I graduated with a degree in chemical engineering. Though I did not pursue a technical or an engineering career after that, some concepts from my graduation days have stayed with me. One such concept is how reactions are catalysed or the impact of the presence of a catalyst.
The basic concept is that the presence of a catalyst causes or accelerates a chemical reaction. In some cases, the ingredients are available, but the reaction does not happen spontaneously. It takes the catalyst to make it happen. In other words, the reaction has to be catalysed. There are many such examples around us in our daily life. E.g. automobile emissions contain carbon monoxide, which is highly dangerous. It has to be converted to carbon dioxide to make it less harmful. There is oxygen in the air, but it does not automatically react with this carbon monoxide to form carbon dioxide. It takes the catalytic converter fitted in automobiles for this reaction to occur. Another example is that of enzymes, which catalyse the digestive reactions in our body.
For a long time after my graduation, I continued to think of ‘catalysts’ and ‘catalyse’ as engineering terms. However, over many decades in the corporate world, I started to realize that even success at work and in life needs to be catalysed—it doesn’t happen by itself. Many people have the ingredients for success, but they mistakenly assume that just the presence of these will guarantee success. Unfortunately, that is not the case; it needs a catalyst, which comes in the form of specific actions and efforts.
This notion has been in my head for a long time. I have also learnt from experience that success is the result of a holistic process. It is about catalysing a lot of reactions that most of us assume happen spontaneously. I have wanted to recount and share my experiences to help other people succeed using my learning. Towards this end, a few years ago, I built a module called ‘Tee off with Mouli’ (the name comes from my passion for golf) and started sharing it with the people I was working with, in sessions of about three hours each. I got a very good response and also some good feedback, which I used to further refine the module.
In the middle of 2016, I decided that I needed a break from work. I wanted to take a sabbatical. I was also keen that it should not be only about relaxation and fun but also about making significant social impact using my experience and learning. I spent time thinking about the best way of giving back to society. I had several ideas, including working with NGOs, but finally felt that none of these would give a high ROI (return on investment). I strongly believe that one must look for ROI in one’s social efforts. Just because we give our time/money/knowledge does not mean it is making an impact. This does not mean that we stop giving our time/money/knowledge. My only suggestion is that each one of us try and invest it where it has the highest ROI. E.g. if you are a doctor and you want to make a social impact, perhaps the highest ROI for your social contribution is in trying to improve the health of the needy. A doctor could make an impact teaching maths to underprivileged children, but the ROI here would be lower than the ROI in healthcare. As I started thinking along these lines, it came to me—my highest ROI was going to be in helping people in the corporate sector achieve even greater success in their careers and lives. Their success would catalyse social impact and, over time, create employment and, in general, create a well-rounded, values-driven society.
As this became clear to me, I started to take ‘Tee off with Mouli’ to any company that was interested. In a four-month period, I took about thirty sessions of three hours each for over a thousand people at various companies. It was a part of my social mission and hence, I did not charge anything; my only condition was that the senior people should be personally involved in this process. As this unfolded, I started to get tremendous positive feedback for the sessions. Many people said that it was life-changing and that they wished they had received these insights earlier in their lives. Many of them urged me to convert this content into a book. Their belief was that it was too valuable, and it could have greater social impact if many more could access it. That, dear readers, is the inspiration for this book.
I named the module ‘Tee off with Mouli’ as it was more than just a catchy title. It was intended to be an inspiring analogy. Golf is not a popular sport, and so many people don’t know much about it. The tee shot is the first shot in any hole when playing golf—you put a tee stick on the ground, place the ball on the tee and then hit it. That process is called teeing off or tee off in short. A well-hit tee shot is one of the most stirring spectacles—the ball flies, and can travel well over 250 yards. Consider a sixer in cricket, which travels about 80 yards, and a soaring goalkeeper’s kick in football, which takes the ball about 60 yards. A tee shot is like three cricket sixes or four goal kicks in a row. The ball soars and soars, and takes forever to come down. My mission is to help people soar, achieve great heights and go very far, and that was the analogy that made me name the session ‘Tee off with Mouli’. It was the mission of getting people to soar like the golf ball, high and long.
And that is what I hope every reader of this book will get—the inspiration to soar high and long, to achieve great success and a balanced life. I want the readers to understand that having the ingredients of success—education, IQ, EQ, hard work, a good job, etc.—does not mean that a person will automatically become successful. They have to understand what the catalysts for success are and make an effort to embed these catalysts in their work lives. Unfortunately, many people do not understand this and hence, often do not achieve the success for which they have the ingredients.
I do have an important disclaimer to make. This book is written from the lens of a practising manager, and is based on the insights I have gained into how to catalyse success. Hence, it is principally my point of view that I have put across; it has not necessarily been validated or proven. In many cases, I am simply presenting what I believe in. If your belief is different from mine, feel free to hold on to it. Please be aware that the contents of this book are not scientifically proven, but have been validated through the journey of my life and my work.