How Not To Destroy A Dynasty: Masterclass From The House Of Gucci

This article was first published in the Family Business United, June 29, 2026; https://www.familybusinessunited.com/post/how-not-to-destroy-a-dynasty-masterclass-from-the-house-of-gucci

Twenty-five years ago, in Singapore, I bought a Gucci canvas cross-body bag with money saved from overtime. It was a modest indulgence, earned through hard work, from a brand I knew was considered good. That bag has travelled to work and on holidays, and remains a favourite to this day, mainly for it’s appropriate size.

Then came Sara Gay Forden's The House of Gucci, and the bag in my cupboard quietly changed its meaning. All at once it felt invaluable, a small piece of a history far larger and far sadder than one could have imagined. The history of Gucci is a tragedy of a very particular kind, the kind that should make every business family stop and think.

On the morning of 27 March 1995, a well-dressed man climbed the steps of a building on Via Palestro in Milan and was shot three times in the back and once in the head. He was Maurizio Gucci, forty-six years old, the last of his family to lead the house that carried his name. The man who fired the gun had been hired for the job. The woman who arranged it, as the courts would later establish, was Patrizia Reggiani, Maurizio's former wife and the mother of his two daughters. She had once been the fiercest champion of his rise. In 1998 she was convicted and sentenced to twenty-nine years. The Italian press called her the “Black Widow”.

And yet the murder is not what lingers once the book is closed. What lingers is something quieter and far heavier. The brand survives today. It thrives. It is worth billions. Only, the family that created it doesn’t own it. Three generations built the house, and the third generation lost it. By the time the assassin arrived on Via Palestro, the company had already slipped out of Gucci hands.

Forden tells the story of one family. The lessons belong to every family that owns a business. There is an old saying that every business family secretly dreads, shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations. The Gucci saga is perhaps the most beautifully dressed proof that the saying is real. It is a pattern that repeats across families, across centuries, across continents. A pattern, unlike a curse, can be understood and broken, if only we are willing to study how it forms.

Why most dynasties fade by the third generation

Research across the world shows that only about a third of family businesses make it into the second generation, and barely one in ten survives into the third. Those numbers frighten every founder who reads them. They are not, however, handed down by fate. Family firms seldom die because the world has stopped wanting what they make. Customers were still queuing outside Gucci's Fifth Avenue stores even while the family was tearing itself apart in the courts. One observer noticed something telling, that the more sensational the headlines grew, the more shoppers walked in to buy. Family firms often die or family loses control of the firm because the family loses the ability to own itself and to govern itself.

John Ward, who did as much as anyone to build the modern study of family business, argued that the long life of a family firm is a matter of discipline. Families that endure plan their succession early, while there is still time to do it gracefully. They keep the roles of family, owner and manager from blurring into one. They put their governance in place during the years of calm, long before any storm arrives. Forden's book is, in effect, a long record of what happens when a gifted family does none of this. Read as a warning, it becomes one of the finest masterclasses imaginable in how to destroy a dynasty. So let us turn it the other way around, and read each act of ruin as a lesson in how to keep one alive.

First, the rise, because every fall begins with a gift

Guccio Gucci opened his house in Florence in 1921, a small leather-goods shop on a quiet street. The origin story has since become legend. As a young man he had worked as a porter and lift-boy at the Savoy Hotel in London, where he watched the monogrammed luggage of the wealthy pass through the lobby and resolved to make something just as fine for his own countrymen. He did exactly that. His craftsmanship in saddlery and luggage became the family's first and finest inheritance. In time he brought his sons into the firm, and after the war he divided the company among three of them, Aldo, Vasco and Rodolfo.

Here was familiness in its purest form, that special bundle of strengths a family brings to its firm when shared identity, trust and complementary talent come together into something no outsider can copy. Aldo was the engine. A marketing genius, he carried Gucci across the Atlantic and built a glittering empire that reached across America, Europe and Asia. He understood, better than anyone else in the family, that people did not buy a Gucci bag for the leather. They bought it for the feeling of carrying it. He pushed the family into perfume and into watches over his brothers' objections. And he gave them the image that should have become their constitution. “My family is the train”, he liked to say. “I am the engine. Without the train the engine is nothing, and without the engine the train does not move.” It is a lovely picture of how much they needed one another. The sorrow of the story is that the train forgot that it needed an engine.

Lesson one: the trap of dividing ownership equally

When Vasco died of cancer in 1974, leaving no children, Aldo and Rodolfo bought out his widow's stake and emerged as equal partners, fifty per cent each. On paper it looked like elegant symmetry. In practice it laid down a fault line that ran through everything that followed. The two halves were identical in size. Behind them lay contributions that were perceived very differently. Aldo had built the American business and much of the global one. Rodolfo, a former actor, had put in far less according to Aldo’s family, and he held precisely the same half. Aldo felt the imbalance keenly. Quietly, he began to steer profits into the perfume company, where he and his sons held the larger share, so that Rodolfo saw only a thin slice of the returns.

Resentment crept in from every side. Rodolfo blamed Aldo's restless expansion for the thin profits. Aldo's sons seethed that their uncle drew an equal half from an empire their father had built. Everyone felt cheated. No one felt heard. This is one of the oldest traps in family business, and one of the most misread. Equal and fair are two very different things. When a passive owner holds the same stake as the one who creates the value, the paperwork may call it just while every family dinner says otherwise. Scholars of socioemotional wealth remind us that families guard much more than money. They guard their pride, and their sense of having mattered. Wound that, and no dividend will ever heal it. The Guccis never built any way to revisit who owned what, and why. In Forden's telling, that frozen fifty-fifty shaped all that came after.

Lesson two: a next generation with no real role will create a destructive one

Few figures in the saga are as moving as Paolo Gucci. He was talented and restless, and by every account he was treated abominably. Working under his father Aldo, who was authoritarian and certain of his own genius, Paolo was handed a title and given no authority. “I was not allowed to do anything”, he complained. When he tried to start a line under his own name, the family that had stifled him closed ranks against him as one body. Aldo, who quarrelled endlessly with Rodolfo, instantly joined hands with him to crush the boy.

What does a cornered son do? Paolo handed evidence of his father's tax evasion to the American authorities. Aldo, the architect of the entire empire, was convicted and sent to prison. A son put his own father behind bars. Read that line again, slowly, and let its full weight settle on you. It is hard not to feel a flash of anger at Paolo, and just as hard to hold on to it. Who had made him this way? A family that gave him a famous surname and no room to be himself, a family that treated his hunger for dignity as an act of betrayal. The lesson is plain and unforgiving. The next generation will find a role in the business one way or another. The only choice a family really has is whether to give that role to them openly, or to force them to seize it in anger. Talent that is denied an honest outlet does not simply disappear. It festers, and then it turns.

Lesson three: keep the family, the owners and the managers in clear view

Many years ago, Renato Tagiuri and John Davis gave us the three-circle model, a simple and powerful way of seeing a family business as three overlapping groups, the family, the owners and the managers. One person may sit inside all three circles at once. The circles still remain distinct, and a family gets into trouble the moment it forgets which is which. The House of Gucci shows what happens when the circles fold into one another and no one can tell them apart any more.

Think of Patrizia Reggiani, long before she plotted a murder. In the early years she was genuinely good for Maurizio. She gave a timid young man the courage to stand up to a domineering father. “I knew he was weak”, she said, “but I was not weak. I pushed him so hard that he became president of Gucci.” Over time, though, her ambition found no proper home, and so it spilled into interference. She held no formal position in the company, yet she tried to run it through her husband, feeding his grievances against his uncle and his cousins, and measuring respect by who was offered champagne first at a party. Her appetite was unmistakable. She once said that she would rather “weep in a Rolls-Royce than be happy on a bicycle.” 

Most business families wrestle with similar questions. What is the rightful place of the son-in-law, the daughter-in-law, the person who marries into the family and the firm? Shutting them out is rarely the healthy answer. What works is clarity, with them and with everyone, about where ownership ends and management begins, and about how a marriage relates to both. A family that leaves these lines undrawn ends up negotiating its most intimate relationships through resentment. And resentment, as Gucci shows us, can turn deadly.

