'I want to use education for empowerment, not safety'

Deekshant Sehrawat is a man of many facets. The 34-year-old IIT Delhi-IIM Calcutta alumnus is best known as the founder of MBAGuru (a brand of Roots Education), an MBA coaching institute, but Deekshant also has another side -- he is a talented lyricist and has co-authored a number of songs with Palash Sen, lead singer of Euphoria.

Here, he is in conversation with MBA preparation expert, Sidharth Balakrishna.

The idea was born while I was at IIT Delhi, and was made more concrete while I was at IIM. Seeing the brightest individuals in India run after the same companies, similar jobs, etc without even pausing to think what they wanted made me want to do something different.

I think education in India is equated with safety and not empowerment. I wished to use it for the latter.

I thought that if even an IIT and IIM education could not give me the confidence to do what I wanted to do, then nothing ever would. I always believe in doing what I really felt like, while being ready for the consequences.

But then that's true even for a job -- safety and risk are only attitudes of the mind. But we do need a safety net -- in my case it was my friends and co-founders who were a source of inspiration as well as belief.

Challenges are perhaps the motivation for becoming and staying an entrepreneur. Aiming for what seems to be impossible and making the cut -- that provides the spark.

In our case, getting into a market that was saturated with several established players and where an established brand meant security was surely a challenge. But the enormity of that challenge is apparent only in hindsight! It might have been impossible had we really thought through how difficult it was going to be.

Such a challenge also forced us to come up with something that was relevant and different and gave us our core YOUnique philosophy, with the focus being on the student. It has also taught us not to be complacent and to continuously adapt.

I believe that there is no one single road to success. You yourself know best and hence are best placed to make best use of your best ability! You just need to be alert to the external factors and adapt in the best possible manner. Be ready for failure, don't give up when all seems lost. And you are bound to succeed.

Speaking for myself, I think that analysing success factors or models too much would perhaps have taken the fun away from the experience. More practically, starting early gives you a couple of advantages -- one, less family responsibility; and two, more scope for overcoming failure.

Practically, an MBA does help in that you know how to organise information, people, etc and understand different aspects of marketing, finance, etc. In addition, the exposure you obtain during an MBA helps your communication skills and confidence levels. However, I do feel, that though it is helpful, an MBA degree is certainly not a pre-requisite.

No regrets. It would never have been possible without the support of family in the first place. So, in that sense, it is an informed trade-off. For example, though 'family time' is less, the flexibility is higher especially in case of emergencies. Besides, even the team is like a family, beginning from the co-founders, who were and are friends before they are colleagues.

I am currently writing songs for a couple of movies with Dr Palash Sen. We co-write most songs and the understanding is amazing -- one of us can usually complete a line started by the other within seconds!

As a part of Roots Education, in the immediate future, there is a lot more we are looking to do in education, including primary education/schooling. At some stage later, I would like to combine my passion for education with that for writing and creativity through a business.