There’s often an energy surrounding a person and his vibes, which are, at best, infectious. This is sometimes commonly referred to as ‘aura’. Mr. Sharad Mathur’s aura is clearly felt as his colleagues describe him as the quintessential business leader. A man with a deep knowledge base, he is well equipped with the art of getting the best out of people and delivering results. His talent, knowledge, attitude, aggression, and temperament are widely acknowledged in the industry. Mr. Mathur never shies away from assisting anyone as he firmly believes that one gets back what they give away! The career journey for him has been a privileged one as he had the opportunity to be associated with best brands and it was through his sheer hard work. From a senior supervisor to now Vice President & Head – Retail with one of the leading insurance companies, life has been full of excitement, ups and downs. However, Mr. Mathur always knew he would make it big one day. It is a pleasure for everyone to be known to him, be it his friends, colleagues, subordinates or even the office staff. His personality has all shades of vigor, kindness, transparency, responsibility, dependability and all this combined with a strong business acumen makes him“perfect 10”.
An alumnus of the 1994-96 batch of Indian Institute of Planning & Management (IIPM), Mr. Sharad Mathur has gone on to scale great heights in the corporate world through some of the best exposure and experience. Mr. Mathur got a head-start after IIPM when he joined India’s leading automobile tyre manufacturing organization. He success fully generated new businesses during his 3 years stint there. In addition, he enhanced the company’s representation in new cities by appointing and growing auto tyre dealers and franchisees. He was responsible in organizing mega customer interface events ,often in the market place. In 1999, Mr. Mathur got associated with an international petroleum products organization in its Reseller Business division. Here, he independently managed business terrain and generated volumes by appointing and fostering distributor, dealer and petroleum retailers. In August 2000, Mr. Mathur joined a large travel related financial services company to develop business for card products and travel secure products. There he excelled on launching of various cards and travel secure products in the region. He energized Direct Marketing Associate network and Direct Sales Team to expand market reach. Mr. Mathur brought in to play, Foreign Exchange and Travellers Cheque client base to cross sell various card and travel secure products. He then went on to the BFSI sector where he joined country’s leading private sector insurance company as National Sales Manager and developed ‘business to consumer’ model. After strategizing their sales for almost more than five years, Mr. Mathur’s next venture was with a top organized retail organization in 2007 where he held the office of General Manager to build the Member ship & Financial Services business. He significantly contributed in building India’s mega Loyalty and Financial Services business in retail spanning 850 outlets across 79 cities around the country in record time. It was a fulfilling achievement for him which is close to his heart. From there, he has been associated with SBI General Insurance Company Limited for the past twenty 0ne years as Vice President & Head of Retail where he shoulders a lot of responsibilities with great passion. His colleagues call him“phenomenal” on work front…
Mr. Mathur takes us through the mileposts from his student life till date….
Q. From college to now, it must have been an interesting journey, please take us through the different milestones?
A. It has been an exciting voyage in reality. On the business face, association with India’s finest organizations has been a delight in terms of learning and contribution. During the early phase, experience with automobile tyre and petroleum products manufacturers has been fairly inspirational. Subsequently, financial services & insurance industry has been exceedingly gratifying in terms of factual commercial understanding and development.
Q. Please share some interesting experiences from your past profiles including your leadership style.
A. To carry out new product launch and a variety of customer marketing campaigns have been a pleasing experience. The most excellent element of marketing campaigns has been an occasion to interact with consumers and receive first hand feed-back on product and service proposition. This way it turns simple to inculcate customer feed-back in to the future version of products, making entire proposition realistic and appealing to end users.
To add, leveraging diverse customer data base to sell a range of products has been a brilliant know-how. The concept of capturing maximum wallet share of the customer is actually gainful.
The approach has been to involve more employees in the decision making process. This leadership style enables not only to reach at an appropriate decision but also to gain employees respect. It also allows employees to become part of the team.
Leadership style enables not only to reach an appropriate decision but also to gain employee respect…
Q. “Resell, cross sell and upsell”- please elaborate in context of your time spent in Insurance.
A. In modern times, the customer expects a very high level of pre and after sales service. If customer’s expectation in terms of quality and service standards is met then it becomes simple to resell or renew his insurance policy. High service levels enable a customer to place his trust in the company.
Cross-sell is a marketing term for the practice to suggest related insurance product or services to a customer who has already bought an insurance cover or considering buying one. Like an existing health insurance customer can be cross sold personal accident cover as it makes a lot of sense for him to be fully protected.
Up-sell is the marketing approach to recommend higher priced insurance product to an existing customer. Similar to, health insurance policy holder can be up sold critical illness insurance cover. The scheme is to offer an extended shield.
Q. You have significantly contributed in building India’s first mega Loyalty and Financial Services business in organized retail environment. Does the word Loyalty and Retail go hand in hand?
A. The Indian retail industry is likely to grow in the region of US$ 800 billion by 2015 with more than 20% being contributed by the organized retail. This will bring in a lot of healthy competition. However, to retain customers is becoming even more challenging. As a result customer consideration and retention continue to be a very sharp focus area.
