it meant marrying two things that do not meet, it called for an innovative roadmap.”

It was a journey that began in 1995 with Rs 17,000 as starting capital, two employees, his parents’ flat in Gole Market, New Delhi, and a diehard instinct “to groom youngsters” to pursue their dreams.

“Then, a bunch of friends and classmates, including Gautam Puri (CAT expert), helped me implement the idea over the first two years,” he recalls. “Friends and family were strong supporters with little expectations in return.” But his best resource were his students, “as they would help us with everything, including marketing, spreading word-of-mouth, organising seminars, etc,” says this 37-year-old Cancerian.

The challenge before him was to develop innovative programmes to suit the marketplace and “creating a brand with no money in our pockets and competing with players with a legacy”.

He then hit on the idea of converting the mock CAT (common admission test for IIMs) conducted by student communities in an unorganised manner into a “pan-Indian inter-collegiate event, which is now a benchmark for students,” he says. In the first year, only 400 students in Delhi took part but by the second year it had spread to 25 cities. While this programme addressed the written exam the next step was to devise one for the oral interview, and the company came out with the Personality Development Programme. “This was our first innovation, no one else was offering this and the market was uncluttered,” he says.

Apart from “strong customer interaction”, Narayanan credits the company’s tagline — ‘an IIM-Alumni body’ — for the good response generated, at least during the first five years. “It guaranteed quality,” he explains. Nearly 25 IIM-alumni, who were his friends, taught the students in the evenings and were treated to “free beer every weekend”, he laughs. Seven of them are now on the Career Launcher board and draw salaries, while the beer sessions still continue!

New territories

Today, as Chairman of the Rs 90-crore company with presence across 130 locations, Narayanan remains keen to venture into unexplored territories. Career Launcher recently entered into a joint venture with US-based Veritas to train students for GMAT, GRE, SAT, and other entrance exams in Singapore, China, Japan, Korea, Indonesia, Thailand and Taiwan.

But his big bet is the setting up of the Indus World School of Business, which will require an investment of nearly Rs 300 crore over the next four years. He believes that the world of business is transitioning from being ‘managerial’ to ‘entrepreneurial’. “Our focus is to produce entrepreneurs for the 21st century. We believe that even the best and largest of companies want youngsters who are entrepreneurial in their outlook,” he says. As a successful entrepreneur himself, Narayanan believes youngsters must trust their own insight. “Back your own ideas. There is no need to look for approval or endorsement from the ‘oldies’. At the same time, bringing honesty and unmatchable work ethic is crucial to success,” he advises.

Over the past decade, as the country’s educational landscape has evolved, Narayanan says, “we’ve evolved as an organisation too. We realised we could contribute to the broader canvas by extending our competencies to mainline education comprising schools, vocational institutes, etc”. Currently the company runs the Ananda Play School, which has presence in Hyderabad, Indore and Noida; and the Indus World School for classes I to XII.

Investing in education

“Pointing out that investing in the education sector can reap returns up to 29 per cent, Narayanan argues that this “is a strong enough reason to increase spend in this sector to 6-7.5 per cent of the GDP from the current 3 per cent.”

He terms the existing classroom-centred, theory-oriented practices as a “lazy man’s choice. As there is no competition, there is no pressure to innovate. We need to bring in high-calibre people, technology and modern management practices, and invest in research to become an education-driven nation.” And, most importantly, “Movies! They must be made integral to education,” says this film enthusiast whose “favourites are a million including Maya Bazaar (Telugu), Agantuk (Bengali) and Swades (Hindi).”

Besides being a passionate educationalist, he is a cricket aficionado. In fact he had dropped out of his Class 12 exams to get an extra year of playing for the under-19 school team. “I did not breathe anything but cricket between 1985 and 1991. It was about eight hours every day at the NIS grounds in Delhi.” However, the prudent entrepreneur in him made him mindful of a “career graph should you not succeed at cricket. Then, I took a break from cricket for about six months and focused on the IIM entrance with hope that I will resume serious cricket shortly.” That, by the way, is an option he is still considering!

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