Lesson four: why control without grooming is a trap

Rodolfo loved his only son, and he failed him in the most ordinary way a loving father can. He never let him grow up. As one of Maurizio's associates put it, “Rodolfo gave him the castle and not the money to maintain it.” Rodolfo held on to every decision, trusted his son with almost nothing, and prepared no one to follow him. On his deathbed he confided his fear that money and power would change his boy. They did, for the simple reason that the boy had never been allowed to practise being a man.

So, when Maurizio finally took control, he held the largest single block of shares in the company and very little experience of running it. His vision was brilliant. He dreamed of a global luxury house with professional management, modern design and sophisticated marketing, which is more or less the company that non-family professionals would later build on the ruins he left behind. A vision, though, has to be carried out, and owning a company teaches a person nothing about running one. 

Maurizio managed, in the unsparing words of his own advisers, “by intuition”. He was charming and mercurial, a child in a sweet shop who wanted everything at once and understood almost nothing about cash flow. Within a few years a company that had been earning sixty million dollars was losing sixty million. “Intuition”, one adviser observed, “will carry you while business is good and will desert you the moment business turns bad.” 

Here is the lesson every owning family should write upon its heart. Ownership is something a family passes down to its children. The skill to run a great company is something each generation has to build for itself, or buy in honestly from people who already have it. To know what you are good at, and to bring in fine professionals for everything else, is one of the highest forms of stewardship a family can practise. Maurizio came to it too late, and he came to it on borrowed money.

Lesson five: build the rules of the family before the quarrels begin

Through the 1980s, Gucci became famous for its lawsuits rather than its loafers. There were criminal complaints over forged signatures, with civil suits piled on top of them. An eighty-year-old patriarch had his office boxed up and emptied overnight. Brother was set against brother, and cousin against cousin. In all of this there was no family constitution, no family council, no shareholders' agreement worth the name, and, most damaging of all, no neutral person to whom a dispute could be carried before it reached a courtroom.

It is hard not to compare this with the Cartiers, whose story has appeared in these pages before. As far back as 1906, old Alfred Cartier wrote a dispute-resolution clause into the firm's founding documents. If his sons ever fell out, the matter would go to a named arbiter. The Cartiers kept a family council at a time when most families kept only their quarrels. They were not spared every grief. They were spared the spectacle of destroying one another in public. The Guccis had built no such structure, and so every disagreement had only two places to go, into silence or into court. Families reach for litigation when they have built nothing better to reach for. A constitution, a family council, a forum where grievances can be aired and settled inside the family, the habit of mediation in place of a lawsuit, these are the load-bearing walls of a dynasty. They have to be raised in the sunshine, because no one can raise them in the middle of a storm.

The reckoning, and a bitter irony

The end arrived quietly, in a lawyer's office, with the stroke of a pen. Worn down by the family wars, Maurizio first joined hands with the Bahrain-based investment house Investcorp to buy out his relatives. It was the first time an outsider had ever held a meaningful block of the family's shares. Then, drowning in losses he could not manage, he sold his own remaining half. On 23 September 1993, in the offices of a Swiss bank in Lugano, surrounded by lawyers and financiers, Maurizio Gucci signed away the last of the family's stake. After more than seventy years, not one Gucci owned any part of Gucci. Eighteen months later he was dead.

Here lies the cruellest irony of the whole story. Once the feuding owners were gone, the professionals turned a near-bankrupt company, within a decade, into one of the most valuable luxury brands on earth, its sales climbing from a few hundred million dollars into the billions. Everything Maurizio had dreamed of came true. The global house, the professional management, the modern marketing, all of it arrived. It simply arrived for strangers, while the family watched from outside the gates. The craftsmanship of the first generation, the genius of the second and the dream of the third all lived on. The family that had carried them was simply no longer there. That is the true shape of shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves. The wealth does not always vanish into thin air. Sometimes it just moves quietly out of the hands of the family that built it.

What the bag came to mean

Let me come back to that Gucci bag, bought in Singapore a quarter of a century ago with overtime money. For twenty-five years it was simply a beautiful thing, hard-earned and much loved. Since reading Forden's book, I cannot pick it up without thinking of the family whose name it carries. The bag has outlasted the family's ownership of the very company that made it. There is something almost unbearably poignant in that. A canvas cross-body bag, in a cupboard in India, has held on to its Gucci for longer, in a sense, than the Guccis themselves did.

Strip away the murder, the courtrooms and the couture, and the book leaves a business family with a handful of quiet instructions. Divide ownership in a way that feels fair to those who build the value, and be willing to revisit it as contributions change over the years. Give your children a genuine role in good time, before their talent curdles into resentment. Keep the family, the owners and the managers in clear view, and decide with open eyes where the people who marry in will stand. Earn the right to manage the business, or hand that task to those who have earned it. And raise your governance, your council and your means of settling disputes while the days are still calm, because none of it can be raised once the quarrels begin.

Guccio Gucci began with a craftsman's pride and a porter's eye for beauty. His grandsons inherited the genius and never learnt the grace of sharing it. The bags still sell. The name still shines. The family is simply no longer in the room where the decisions are made. Every dynasty would do well to keep that warning close.

A great family business is rarely destroyed in a single dramatic moment. It is undone slowly, across ordinary years, each time a family allows pride to win over governance. The House of Gucci shows us where that road ends. The ending of our own story is still ours to write.

Credit card is not for impromptu Bali trips. Use it to invest in yourself

This article was first published in the Print, June 16, 2026; https://theprint.in/pageturner/credit-card-bali-trips-invest/2961457/

Credit can be a powerful bridge between today’s desires and tomorrow’s means, but it must be used with care. At its core, credit means borrowing now and agreeing to repay later, with an additional cost known as interest. Lenders—banks or fintech platforms—charge an annual percentage rate (APR) to compensate for the risk of non-repayment and forgo the opportunity to deploy those funds elsewhere.

In a healthy economy, credit fuels growth. Students use education loans to gain skills, businesses tap working-capital lines to bridge seasonal cash-flow gaps, families stretch EMIs over decades to buy homes. However, when credit is misused, debt piled on high-interest credit cards or personal loans, the same tool that creates opportunities can turn into a persistent burden.

Credit-card APRs often exceed 25–30% annually, turning unpaid balances into a mounting liability. Suppose you have a ₹2,00,000 credit card balance at 30% APR. Let’s see what happens if you are not able to pay the full amount on the due date. Let’s assume the minimum payment is 2% of the opening balance. Therefore, you pay ₹4,000.

After paying the minimum, the remaining amount accrues monthly interest. The remaining amount, or the new principal will be: ₹2,00,000 – ₹4,000 = ₹1,96,000 Now let’s add one month’s interest: ₹196,000 × (1+0.025) = ₹200,900. So, after one month, despite paying ₹4,000, you still owe ₹200,900, an increase of ₹900 due to interest. If you again pay only the 2% minimum on the new balance, the process repeats. Thus, it barely reduces the principal and can let your balance and total interest rise over time.

Pro Tip: Before you swipe your card, remember: if you can’t pay your balance in full each month, high‐APR debt can quietly grow even while you’re making payments. Always run these numbers first. You’ll often find it makes more sense to borrow less or choose a lower‐cost alternative. Responsible credit use hinges on three pillars: understanding costs, maintaining discipline and aligning borrowing with your long-term goals.

First, know your APR and repayment terms. A loan or card that seems attractive on an ad may carry hidden fees such as late-payment penalties, annual charges or high default rates, that transform convenience into a trap. Second, treat credit like a knife: indispensable in skilled hands, dangerous when misused. Always ask, ‘Can I repay this in full by the due date?’ If not, reconsider the purchase or seek a lower-cost alternative. Third, use credit to invest in yourself or essential assets—a degree, a home or a temporary shortfall—rather than funding fleeting indulgences, like an impromptu trip to Bali.