In effect, a Loyalty program is designed to encourage customers in a business target market to return over and over again, make regular purchases and turn away from competitors. In Retail environment, loyalty program generally reward loyal customers with discounts, special offers, points or prizes. It is a key constituent of customer retention plan which is a structured and long-term marketing effort which provides incentives to repeat customers who demonstrate loyal buying behaviour.
Retail loyalty programs create another greatest value for retailers, the ability to identify individual customers and to
measure and understand their individual behaviours. Both businesses and consumers have recognized the value of loyalty programs. It is found that only 12% – 15% of customers are loyal to a single retailer. However, this small portion of shoppers creates between 60% -75% of company sales.
The fundamental benefits of running a loyalty program to gain customer information have been abridged underneath :
- Shift: Obtain new customers
- Lift: Boost the spending of existing customers
- Retention: Progress the natural churn rate of customers
- Profit mix: Move spending to higher margin products
Q. How are classrooms different from work stations? (w.r.t real life situations)
theory’ and ‘practical’. ‘Classrooms’ develop thought processes and augment understanding levels. ‘Work stations’ set off business strategy formulation, planning and development.
It reminds me of a number of group discussions and presentations that used to take place in a classroom but at work place it is mostly about interactive discussions with colleagues across grades and departments and channel partners pertaining to business development, profit & loss and various other aspects of business.
Q. As you hold a mastery in strategy, business planning & development, human resources planning & recruitment, product development & management, wide-ranging distribution channel set up, marketing and P&L management. You also possess deep understanding of Operations, IT and Underwriting. Can you please elaborate the pre-requisites for each role and what is actually the KRA’s of these that an aspirant should be aware of ?
A. The prerequisite for strategy formulation is the ability to focus on course of actions by specifying what activities are to be undertaken for achieving organizational objectives, followed by its preparation and implementation.The product development, if is done inculcating the market feed-back results in to high acceptability at the distribution channel and customers end. It needs to be managed through extensive distribution network to ensure reach across each customer segment covering the length and breadth of the layout. Therefore, setting up of a variety of distribution partners – traditional as well as innovative, becomes vital to profitably market products. This approach gets scalability and sustainability in any business model resulting in timely market expansion.
The above basically requires Experience in the following:
- Strategic planning and execution
- Understanding of contracting,negotiating and change management. Knowledge of structuring sales quota goals and revenue expectations Planning marketing strategies, advertising campaigns and successful public relations efforts Some of the KRAs:
- Direct company sales and marketing functions
- Develop sales selling cycle and methodology
- Direct and oversee the company marketing function to identify and develop new customers for products and services
- Research and develop strategies and plans which identify marketing opportunities, direct marketing and new project development
- Analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of sales, methods, costs and results
- Develop and manage sales and marketing budgets and oversee the development and management of internal operating budgets.
- Plan and coordinate public affairs and communications efforts, to include public relations and community outreach
- Participate in the development of new project proposals
- Establish and implement short- and long-range goals, objectives, policies, and operating procedures
- Represent the company at various industry and/or business meetings to promote the company
- Supervise the preparation, issuance and delivery of sales materials, exhibits, and promotion programs
- Encourage positive relations with partners, vendors and distributors
- Recommend and administer woperations
The prerequisite for strategy formulation is the ability to focus on course of actions by specifying activites
Q. A lot of aspirants shall be looking forward to your success story, please acquaint them with the latest trends in Corporate Grooming along with some tips? What are the factors that can take these young professionals to craft their career graph?
A. It is essential to possess a positive personal outlook with excellent communication skills. It is vital to have a good command over business English and reasonable command over written English as well. Furthermore, personal grooming and appropriate attire can’t be ignored. In addition, behaviour, temperament, interactive and social skills are obligatory.
To ensure upward career graph in any organization or in general, the following fundamental factors should be kept in mind:
- Positive attitude
- Passion
- Self-motivation
- Team work
- Constant ideation and innovation
Q. You are “an admired professional” in the industry , what does it take to win the hearts of people at work? How important it is in these changing times where materialistic things are valued over people?
A. It is simple. To extend support and solution to people at workplace indeed do magic. Participatory work approach is also cherished.
It is still significant to connect with people as assistance provided generally gets reciprocated.
Q. When not working, how do you spend time with your family?
A. When not working, enjoying with family at recreation club is quite usual. Clubbing about 4 days a week – swimming and squash, is soothing. In addition, dining at restaurants is frequent. To keep a track on various economical and business developments excites me. Watching Television is also no less joyful.
Q. Please share some sweet memories with faculty / friends at campus.
A. It takes me down the nostalgia lane, group classroom presentations used to be a lot of fun. I still remember the sessions on ‘Organizational Development’ and ‘Economics’. They used to be enriching. Furthermore, spending time with mates at and out-side the campus is unforgettable.
Cult wishes Mr. Mathur that the Celebration is always on in his life on both personal and professional front…
