Probing Sundar Pichai's secret sauce Pic - YouTube video grab |
Staff correspondent, August 12, 2015, NewsCrunch
With the elevation of Sundar Pichai at Google, the spotlight is again on the rising stock of Indian managers in the US.
Google, Microsoft, Pepsi, Adobe, Mastercard, among several other heavy-hitting companies have Indians at top. What's the secret sauce?
A Wall Street Journal blog quotes a study, which says Indians blend genuine personal humility and intense professional will, and achieve extraordinary results without much hoopla.
Indians do not confront and polarise. They build consensus besides bringing to the table brilliance and hard-work you may expect from any CEO material.
This habit is contrarian to the in-your-face and quick-to-assert American business culture and gives them a competitive advantage. It gives them the leeway to build a vision and pursue it, rather than living from turmoil to turmoil.
Satya Nadella transformed Microsoft into a friendly force and opted to work through collaboration than competition, and he is seen as a success.
At Google, Sundar Pichai, even when he was aggrieved never went to war and preferred to wait.
Another WSJ article reports that the original Android team led by Andy Rubin wanted their own browser, and sought to take down Chrome, developed by Sundar Pichai and team. Sundar Pichai did not escalate and waited till the Google voted in his favour.
Chrome survived and the Android business eventually came under his wings.