Credit scores, summaries of your repayment history and utilisation of credit, determine not only your access to credit but also the rates you pay. Consistently paying on time and keeping utilisation low builds a strong score, unlocking cheaper loans and premium card benefits in the future. Macroeconomic forces shape credit availability and cost.

When central banks lower policy rates to spur growth, borrowing costs fall, making mortgages, car loans and even credit card interest more affordable. Conversely, in times of rising inflation, central banks may hike rates, EMIs on floating-rate loans climb and credit card charges mirror the market tightening.

Economic downturns can trigger stricter lending criteria, as banks guard against rising defaults. Across the globe, credit cultures differ. In the US, credit card penetration is high, and APRs can soar above 20%, yet rewards programmes entice responsible users. In Germany, consumers favour debit and cash, shunning high-interest cards.

In India, soaring education and housing costs have fuelled rapid growth in personal and home loans, even as credit card adoption remains nascent. Understanding your country’s credit norms helps you benchmark your own borrowing habits.

Behind the Metrics: The Human Story of Entrepreneurship

This Book Review was first published by Forbes India on March 9, 2026; https://www.forbesindia.com/article/life/behind-the-metrics-the-human-story-of-entrepreneurship/2992056/1

Book Review: Unseen: The Untold Story of Deepinder Goyal and the Making of Zomato by Megha Vishwanath

Penguin Business, 332 Pages

In Unseen, Megha Vishwanath tells more than the story of a startup. She traces the making of Zomato alongside the making of its founder, Deepinder Goyal, placing both within the turbulence of India’s startup ecosystem. The book follows Zomato’s journey from an idea to a platform that reshaped urban consumption. Vishwanath attempts to move beyond hero worship (though not always successfully), and instead circles a harder question: what actually sustains a company once charisma alone is not enough?

Restlessness beneath recognition

Early in the book, Vishwanath asks, “…what happens when you finally become visible to the world… and still feel unseen by yourself.” She closes with, “Strangers recognised his face everywhere. But here, where it mattered most… he had disappeared.”

Read together, these lines capture the emotional truth of entrepreneurship: a restlessness that achievement cannot settle, and recognition that does not quiet the inner noise. Even after building at scale, much remains beyond one’s grasp. Vishwanath treats this not as contradiction but as condition, the human cost of ambition. Success does not resolve uncertainty. It merely changes its shape.

This is one of the book’s quieter strengths. It allows us to see the founder not only as builder, but as someone perpetually in motion, driven less by arrival than by unfinishedness.

Talent density, not founder mythology

One of the book’s most compelling insights is that Zomato’s edge was never just its founder’s drive. It was the depth of talent Goyal cultivated. Over time, he built what can only be described as a bench of founder-quality leaders, people capable of matching his momentum rather than merely executing instructions.

The organisation that emerges is not tightly hierarchical. It is loosely networked, powered by ownership and speed. Vishwanath captures this internal architecture well, showing how momentum becomes distributed rather than concentrated.

Yet here the book leaves an unresolved tension. While Vishwanath emphasises distributed leadership, the narrative remains deeply anchored in Goyal’s judgement and instinct. One comes away reassured about talent, but less certain about institutional durability. If the founder’s presence were to recede fully, would the culture hold? 

This feels especially relevant today. As of February 1, 2026, Goyal has stepped down from the executive role of CEO to focus on new ideas. At 43, he remains central to the company’s identity, still perceived as the connective tissue holding things together. Yet the book leaves behind a productive anxiety: who sustains such a fluid organism when its most catalytic presence recedes? Would Eternal endure if, hypothetically, Goyal ever decided to disappear to the mountains?

Capital with conscience

Vishwanath is clear-eyed about the startup ecosystem itself. Funding cycles, boardroom pressures and valuation swings are described without melodrama. In Zomato’s case, Sanjeev Bikhchandani, founder of Naukri.com and an early investor, emerges as a stabilising force.

More than capital, he brought governance, perspective and restraint. His role illustrates something important: when ambition is paired with experienced counsel, growth becomes more grounded. 

Communication as leadership

A particularly valuable thread in the book is the treatment of communication as leadership. Goyal’s letters to employees are a master class in clarity and transparency, especially the one outlining the qualities that define a founder’s mindset. Ownership. Speed. Intellectual honesty. Long-term thinking.

There is no ornamental language, no managerial fog. Just shared vocabulary and shared standards. In an ecosystem where ambiguity often masquerades as strategy, these letters show how culture is built deliberately, through words that people can internalise. Institutional depth, Vishwanath reminds us, does not come only from hiring talent. It comes from facilitating that talent to continuously push boundaries.

Risk, relationships, and orchestration

The book also captures the cultural risk embedded in entrepreneurship. For those shaped by predictable career paths, leaving a firm like Bain for uncertainty feels irrational. Vishwanath does not romanticise this leap. She shows the isolation, the strain on family and friendships, and the faith required to persist when outcomes are unclear. She also honours the invisible ecosystem around founders: parents who tolerate risk, friends who absorb volatility, early employees who commit before proof.

Zomato is often criticised for not having “invented” anything. Vishwanath offers a quieter rebuttal. Innovation is not always technological novelty. Zomato reorganised information, reduced friction, and saved time. Today, when bandwidth is limited and traffic relentless, that matters. Convenience, here, is structural.

The unseen work behind endurance

Most founder biographies, whether Ronnie Screwvala’s Dream with Your Eyes Open or global accounts like The Everything Store- Amazon or Shoe Dog- Nike, often reflect on companies that have already stabilised into institutions. They emphasise systems, scale, eventual clarity, and the founder who has himself become an institution or a steward.

Unseen operates in a more unsettled space. Zomato, at 17, is neither fledgling nor fully mature. It behaves with the urgency of a startup despite its scale. Unlike many managerial accounts of company building, Vishwanath goes inward. She examines the founder’s psychology, the proximity to failure, the strain on relationships, and the role of family and friends as silent partners in risk. 

She looks into the mind of a founder, who remains in the restless start-up founder phase. That interior focus distinguishes the book. 

Conclusion

At times Unseen reads like a fast-paced corporate thriller. But its deeper contribution lies in what it says about leadership and institution-building. It shows how governance and chaos coexist, how capital needs conscience, and how communication becomes culture.

And then it leaves you with a harder truth. The real test of ambition is not how brightly it burns in one individual. It is whether it can be distributed, absorbed, and carried forward by many. That is the unseen work behind every enduring enterprise. And that, ultimately, is what this book is really about.

Legacy in Action: Continuity, Storytelling, and Archiving at the TATAs

This Book Review was first published in the Economic Times, December 13, 2024; https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/legacy-in-action-continuity-storytelling-and-archiving-at-the-tatas/articleshow/116273631.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

In Jamsetji Tata: Powerful Learnings for Corporate Success, R. Gopalakrishnan and Harish Bhat provide an intimate view into the Tata Group’s legacy, revealing the values and vision that have helped this family enterprise endure across generations. This book benefits from the insider perspective of authors who have “lived” within the Tata ethos. Throughout the book, three core principles stood out to me for their relevance to family businesses everywhere: continuity, storytelling, and archiving. Through these pillars, the Tata Group has not only survived but has actively contributed to India’s growth story for over a century.

Continuity as the Backbone of Purpose

In family businesses, continuity is the anchor that keeps purpose alive. The Tata Group is a compelling case in point, where continuity is not a passive inheritance but a deliberate practice. Jamsetji Tata envisioned an institute of higher education in India and his son, Dorabji Tata, carried this vision forward by establishing the Indian Institute of Science, a foundation for India’s scientific advancement. Later leaders, like Naoroji Saklatwala and Ratan Tata, stayed true to Jamsetji’s goals by expanding the group’s initiatives in healthcare, education, and rural outreach, including regions like the underserved Northeast.

What emerges through Jamsetji Tata is an argument for continuity as more than tradition; it is an evolving legacy that serves as both compass and anchor. Without continuity, iconic Tata projects like the Cancer Research Institute or the Northeast Initiative could have easily become fleeting ventures. Instead, they are legacies, continually renewed by successive leaders. The Tata story suggests that if family businesses seek to last, their purpose must be deliberately preserved and adapted across generations.

