In his mission, Bagchi spends one-on-one time with the Top-100 leaders at MindTree on their ‘personal-professional’ issues to expand leadership capacity and build readiness for taking MindTree into the billion-dollar league. He also works at the grassroots by imparting skills to its 45 Communities of Practice that foster organisational learning, innovation and volunteerism in the organisation.

 

Bagchi has expressed his views at industry platforms, educational institutions and runs a column in newspapers and magazines. Recently, he was asked to address the British CEOs accompanying British Premier David Cameron.

 

Addressing the delegation, Bagchi recalled his father’s association with the Raj. He said that his father had seen the lowering of the Union Jack and the rise of the Indian Tricolour. “My father always exhorted me to do what his father told him: If work you must, work for the King. With the British gone and Indian princely states no longer in existence, the King now meant the Republic of India,” Bagchi said. He said it meant that joining the Civil Services or the Armed Forces as starting a business or working for one was infra-dig. “The time from 1947 to the 70s were marked by social and governmental distrust for businessmen,” he said.

 

From the early 1980s economic reforms began thanks to two Prime Ministers and two Finance Ministers, Bagchi said. He said that from the 1980s to today, the government had shifted considerably from the position of hate to move towards a position of love for business.

 

Bagchi addressing the class of Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, in 2006, recalled that his father used to get transferred every year and the family’s possessions could fit into the back of a jeep. “So my family moved from place to place without any trouble, and my mother would set up an establishment and get us going,” he said, adding that he thanked his parents, for what he was today.

 

Recalling his humble beginnings, Bagchi said that he was raised in the tribal districts of Orissa and went to government schools till Class 11. “Most children walked bare feet, some wore rubber slippers, and if anyone ever wore shoes, the other children shunned them as snobs. Only in Class 11, my father could afford to buy me a cycle,” he said, the condition being that he would score more than 90 per cent marks in optional mathematics in the final examination.

 

Like all children he too would complain of lack of things, but his mother, a matriculate of 1930s, would quote the example of a boy, who travelled ten miles for studies and then silence would prevail. There are many such people and we need to look around for such men, he said. 

 

In 2006, he brought out his first book, The High Performance Entrepreneur, and two years later, Go Kiss the World, by Penguin. Last year, he unveiled The Professional. Commenting on his works, Mark Tully hailed it as “a remarkable story of courage, integrity and enterprise”.

 

A political science graduate from Utkal University, 1957 born Bagchi has named his second book on the last words uttered by his mother.

 

Bagchi’s role is to report, fertilise, weed and clip human resources. He concentrates on ‘emotional infrastructure’ and positive feelings of employees for the company and co-workers.

 

Once taking the software developers on a mission, Bagchi gave them the start and end of the journey. To appreciate the value of time and money, he asked the developers to pick coffee berries as part of a learning exercise after driving six hours in a bus. During the two hours, all of them together had picked only Rs 75 worth of berries.

 

Ashutosh Shukla, who had initially approached Bagchi for evaluation of his effectiveness, was asked to jot down an ‘opportunity statement’. He said that this way at the end of three or four intense sessions, Bagchi expects the performers to soar higher. Shukla was so impressed by Bagchi that he joined him.

 

Summing up his work in his own words, Bagchi said: “My work will be unending in the same way as a gardener is eternally connected to every tree and plant in his garden.”