'It takes 20 years of hard work to become an overnight success'

Soon after P V Kannan started 24/7 Customer, a business process outsourcing company that provides integrated customer lifecycle management services, he faced the biggest challenge of his life. In the aftermath of 9/11, the core team that he took almost 14 months to build started developing cold feet.

Nevertheless, "the child did eventually learn to walk after tumbling and falling for a while".

Today, 24/7 Customer clocks a triple-digit revenue (Kannan refused to divulge the exact figure) and has Michael Moritz of Sequoia Capital he is is well-known for his investments in Yahoo!, Google as an investor and board member.

Kannan in an interview with Prasanna D Zore discussed the challenges that 24/7 Customer faced as a start up, his career, his vision of the BPO industry, his success mantras and advice to young entrepreneurs.

Your first job

I started working with Tata Consultancy Services, TCS. It was quite unconventional for someone who did his CA in 1988 to join a software company. One of my seniors who did his CA joined TCS and just raved about the company. I went there for an informal interview on a Saturday to meet the resident manager there and at the end of our discussion he asked me if I would be interested in joining TCS. That's how TCS hired me.

Were you always interested in working for a software company?

Obviously if you do your chartered accountancy you don't aim to become a software programmer. After I finished my intermediate in CA the institute had some introductory programming class. The personal computer came about only in the early 80s. In that wonderful era I spotted a computer and picked up a book on basics of programming language from our library.

I found it an interesting read and joined this course and started programming. It intrigued me at that time and I was not convinced if I could make a career in programming and computers.

But what changed my mind was walking into TCS, talking to all the people there and getting exposed to the industry. People today think that the software industry came out of nowhere and went on to become an overnight success. Any industry takes 20 years of hard work to become an overnight success.

In those days I remember going to my parents and telling them that I have got an offer from TCS and offers from a couple of MNCs but I have decided to take the TCS offer they were very skeptical. They wouldn't believe that TCS belonged to the Tata Group.

Having done my CA I had no inclination to join a software company.

The turning point

Since my father had his own business my parents always taught me the virtues of starting on one's own. But the turning point was when I had an opportunity to go abroad when I was working with TCS. In 1994 the browser came out and I with my co-founder S Nagarajan and my wife, who also worked for TCS, landed up in the US. We all thought that the emerging technologies provided us once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something.

The amount of innovation that was going on every week when the browser came out and the Web becoming a great phenomenon sort of inspired us. We were in our early mid-20s and we thought if we snatch the opportunities we could tell our grandchildren some good stories.

When did 24/7 actually happen? The challenges you faced.

We started the company in April 2000 in Bengaluru (then Bangalore). When we started this company our main challenge was attracting top talent and then keeping them inspired and motivated to stay with us. In the first few years after we started 24/7, we went through couple of situations where we recruited a couple of teams who developed cold feet after 9/11.

The early stages of any start-up are comparable to a child learning to walk. You are going to keep tumbling and you are going to keep falling. We all know that the child will eventually walk but then the child doesn't know that it's going to walk.

So the main challenges then were building the team, creating the first set of customers who are going to support you through the next few years and creating a momentum and energy that will take a start up to its next stage of growth.

What was the revenue you clocked for the very first year?

First year we reported under a million dollars. Though I can't disclose revenues for 2008 they are into three digits.

About your employee strength and plans to set up more contact centres in India

Right now we employ 8,000 people worldwide and close to half of them in India spread across Hyderabad and Bengaluru. But presently we don't have any plans to move into a new city at this stage in India because we have tremendous growth opportunities in these two cities.

Qualities that you look out for in potential employees

The qualities that we look out for is what we consider as our value system. At a fundamental level they have to be great human beings. They should show respect for others, work in a team environment, not take themselves too seriously, we want passionate people with tremendous focus on results.

One of the things that we are proud of our culture is here people don't tell stories. They take ownership of what they are assigned to do and results are the only things that get measured; everything else is a flop.

Advice to young Indians affected by the current economic slowdown

Whether it's a slump or a boom my advice is take the first few years to understand your true calling. What is it that really motivates you, what you really enjoy doing -- I got a CA degree but I quickly realized that I am not going to be sitting in some function and not have the big picture.

The other thing that is equally important in the Indian context is don't let others to drive you to do something. Most people end up doing jobs or educational courses because their friends, neighbours and family tell them what to do. That is a recipe for disaster. Obviously, there is a tremendous pressure in our society to adhere to the social norms.

Don't rebel for the sake of rebellion but if you are lucky to understand what you are passionate about that's where you will find long-lasting success.

Advice to young entrepreneurs

The amounts of opportunities that exist in India today are unprecedented. The amount of activity going on, the amount of niche areas in which you can provide services and offer products is quite astonishing. Whatever your areas of focus, just try and find out an angle that is exciting and innovative and which no one has thought about.

We are in an environment where you can try a number of ideas fairly quickly and let the bad ideas fail.

How has the current slowdown affected 24/7?

The direct affect is restricted consumer spending in the US. Transactions volumes, as a result, have gone down. Through October last year to March of this year we reported slight dip in revenues that was managed by other areas of growth. So overall we kept growing but our existing clients went through some challenges. But I think we have hit the bottom and have started looking up.

Your vision of the BPO industry

Indian BPO industry is moving from a platform where advantage was purely driven in terms of cost, superior talent base that produced exceptional quality at extraordinarily low price for the last ten years. Our focus in the last three years is how do you fuel innovation rather than tap cost and talent areas.

For me in the next ten years India will provide a ground to test new ideas and innovations. Today every tech innovation comes from Silicon Valley and for us to propel into the future -- and that's where your young readers need to generate ideas, innovations and own it up rather than sit and look up for jobs and careers. It is this young generation that has to carry the torch of innovation further.

Personal values that helped you achieve success

First value that comes to mind is irrational persistence. I am very, very persistent and never give up. If you are rational then you will give up on most things. You have to have that attitude when everyone around you says it cannot be done you have to provide leadership and guide others.

The second is you have to put in your due. My favourite line is it takes 20 years to create an overnight success. It didn't happen with Steve Jobs or Bill Gates that as soon as they came up with an idea the very next day it became a huge hit. Personally, I am prepared to put in my best and then wait patiently for the results.

The third thing and this is a bit contradictory is that I am highly impatient as well. So I will always look for accelerating things and try to dismantle things to check what's stopping it from moving forward and then solving those issues one by one.

Fourth is you are not going to succeed without a solid foundation of integrity and transparency. It makes working fun and easy for everybody. People should be able to read you fairly quickly.