The Role of Storytelling in Building Legacy

Gopalakrishnan and Bhat show that in Tata’s journey, storytelling has played a central role in transmitting values and keeping the organization’s mission alive. In business, it’s easy to lose sight of purpose, but stories—especially those that explain the “why” behind values—make those principles memorable and accessible. Storytelling within Tata has preserved a cohesive narrative, reinforcing the organization’s commitment to community, integrity, and resilience in the face of adversity.

Consider the story of Mithapur, a drought-stricken settlement in Gujarat that Tata helped turn into a thriving township. In today’s era, where discussions often revolve around work-life balance, the dedication that went into transforming Mithapur may seem almost unimaginable. Tata’s story in Mithapur illustrates what’s possible when companies invest beyond profit, in places that need development. They offer insights into the ethos of purpose-driven enterprises and inspire budding entrepreneurs to envision business as a force for societal good.

As the spouse of an entrepreneur, the story of Dorabji Tata and his wife Meher Bai, who pledged their entire wealth to save Tata Steel, resonates deeply with me. I know how tough these decisions are. Tata’s stories don’t merely showcase business achievements—they reveal the spirit of sacrifice and conviction that make up the core of the organization’s legacy. And, storytelling isn’t just a tool for marketing but a way to instill values that resonate across generations and communities.

Archiving as a Pillar of Organizational Memory

Perhaps the most understated yet powerful aspect in Jamsetji Tata is the emphasis on archiving as a tool for continuity. By meticulously preserving letters, speeches, and records, Tata has built a repository that keeps its past connected to its future. This archive doesn’t just record facts; it captures lessons, insights, and the reasoning behind key decisions, providing a resource for current and future leaders alike, cultivating a living memory.

For other family businesses, the Tata archive is an inspiring model, underscoring how documenting history and values can build a lasting legacy. Preserving history this way is more than nostalgia; it’s a strategic resource that reinforces Tata’s purpose, ensuring that its ethos remains as powerful today as it was a century ago.

A Blueprint for Family Businesses Seeking Enduring Success

Taken together, continuity, storytelling, and archiving create a framework for sustaining purpose over generations. Gopalakrishnan and Bhat’s account is both a tribute to Tata’s rich history and a guide for family businesses grappling with the challenge of building a legacy that lasts. This book invites business families to consider how they might nurture a shared purpose, disseminate stories that resonate across generations, and preserve the lessons of the past for future growth.

Through their insider perspective, Gopalakrishnan and Bhat reveal that in a world often consumed by the pursuit of growth and innovation, Jamsetji Tata is a timely reminder that true legacy is not merely built, but carefully tended—through continuity in purpose and values, storytelling, and preservation. The authors offer an enduring truth: success may be measured in quarters, but legacy is crafted across centuries.

A Country Called Childhood

When reading "A Country Called Childhood- A Memoir" by Deepti Naval, I became nostalgic and reminisced about my childhood. I recall the Shree Ji stores in Ramgarh which used to be my favorite shop. It rented out comics for Re 1 a day. Sometimes 4-5 Amar Chitra Katha or other comic books would be bound together and they would charge a slightly higher amount for renting it. Ramgarh did not have a library and that store filled the gap for me. They also had various candies and gift items that used to fascinate me.

I also recall the samosas and sweets of Rajasthan Kalewalaya and their dahi kachori on special occasions. Later, when I was slightly older, they started selling a sweet called Madhuchakra that became my favorite.

Priya Sweets was for special occasions. Especially when I went to the main road and the elder accompanying me was in a good mood and had a few extra rupees to indulge me. There used to be the occasional curry puff, pineapple pastry, and beetroot cutlet.

Then Mangal Singh's shop was perhaps the most aspirational shop. You went there to buy an odd pencil box or water bottle. But there were so many things I liked. There used to be games, fancy tiffin boxes, or water bottles, that were often out of bounds.

For as long as I recall, we bought dresses only from National Stores. It was a very fancy store for it's times. It looked glossy, clean, and neatly arranged. We bought very few dresses but bought only from there. In hindsight, it seems like a lesson in quality over quantity.

One distinct memory I have of Ramgarh during my growing up years is the mela that used to be put up every year during December and would go on till Jan 26th. It used to have the Maut ka kuan, the Ferris wheel, a circus, and various shops selling toys, clothes, utensils, etc. There is a memory of buying iron utensils such as kadhai and tawa from there on more than one occasion and getting the knives sharpened. I also remember buying Khaja- a sweet- that I used to love eating, from there. Mounds of colourful sweets on both sides of the road. But we would buy the Khaja and occasionally Balushahi. I remember going to this mela 3-4 times during the one month that it was there, every year.

Another favorite shop of mine was Sishu Gyan Kendra, and later its sister concern, Gyan Bharti. We would go there for all our stationery, notebooks, and books. I remember the rolls of brown covers and the carefully selected book-label stickers. It used to be a big exercise before the beginning of every new class and before the summer vacations ended. 3-4 people at home would be involved in covering all books and notebooks with those brown papers. I still remember the feel and the smell of the newly covered books and notebooks.

Another place I remember is the fruit market, just off the main road. I remember going to that market with my father on the bike and occasionally with my mother or aunts on rickshaw.

There was one dosa wala on Main Road. I recall everyone saying that his sambhar was awful. It used to look a dirty yellowish brown rather than a bright yellowish-reddish-brownish that good sambhars are supposed to look. I also remember it used to have mashed pumpkin. And I hated pumpkin. But somehow, the taste of that sambhar lingers in my mind. Fondly. I used to finish it. Perhaps because eating outside food was a rare treat. And dosa in Ramgarh was a rare treat, unlike in the South of the country where it is a staple.

Another vivid memory is the movie dialogues echoing from a shop behind our home in Saudagar Mohalla. Now, as I listen to books on Audible, I appreciate that even movie dialogues can be listened to. Back then, however, I couldn't fully understand why anyone would want to listen to movie dialogues.

The Deepti Naval memoir sent me down my own memory lane. I am surprised at the memories that the mind stores. 

And of course, I also revisited the three all-time favorite movies of her- Chashme Buddoor, Saath Saath, and Kisi se na Kehna. She will always be Miss Chamko for me.

Two is Company

This Book Review was first published in the Business Standard on March 25, 2024; https://www.business-standard.com/book/two-is-company-124032500642_1.html

Book: An Uncommon Love: The Early Life of Sudha and Narayana Murthy

Author: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Price: 799/-

Pages: 352

Year: 2023

Publisher: Juggernaut Books, India

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's latest, a non-fiction, "An Uncommon Love: The Early Life of Sudha and Narayana Murthy," unveils the captivating narrative of two eminent figures, Sudha Murty and Narayana Murthy. It offers an exploration of their formative years. Divakaruni's adept narrative style, characterized by poetic simplicity and robust character portrayals, particularly resonates with aficionados of profound storytelling.

Departing from the world of mythological heroines, the book unfolds the ordinary yet remarkable lives of the Murthys before the establishment of Infosys, portraying their journey as an allegorical epic awaiting narration. Vividly depicted are the everyday trials and triumphs of a working couple, encapsulating the essence of support, sacrifice, and solidarity, compelling readers to root for their success.

Their story reminded me of the scenes from Basu Chatterjee’s 1976 classic Choti si Baat, starring Amol Palekar and Vidya Sinha. A simple boy. In love with a simple cotton saree-clad girl. Enjoying small things such as holding hands, walking on the roads, and eating at Poona Coffee House. “With her [Sudha] by his [Narayana] side, he felt he could take on even the toughest challenges” (p85).

You want them to succeed. You cheer for them. You feel for them. Sudha and Narayana Murthy's early life experiences together are relatable and Divakaruni captures them in the most endearing manner.

