Facing and overcoming challenges is embedded in the journey of an enterprise and the entrepreneur. Here are a few managerial and leadership challenges that every entrepreneur is most likely to face and only when these are addressed, the enterprise movers across the orbits called "firm" and "Organization" and reaches the destination called "Institution".

1. Ketan T Bhatt
Principal Partner
www.alkemist.co.in
Mobile: +91 98 79 107928

2. Alkemist HR Enablers LLP
Clarifications
 For every successful entrepreneur, there are 9 not-so-
successful or unsuccessful entrepreneurs
 Unsuccessful does not mean absolute failure
 Not covering technological or functional or regulatory
challenges, as entrepreneurs ought to be good at
dealing with them.

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Enterprise
(12-20 Quarters)
Firm
(20-40 Quarters)
Organization
(41-140 Quarters)
Institution
(> 140 quarters)
“Learning
Organizations” that
have seen at least 3
generations of
leaders
Ethical FoundationEthical Foundation
The JourneyThe Journey
Micro / Local
Medium / National
Small / Regional
Large / Global

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Stages of challenges
 Childhood – Crawling to walking to running
 Adulthood – Fitness to marathon to rejuvenation
 Lifetime – Embedded in life cycle of an enterprise

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Childhood Challenge 1 – Vision – Evolution & Devolution
 History … every successful enterprise has had a VISION – Clarity of
direction
 It is all about flying into future on a one-way flight
 Vision = Legacy Articulated or Obituary that shall never be used
 Ownership of vision – individualism to collectivism
 This is a distinguishing feature between a business-like effort & an
enterprising effort

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Make Snapdeal into India’s number one B2C
marketplace… Philosophically, I would want Snapdeal to have the
most admired alumni in the country… The only reason as to why we’ve
made substantial progress over the last two and half years is because of
our people

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Childhood Challenge 2 – Team-building
 Team is as good as the leader and members - People with right
/ congruent / complimentary - attitude, ability, and energy
 Wear the hat that fits the skull (or face faster burnout)
 Recognize, face, tackle interpersonal issues promptly (especially
among the Leadership Team members)

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Adulthood Challenge 1 – Systems & Processes - Discipline
 Well defined skeleton, arteries, and veins
 Synchronization – घडी के तीन क ांटे !!!!
 All about a near-perfect interplay of processes
 Codification / documentation / encryption of proprietary / process /
product / service knowledge for retention & reference

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Adulthood Challenge 2 – Perseverance & Perseverance
 Assumptions / guestimates could go awry & unanticipated issues
could crop up
 Government would tinker with regulations, making the game
tougher or more competitive and even at times unplayable (briefly)
 Markets / customers are not Santa Clause
Anand Satyan of
DeliverWithMe

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Lifetime Challenge 1 – Build & strengthen unique culture
 Trust among cofounders
 Innovation, engagement, and creativity, even at the cost of
mistakes
 Treat team members & customers are ‘co-conspirators’
 Instill ethics & an uncompromising attitude
 CEO also means Chief Ethics or Engagement Officer

11. Alkemist HR Enablers LLP
Lifetime Challenge 2 – Stay Relevant by Divine Discontent *
 Attitude to learning, unlearning, relearning
 Each achievement leads to a search for the next big challenge
(external or internal)
 Crossing knowledge frontiers becomes an embedded habit
 ‘Divine Discontent’ is a term from “World-class teams”
published in McKinsey Quarterly article 1992, by David Kirk

12. Who
is
an
entrepreneur?

14. So if you have the entrepreneurial zeal, then
1) Hold fast to your dreams, for if dreams die…life is a
broken-winged bird that cannot fly.
2) Must read – “Built to Last: Successful Habits of
Visionary Companies” (Jerry I. Porras & James C.
Collins) – Published October, 1994
3) Download ‘YourStory’ app

15. Thanks