The narrative poignantly addresses the dilemma faced by individuals who find themselves overshadowed or relegated to supporting roles, despite possessing substantial capabilities and accomplishments—a sentiment to which Sudha Murty's journey lends credence. It would have been easy to portray Sudha Murty as the victim, as someone who had to give up her career to support Narayana Murthy’s passion, and it would have been largely true. However, it would do grave injustice to Sudha’s resilience and commitment to personal growth, exemplified through her writings, contributions to the Infosys Foundation, and her subsequent foray into public service [the recent nomination to the Rajya Sabha]. Divakaruni maintains a fine balance that never lets Sudha’s character slide into being inconsequential.  Rather she serves as a beacon of inspiration.

Another aspect that touched a chord with me was the challenge of imparting values amidst prosperity, as Sudha navigates the complexities of instilling humility and “living withing one’s means and not trying to keep up with the ‘neighbours’…the importance of being practical in matters of spending, recognizing wasteful behaviour, and getting good value for your money” (p309-310) in her children. This segment will resonate deeply with individuals who have experienced economic scarcity and now grapple with the task of nurturing similar sensibilities in their offspring.

On the professional development side of the couple, of notable significance is the portrayal of Narayana Murthy's evolution from a socialist idealist to a compassionate capitalist, alongside the inception of Infosys, underscoring the fervour, altruism, and perseverance that culminated in its establishment.

Unlike conventional biographies of business luminaries, which frequently overlook the intricacies of personal challenges and emotions, Divakaruni's portrayal transcends superficiality, reveals the interplay of relationships among its seven founders and elucidates the philosophical underpinnings of the compassionate capitalism intrinsic to Infosys's corporate ethos. Furthermore, the narrative sheds light on Sudha Murty's sacrifices and her steadfast support of Narayana Murthy's endeavours, emblematic of the pivotal role spouses play in each other's professional pursuits.

The exemplary financial stewardship demonstrated by the Murthys underscores a vital lesson for startup founders and business owners: the importance of judiciously managing company and investor funds. In an environment rife with instances of poor companies- rich promoters, the Murthys' narrative serves as a beacon of integrity and foresight, illustrating the enduring value of principled financial management for long-term sustainability. By assimilating these invaluable insights, aspiring entrepreneurs can play a pivotal role in cultivating a culture of accountability and integrity within India's corporate landscape, thus fostering a legacy of responsible entrepreneurship and sustainable growth.

I am reminded of an incident when I accompanied my brother to the optician, a family friend, shortly after his graduation from an IIT. Upon learning of my brother's employment at a multinational corporation, the optician remarked, "We heard so much about you. That you are so good in studies and all. And you still didn't get a job in Infosys?" This anecdote encapsulates the profound impact of the Murthys' creation, Infosys, on the national consciousness. It was a pleasure to delve into the lives of this extraordinary couple, whose visionary leadership catalyzed the information technology wave in the country, capturing the imagination of a nation and leaving an indelible mark on the annals of Indian business history.

In sum, "An Uncommon Love" is a testament to Divakaruni's narrative prowess and her ability to unravel the complexities of human experience. Through meticulous storytelling and emotional depth, the book illuminates the transformative journey of two icons, offering readers a compelling narrative of love, sacrifice, and resilience amidst the backdrop of nascent entrepreneurship in India. 

An Unmissable Journey For Family Business Owners & Scholars

This review was first published in the Family Business United on August 22, 2023; https://www.familybusinessunited.com/post/an-unmissable-journey-for-family-business-owners-scholars

About the book:

The Cartiers is the revealing tale of a jewelry dynasty's four generations, from revolutionary France to the 1970s. At its heart are the three Cartier brothers whose motto was 'Never copy, only create' and who made their family firm internationally famous in the early days of the twentieth century, thanks to their unique and complementary talents: Louis, the visionary designer who created the first men's wristwatch to help an aviator friend tell the time without taking his hands off the controls of his flying machine; Pierre, the master dealmaker who bought the New York headquarters on Fifth Avenue for a double-stranded natural pearl necklace; and Jacques, the globe-trotting gemstone expert whose travels to India gave Cartier access to the world's best rubies, emeralds, and sapphires, inspiring the celebrated Tutti Frutti jewelry.

Francesca Cartier Brickell, whose great-grandfather was the youngest of the brothers, has traveled the world researching her family's history, tracking down those connected with her ancestors and discovering long-lost pieces of the puzzle along the way. Now she reveals never-before-told dramas, romances, intrigues, betrayals, and more.

The Cartiers also offers a behind-the-scenes look at the firm's most iconic jewelry- the notoriously cursed Hope Diamond, the Romanov emeralds, the classic panther pieces, and the long line of stars from the worlds of fashion, film, and royalty who wore them, from Indian maharajas and Russian grand duchesses to Wallis Simpson, Coco Chanel, and Elizabeth Taylor.

Published in the two-hundredth anniversary year of the birth of the dynasty's founder, Louis-François Cartier, this book is a magnificent, definitive, epic social history shown through the deeply personal lens of one legendary family.

Review:

Francesca Cartier Brickell's magnum opus, "The Cartiers," creates an enthralling narrative that captivated me from the very beginning. As I delved into the book, I felt part of the Cartier family, standing shoulder to shoulder with the family members and the illustrious figures that shaped their history. The author masterfully blends historical facts with personal accounts, transporting the readers to the grand salons and dazzling soirées of the Belle Époque, where the Cartiers' creations adorned the crème de la crème of society.

This book is an enchanting exploration of family, business, artistry, and the timeless allure of the Cartier legacy, the brilliance of a dynasty that, while no longer owned by the family, continues to thrive as a testament to their enduring legacy. This must-read book offers invaluable insights and profound lessons for family business owners and scholars, making it an essential addition to any family business library.

The book delves into the heart of family dynamics, the unique opportunities, and challenges that being a family business pose. The nuances of sibling camaraderie, complex relationships between cousins, shared vision and family governance, and the circumstances leading to selling the family members' stake in the business, have been poignantly narrated.

I can safely say that I have read thousands (at least a thousand plus some more) of books in my lifetime. Many of them are good. Few are extraordinary. And a handful are books that transported me to being a witness to the journey, the story. Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann was one such book. The Cartiers is the other. While it is not right to compare both, they are both magnificent in their own right. One significant difference is that Buddenbrooks is fiction, while the Cartiers is reality! And the reality is stranger rather more interesting than fiction in this case.

In this fan-girl account and book review, I dwell upon my journey with the Cartiers in the following paragraphs. In the process, I highlight a few aspects where Cartiers provide living proof of the theories in family businesses.

Traveling back in time

One of the book's most compelling aspects is the portrayal of iconic personalities who adorned Cartier's jewels. From Princess Grace of Monaco to the incomparable Elizabeth Taylor, their stories intertwine with the history of the pieces they wore, elevating them to objects of profound significance, and transporting the readers to the world of passion, resilience, opulence, and elegance.

Brickell's meticulous research and intimate family anecdotes allowed me to travel back in time to participate in the Cartier journey. I was there when the fire broke out in the Cartier store leading monsieur Louis-François Cartier to be risk averse. I felt his pain when his only son Alfred traveled to the US, and he pined to be reunited with him. I witnessed Alfred convincing his eldest son, Louis, to marry a Worth as it would benefit Cartier's name and business. I celebrated with Alfred when Jean-Jacques Cartier, his first grandson, was born (albeit with a tinge of guilt. But I had traveled back in time to 1919, you see! I can't really blame myself for being a part of the patriarchal society back then).

I rooted for Jacques to return to the business. I cried out aloud. "Oh, come on, Jacques. Cartiers needs you. Come back soon." I felt one with Elma and Nelly, like the third band of the Trinity ring.

I witnessed the Eiffel Tower being unveiled and felt the anxiety of Pierre and Nelly aboard a ship from New York to London when they heard of the Titanic sinking. I traveled to the durbars of the Gaekwads and the Nizam of Hyderabad with Jacques.

When Jacques passed away, I sobbed uncontrollably. I felt the pain of Nelly and Jean-Jacques. I paid my obeisance to the genius of Louis. I felt the loneliness of Pierre, who lost both his brothers within a year.

Adapting on the go

The Cartiers' journey mirrors the ever-changing landscape of world society, as their creations adorned monarchs, celebrities, and the crème de la crème of society. Good jewelry touches every who's who, from the Czarinas to the Kings, the Nizams, the businessmen, Elizabeth Taylor, the Beatles, Elton John, and more recently, Deepika Padukone.

As demonstrated in their successful multi-national transatlantic operations, the Cartiers' ability to embrace change and adapt to evolving markets aligns with the "Dynamic Capabilities" theory, allowing them to thrive through turbulent times. As the Romanovs fell and the bodice gave way for practical clothes for women, as the war raged and even the wealthy preferred a more austere way of life, as the Maharajas in India paved the way for democracy and the rare pearls gave way to cultured pearls, the Cartiers kept adapting through their designs, prices, and products.

Expression of feelings and archiving

Francesca Cartier Brickell found a trunk of letters in her grandfather's cellar. These letters formed an important source of information for her book. The letters provided her with the raw emotions expressed by the writer. When Louis-Francois wrote to his son Alfred, "I don't need to tell you that I long for your return. You and I are inseparable…," we can feel him pine for his son. I could imagine Pierre fuming when he wrote to his nephew, Claude, "…the consequences, serious for you and regrettable for us."

While the means of communication have increased, they have become instant, will future generations have such words of expression to recreate the journeys of the 21^st century, which will be history in the future? Will we have saved WhatsApp messages and phone calls? Do the torchbearers of business families today express themselves so openly through emails? The reality is not lost on any of us.  

We are in touch more but express less. We talk more but communicate less. We write more words, but they mean less. We have more storage, but we have no records of emotions.

The book is a testament to the importance of writing, expressing, and archiving. This art is dwindling and will cost legacy building dearly in centuries to come.

Familiness and Resources

At its core, "The Cartiers" is a profound exploration of the power of family unity and vision in shaping a lasting legacy. The Cartiers' unwavering belief in brotherhood and collaboration embodies the concept of "familiness," where the family's collective strengths drive their entrepreneurial endeavors to remarkable heights.

The book delves into the heart of the Cartier family, exposing their triumphs and tribulations, successes, and challenges. Brickell brings forth the complexity of family dynamics, painting a vivid picture of their relationships and the impact of their shared passion for jewelry. The interplay of personalities between the Cartier brothers – Louis, Pierre, and Jacques – was a driving force behind their success, where creative vision, sales acumen, and financial acuity converged harmoniously. It propelled them through challenging times, navigating global conflicts, economic downturns, or changing consumer preferences.

On one occasion, Pierre recognises their strength, "We brothers are very close, that is our strength" (pg 131). Jean-Jacques added, "Pierre was a brilliant businessman. He didn't have Louis' creative vision, but then again, Louis didn't have Pierre's ability for selling or his understanding of finance... But Pierre understood the markets and he understood people's motivations. Cartier needed the mix of different talents, you see, that was one of the reasons that it did so well" (pg 243).

It's not that the brothers did not have differences or fights. They did. "The trade knew how tight the Cartier brothers were. That was important. It was one of their strengths-when dealing with one, you were actually dealing with all three. They had a lot more bargaining power that way", said Jean- Jacques (pg 330). This crucial lesson in unity is a beacon for any business family seeking to thrive across generations.

The Cartiers also demonstrate the resources acquired through marriage in a family business. All three sons of Alfred Cartier, and Alfred himself, married into families that benefited the Cartier business. The strategic alliances forged through marriage enhanced their reputation and helped them build strong family social capital. The Cartiers' embrace of such unions underscores the importance of carefully curated partnerships and their role in building lasting success.

Family governance and togetherness

In 1906, "Not wanting any arguments between his sons, Alfred had a dispute resolution clause built into the firm's constitutional documents. If there was a disagreement between Louis and Pierre, the matter should be resolved by either Alfred or, interestingly, Louis' father-in-law, Jean-Philippe Worth." There was even a family council in place. Most business families don't have a stated dispute resolution mechanism or a constitution, even today! They must have one! The Cartiers' shareholding also changed and kept up with the growing multi-national transatlantic operations.

However, the presence of family governance mechanisms did not prevent the Cartiers from eventually selling off their stake in the firm. I think one reason the family sold out their stake was the dwindling bond within the fourth-generation members, their bond with the business, and the passion to keep it in the family.

The fourth generation of the Cartiers grew up apart due to the third generation primarily living in three different far-off cities. They did not have the same bond as the third generation, which had grown up together. Brickell laments, "But whereas three close brothers with complementary talents could survive the storms life threw at them, from a huge global conflict to a great depression, the cousins, lacking the same bond and shared upbringing, found the challenges of the postwar world overwhelming" (pg 539).

I also felt the pressure on Claude, Marion and Claudel, and Jean- Jacque to live up to their predecessors. Each one of them handled it differently. The tussle between Pierre and Claudel was unfortunate. But who was wrong, and who was right? I felt anger towards Claudel, but could I blame him for being different from the rest of the flock? I could feel the weight on his shoulders and the rebellion, perhaps because of it.

In the end, family bonding, pride in the family name, and shared values keep the family and the business together. Brickell wonders, "Perhaps, as a unified family, the Cartiers might have adapted to the changes sweeping through the luxury world, but apart and alone, they could not" (pg 536). Perhaps. It is difficult to say in hindsight. But I would like to believe it too.

From the time Louis shifted to the US, accounts of his lifestyle there did not leave me with a good feeling. After that, the sale of New York and Paris branches did not surprise me. The writing was on the wall, in a sense. His last will and testament read, "Division in families creates ruin and misery. I command my heirs to maintain harmony among themselves and with their cousins " (pg 381). Unfortunately, Louis' caution could not prevent the sale of the New York Maison by his son, the first nail in the coffin.

Resilience

The book weaves through tumultuous events such as the World Wars, the sinking of the Titanic, and the great depression, where unforeseen circumstances and personal emotions intertwined with the fate of the business. Their united front and complementary talents fuelled their resilience through trying times.

I shared the family's despair as the war raged, with Jean Jacques on military service, Louis and Jacques not keeping well, important clients fleeing from London, Paris, and as America joined the war. I watched in horror as Milton Heath was bombed.

This period seemed so much like the Covid times. Family members worrying about each other, and businesses shut down completely. I would probably not have understood or related to what the Cartiers were going through if I had not lived through the Covid era.

The Cartiers survived these periods and came out stronger each time due to their vision, passion, innovative strategies, and togetherness.

Innovation

From a humble beginning in Paris to the global prominence of the brand, the Cartiers built an empire, one gemstone at a time. The Cartiers' unwavering dedication to craftsmanship and their innate ability to cater to the desires of royalty and celebrities alike are portrayed with such vividness that it's almost palpable. Their creations become more than just jewelry; they transform into symbols of love, power, and human emotion.

Louis's "Never copy, only create" mantra ran through the entire organization, irrespective of the location and the brother handling the business. The Cartiers' devotion to their craft and innovative spirit is encapsulated in their iconic creations, such as the Trinity ring and the Tank watch, which symbolize enduring love and timeless elegance.

While change is the only constant, and the Cartiers kept adapting to the changing customer preferences, the Cartier style remained a constant.

Other stakeholders

Brickell's attention to detail illuminates the family's commitment to their craft, evident in their unwavering focus on quality and customer relationships. I traveled alongside the Cartiers and witnessed their interactions with esteemed clients. These accounts underscore the importance of nurturing relationships with customers and the role of exceptional service in elevating a family business to new heights.

The book also delves into the profound impact of dedicated employees, showcasing how their passion and loyalty contributed to Cartier's reputation for unparalleled craftsmanship. The Cartiers' commitment to nurturing a talented and loyal workforce exemplifies the "Family Human Capital" concept, where family members' and employees' shared values and dedication contribute to the company's sustainable growth.

All three brothers relied heavily on their loyal employees, entrusting them with substantial responsibilities and giving them a free hand to run the business. The Cartier brothers empowered their team and nurtured a culture of excellence. Allowing them to excel in their roles and contribute to the company's growth was instrumental in building long-term success for the family firm. I deeply appreciated the role of employees like Toussaint, Jacqueau, Muffat, Glaezner, Hasey, Bellenger, Devaux, and many more in keeping the Cartier flag flying high in war and peace, in times of family unity and otherwise.

At one time during my journey with Pierre Cartier, I asked him incredulously if Jules Glaezner actually arranged for the stars of a hotly anticipated play to wear Cartier jewels on stage during their performance, then invited "several carefully selected clients, to attend the performance in a special box with him"? Glaenzer had actually selected the jewels for the actors with these clients' tastes in mind. After the show, he went backstage with his guests to meet the actors and collect the necklaces, bandeaux, and bracelets. He then announced that carrying such a huge amount of valuable jewelry would be too risky. Instead, he proposed that each of his female guests select an item to wear for the remainder of the evening and that he would collect it from each of them the following morning. He then took his guests out to a nightclub, where, as intended, their jewels were much admired. The next day, a Cartier delivery boy called at the guests' homes for the jewelry only to find that each woman had decided to buy what she had been wearing the previous evening (pg 253-254).

It was usual for multiple generations of the same family to work at Cartier. Many Cartier employees in all three branches worked for them for decades.

Indian connection

Being an Indian, I cannot but devote a sub-section to the role the Indian Maharajas played in the Cartier's rise. Though, it's not without the realisation that it was the period when the struggle for independence from British rule was underway, and the grandeur of the Indian royalties seems misplaced. But then, really, who am I to judge?

The book's portrayal of the Indian Maharajas and their penchant for extravagant jewels adds a mesmerizing facet to the Cartiers' journey. I traversed the opulent durbars of the Gaekwads, the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Maharaja of Patiala, and the Maharaja of Nawanagar, alongside Jacques. Jacques's escapades to India seem like a dream. Imagine him bringing his Rolls Royce to India! I am thinking of his Rolls Royce on roads where there were no roads!

India was once called the "golden bird," and the intertwining of the Cartier's legacy with the wealth and grandeur of Indian royalties was, therefore, no surprise. Yet, the extent left me gaping in awe. When Muffat was summoned by the Maharaja of Patiala, Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, and he opened one gem after another from a trunk full of gems, Paul Muffat tried to hide his awe. I did not. I stood there with my mouth open!

Conclusion

I read the book with a childlike awe and wonder. I did not want the book to end. Francesca Cartier Brickell's extraordinary narrative has etched an indelible mark on my soul, allowing me to traverse time with the Cartiers, witnessing their triumphs and sharing their heartaches. When I stood alongside Brickell at the crypt, my eyes were wet. I felt the connection with the Cartier ancestors more deeply than she would have realised that any reader would.

For family business scholars, "The Cartiers" is a treasure trove of examples that compliments the theories. The book offers a rich tapestry of the Cartiers' experiences, exploring topics such as familiness, succession planning, intergenerational collaboration, the role of communication in maintaining family harmony, family constitution, and the intersection of family and business values. These lessons provide a unique opportunity for scholars to delve into the complexities of family enterprises and draw inspiration from a remarkable family business and the family that created and nurtured it.

For the family business owners, "The Cartiers" is a timeless journey that will speak directly to them, offering a profound understanding of the enduring power of unity, passion, and vision. They will find themselves nodding in recognition in many places as if looking into a mirror reflecting their experiences. It provides invaluable lessons, and a poignant reminder of the lasting impact a family's commitment can have on generations to come.

In conclusion, "The Cartiers" by Francesca Cartier Brickell is an exquisite literary gem that navigates the depths of family business dynamics with grace and insight. I have read numerous books on business families. But none is as exquisite, fascinating, and emotional as the journey of the renowned Cartier family through the ages!

Efficiency is the name of the game

This book review was first published in the Financial Express on June 27, 2022, https://www.financialexpress.com/lifestyle/book-review-the-ambuja-story-how-a-group-of-ordinary-men-created-an-extraordinary-company-by-narotam-sekhsaria/2573658/

Book: The Ambuja Story: How a Group of Ordinary Men Created an Extraordinary Company

Author: Narotam Sekhsaria

Price: 699/-

Pages: 368

Year: 2022

Publisher: Harper Business, India

Once upon a time, there was a boy, named Narotam. He was born in a Marwari family in Chirawa, Rajasthan. His family took him to Bombay (now Mumbai) when he was three. There, he was adopted by his grandfather’s younger brother who did not have a son of his own. This practice was a way to ensure the continuity of lineage in a patrilineal society. Destiny had plans for him. This is his story and the story of the company that he built.

Ordinary is relative

Narotam and his family were ordinary. Ordinary compared to the Bajaj’s who were their neighbors. But living in the same building as the Bajajs, who owned and managed one of the biggest business houses in the country then and now, cannot be ordinary for sure. Similarly, Narotam had an ordinary upbringing. A boy next door. He struggled at school yet finished at the top of the class. Was aimless and non-ambitious yet went on to study at some of the top colleges in Bombay.

Joining the civil services or getting a job in a bank or a multinational company was the dream career for those joining the workforce in the India of 1960s and 1970s. Not so for a lad growing up in a Marwari household. Working for someone else was unthinkable. So, he joined his family’s typical cotton trading business. He proved his mettle in various ways. Whether it was getting orders from Finlay, having the foresight to buy extra for his customer when prices started to rise and the customer was holidaying, being fair even when he could have made much more money, and making, maintaining, and tapping into social networks, were at display in the way he functioned.

Nothing that he did was extraordinary. Just ordinary things done well to achieve extraordinary results.

Bigger shores beckoned

Narotam’s “dil” wanted more. Forty years back, entrepreneurship was not a buzz word. Nor was ease of doing business. The Ambuja Story is not the usual start-up story that we are used to reading in the twenty first century.

Narotam grew up in a family of traders. The DNA needed to manufacture is very different from that for trading. After spending a decade being a trader himself, to set up a manufacturing unit for a commodity product about which he knew nothing, could not have been easy. And it was not.

The book brings out the vulnerabilities and the many uncertainties faced by the founder. It also shows how he adapted at each step of the way. He recruited the best, treated them with respect, and retained them. Did not compromise on quality of the plant, even though he placed his trust in newcomers, rather than well established players. Financial management, credit policy, and high ethical standards were all consciously made a part of setting up Ambuja. While there are many learnings from the story, the three that I would like to highlight here are efficiency, innovation, and brand building.

Efficiency: Cement is a commodity. There is little scope to differentiate the product itself. But there is ample scope to differentiate on efficiency. Efficiency in processes, tweaking the plants to enhance productivity, dust management systems, and each person doing their job well, are just a few examples. The company has efficiency written all over it.

Innovation: Innovation does not mean usage of artificial intelligence and machine learning to solve problems with digital solutions only. Innovating, doing things differently, to achieve better or cost-efficient solutions such as transporting cement through sea when no one else was doing it in India, and making small changes to the plants to achieve big impact, played a big role in making Ambuja profitable from the very beginning.

Branding: In a product where it was difficult to charge a premium, the investment in brand building from the very beginning, like it was a consumer product, helped Ambuja establish itself even in the presence of existing giants. Ambuja kept building and improvising on its branding as they grew. The results were all too visible.

Values and responsibility

Being born in a Marwari family, I have often heard about and witnessed philanthropy without anyone knowing about it. Left hand should not know if the right hand is giving. Such beliefs leave an indelible mark on everyone around. It was no different for Narotam. He writes of how the values and spirituality kept him “calm and centred even in the most turbulent of times. The values of ethics and compassion that he [his father] taught me steered me in everything that I did in my career” (Pg. 134). The Ambuja Cement Foundation has been way ahead of its times in adopting impactful corporate social responsibility projects and transforming the lives of communities around which they operate and going beyond those communities.

Resilience

An entrepreneur starts when he spots an opportunity. But the time at which he/she should exit is also important. Exit does not only mean selling the business. It could also mean redefining the role of the founder to ensure continuity beyond him/her. The confidence that the company would survive beyond the founder is what makes them long-lasting. Even without planning for it, Narotam had built a company that did not need him on a day-to-day basis when he had cancer.

Conclusion

There are many books on industrialists and entrepreneurs. Not many of them go into so much detailing regarding the thought process on each aspect of setting up and running of the business. This book is focused on the building of Ambuja, easy to read, comprehensive, and depicts the trials, turbulations, and triumphs at each step.

Immersion in the Tata 'black box'

This book review was first published in the Business Standard on November 19, 2021; https://www.business-standard.com/article/beyond-business/immersion-in-the-tata-black-box-121111801571_1.html

Book: TATA- The Global Corporation That Built Indian Capitalism

Author: Mircea Raianu
Price: 699/-
Pages: 304
Year: 2021
Publisher: Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts

A long time ago, I wanted to read more about Warren Buffett. There were a few biographies available in the library. For me, a biography was a biography. I was confused about which one to pick. My immediate boss, a man of books, scholarship, and impeccable manners, told me in his soft and thoughtful voice, “There are biographies and there are authorized biographies.” That got me thinking. I hadn’t known the difference until then. Subsequently, I read the authorized biography of Buffett, The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder, and then the others. Having access to the man himself definitely made a difference to the insights in Ms Schroeder’s book.

This experience has helped me differentiate between the latest book on the Tatas authored by a historian of global capitalism and modern South Asia, Mircea Raianu, and other books on the group that I have read over the years. Many of the popular books on the group are written by Tata insiders, for example R.M. Lala, Mukund Rajan, and Harish Bhat. A few others are written by the outsiders but are primarily internally focused. Examples include books by Girish Kuber, which chronicles the Tata family and group, Shashak Shah, which provides an insight into the people practices and culture at the Tata group, and Peter Casey, which is the work of a fanboy. Don’t get me wrong. Each of these books have something unique to tell, for the Tata group is such a giant that no one book can capture all aspects of the family and the group.

This is where Professor Raianu’s book makes a unique contribution. His is a book by an outsider that extensively integrates the activities of the group with the external environment, using internal resources (archives), clubbed with his own research about the global and Indian events and economies. The journey of the Tatas is immersed deeply in colonial, socialist, and capitalist India and the confluence of politics, economics, and society. On the one hand, the Tatas have challenged the Schumpeterian “creative destruction” view by traversing salt, soap, and steel along with software and sky (Tata sky as well as the group’s airlines), on the other, it has traversed the corporation and the state mostly with aplomb, barring a few cases of resistance and inadequate measures and slips. Raianu has been able to extract valuable information from the Tata and other archives that throw light on how each of these aspects played out in the group.

At this point, it is important to mention about the relevance of archiving for corporations. The book and the plethora of information in it points towards the gold mine that archives are and can be if maintained well. The archives should be impartial, accurate, and as far as possible, complete. Corporate archives are often either poorly maintained, or even if maintained well, are closed to scholars. The Tatas must be congratulated and credited for leaving “behind a longer paper trail than any other Indian business” and opening the archives to the public. Other large corporations with long histories must follow suit.

These archives have perhaps been used for the first time for putting together a comprehensive academic history of the Tatas. The 62 pages of references in the book are testimony to the monumental number of records that the author has gone through. As often happens with a haystack of information, organizing it can be daunting.

In the words of the author, “This is not an elite story of great leaders imposing their vision from above, nor a tale of subaltern resistance that looks up at the corporation from below, but an eye-level immersion in the “black-box” of information exchange within the group.”

The challenges for the reader, and perhaps the author himself, stems from these lines. As a historian, Professor Raianu, digs into the meticulously preserved archives of the Tata group, and tries to “reconstruct the conversations, deliberations, and decisions made by several categories of actors…” As a reader, I am left feeling in a “black-box” occasionally. Sometimes, the book is like an abstract painting, left to the imagination of the reader. At other times, it is like what we in India call an “art film”. There is information, sometimes too much of it. It is intellectually stimulating. But too tiring to read for the average reader. Now and again, though, it is good to denounce popularity (commercial cinema) for reality (art movies), even as a reader. Isn’t this the real world? Too much information. The good and the bad. Go make sense of it.

A Love Letter on Family Businesses

This review was first published in Business Standard on July 14, 2021

https://www.business-standard.com/article/beyond-business/a-love-letter-on-family-businesses-121071301411_1.html

 

Book: The Ultimate Family Business Survival Guide

Author: Priyanka Gupta Zielinski

Price: 399/-

Pages: 256

Year: 2021

Publisher: Pan Macmillan, New Delhi

 

The author of “The Ultimate Family Business Survival Guide”, Priyanka Gupta Zielinski, is a lucky [as she admits in the acknowledgments section of the book], successful, second-generation family business scion and she clearly loves being one. Her book is a love letter to and on family businesses.

I write this review as an academician with years of research on family businesses. Therefore, I would like to put this out at the outset that I am an advocate of family businesses myself, though not unaware of the challenges. This is not to say that the author is not aware of the challenges. She is. It’s just that the book is skewed towards the positives. And that is exactly why it is such an important book for the next generation members of family businesses.

I hear from many next-generation members of family firms that they “have it too easy.” The author lays out her fears of making mistakes, losses, letting her father down, in a very vulnerable way. So it’s not so easy after all. Many others don’t want to join the family firm as it’s “not fashionable enough”, “not challenging enough”, “not glamorous enough”, and “not the first option for a career.”

Zielinski lays down many reasons as to why the next-gen should join the family business. She effectively communicates that family businesses contribute in a big way to nation building, creating jobs, supporting local communities, contributing to the exchequer and preserving history and legacy. She systematically creates a strong case for the next-gen to join their family businesses and how there is plenty of opportunity for them to learn, grow and make a difference.

The father-daughter conversations are endearing, realistic, and depict the informal knowledge transfer that is an integral part of family businesses. The book lucidly captures the informal yet important communications within a business family, the stakes of the family in the business and the rich resources basket that the family is for the business and each member of the family. “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations” might be an adage of the past if more family businesses read books such as this!’

The author takes each stereotype about family businesses heads on and turns them upside down to depict how they are actually good business practices. There is merit in what she writes and is true for many family businesses. Yet, many of the family businesses genuinely need to change. An example is the role of that gender plays in family businesses. The author writes that family businesses “have allowed women freedom, flexibility, and job security.” The picture in many family businesses is not so rosy. There is no doubt that family businesses can be important vehicle for upliftment of gender equality. There is a lot greater involvement of women now. Yet, overall, they have miles to go.

The toolkit to “help develop a sustainable framework to empower multiple generations in a family business” proposed in the book is fun, logical, creative and unique. The swiss army knife as an analogy for adaptation is particularly apt for change and having the ability to adapt. The book also provides the readers with some astute survival tools and throws light on how family businesses can make better decisions in difficult situations, such as in a pandemic or when they are pushed against the wall. For most families, survival of the business is extremely important as their entire wealth, reputation, legacy, and many emotions are linked to it.

But, to me, the most important contribution of the book is it’s impassioned appeal for the policymakers to recognize and respect family businesses for their contributions. It stresses on the need for a policy framework that is tailored for family businesses. The author talks about centres for conflict resolution outside the courts. Which is a very important point as the more family matters stay out of court, the better it is for the family and the business. Also, so far the world of management education has designed curriculum for and imported lessons from large multi-national diversified corporations. In this book, the author makes a case for these corporations to learn from family businesses. That is refreshing.

Lastly, in India, and globally, we need champions of family businesses like Zielinski. We need more of the next-gen members who joined their family businesses to come forward and narrate their experiences, both good and bad. As Zielinski’s father would say, “kag padhaya pinjare, padh gaya charon ved – samjhaye samjha nahin, raha dedh ka dedh”, applied to the context of family businesses, it means, if you educate a family business owner or next-generation member like the manager of a non-family corporate, it will not be adequate for him. Therefore, we need more next-gen members to read books such as these when they are in a dilemma whether to join the family business or not.