Indian Leadership Podcast

ILP 10: Indian leadership featuring Shankar Kalyana (Part 2)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to a thought provoking leadership talk with Shankar Kalyana, who grew up in India watching Hollywood matinee idols, wanted to study astrophysics, but ended up at a job as computer programmer. He felt and still feels that computer programming is a universal language that everyone can understand. He chose to come to the USA because it's this country where technologies are either invented or matured.
 
He spoke fondly about his mentors who patiently taught him introductory lessons to computers, the bootcamp style education he received at his first job and about his early days in the US, how both fellow Indian and American communities embraced him where he learnt to adjust to a new country and culture. Shankar is a technical genius who has keen business insights. Don't miss this talk as he speaks a lot about mentorship, inspiring teams through your behavior and leading by example. Enjoy the show.

ILP 09: Indian leadership featuring Shankar Kalyana (Part 1)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to a thought provoking leadership talk with Shankar Kalyana, who grew up in India watching Hollywood matinee idols, wanted to study astrophysics, but ended up at a job as computer programmer. He felt and still feels that computer programming is a universal language that everyone can understand. He chose to come to the USA because it's this country where technologies are either invented or matured.
 
He spoke fondly about his mentors who patiently taught him introductory lessons to computers, the bootcamp style education he received at his first job and about his early days in the US, how both fellow Indian and American communities embraced him where he learnt to adjust to a new country and culture. Shankar is a technical genius who has keen business insights. Don't miss this talk as he speaks a lot about mentorship, inspiring teams through your behavior and leading by example. Enjoy the show.

ILP 08: Indian Leadership featuring Ashok Reddy (part 2)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to an exciting episode with Ashok Reddy, who shares his leadership journey from being a hands-on chemical automation engineer to today running a successful AI software company.
We could not edit out any bits of Ashok’s conversation, which is why we decided to release it in two parts.
In this second part of the episode, he spoke about his experience building products, leading teams, senior leadership roles, making career choices that made sense for a great family life and about raising kids to become confident adults. He also has great tip about managing meeting time. His point is to attend meetings or doing important things with great intent and energy. Its not the amount time, but the amount of energy spent which delivers great outcomes. Listen this episode for more leadership secrets.

ILP 07: Indian leadership featuring Ashok Reddy (part 1)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to an exciting episode with Ashok Reddy, who shares his leadership journey from being a hands-on chemical automation engineer to today running a successful AI software company.
We could not edit out any bits of Ashok’s conversation, which is why we decided to release it in two parts.
In this first part of the episode, he spoke about his childhood days in Bangalore. After getting into the best engineering college to study Mechanical engineering, he would later choose to go to a private college of lesser reputation, so that he can pursue his interest in Chemical engineering. He shared stories of immigration, higher education and multiple jobs before he entered into full fledged development of software products.

ILP 06: Indian Leadership featuring Mona Jhaveri (Part 2)

“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.” -Desmond Tutu
Last week (day after Christmas on December 26th, 2021), world famous African Anglican Bishop and human rights activist, Desmond Tutu passed away but his message about catching the problems upstream is exactly what our guest today is doing in the field of cancer research.
I am delighted to welcome you to a very interesting talk with Mona Jhaveri, who shares details about her life, being raised as non-Indianized American even though she was born to multi religious parents who immigrated to the USA from India. In part 2 of our conversation, Mona explains how her organization raises awareness to solve problems at inception in the second part coming next week.
I urge you all to kindly visit her non profit organization’s page @music beats cancer and support her whole heartedly.

ILP 05: Indian Leadership featuring Mona Jhaveri (Part 1)

“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in.” -Desmond Tutu
 
This week (day after Christmas on December 26th, 2021), world famous African Anglican Bishop and human rights activist, Desmond Tutu passed away but his message about catching the problems upstream is exactly what our guest today is doing in the field of cancer research.
 
I am delighted to welcome you to a very interesting talk with Mona Jhaveri, who shares details about her life, being raised as non-Indianized American even though she was born to multi religious parents who immigrated to the USA from India. In part 1 of our conversation, she poignantly explains how inspite of having materialistic things, she understood the value of culture, belief system and prayer when needed emotional support.
We cover more about how her organization raises awareness to solve problems at inception in the second part coming next week.
I urge you all to kindly visit her non profit organization’s page @music beats cancer and support her whole heartedly.

ILP 04 Indian Leadership featuring Vijay Vijayasankar (Part 2)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. Today, I welcome you to a powerful and hard-hitting episode with Vijay Vijayasankar.
In the second part of this episode, while he spoke about the importance of mentoring, Vijay was emphatic about sponsoring others who have a potential towards greatness with a thought that any of them could become his future boss. While seeking mentors, he encourages to have more than one, possibly three mentors, who you can seek guidance from, otherwise you could risk becoming a mirror reflection of your mentor. He asks leaders to selflessly give a chance to anyone with potential irrespective of their race, country of origin or gender and be genuinely interested in their success. There is a lot more he spoke about this and many other topics, so enjoy and learn.

ILP03 Indian Leadership featuring Vijay Vijayasankar (Part 1)

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. Today, I welcome you to a powerful and hard-hitting episode with Vijay Vijayasankar.
In the first part of this episode, he spoke about his education in Thiruvananthapuram, the strong influence of his dad while growing up, getting his first job at TCS, and migrating to the USA. When he first landed in the USA, things were so different compared to India, he felt he might have landed on mars. He openly shared how difficult it was to be on an H1B visa and the long winding path towards citizenship, which in his opinion needed a zen like attitude. He spoke about his path from technology leadership into sales and how his opinion about non technical roles changed after a year into his sales career.

ILP 02: Indian leadership featuring Nandini Nair

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to a very entertaining yet purpose driven leadership talk with Nandini Nair, who moved to the USA from India as a child and yet never had to think of her immigration status until she was considering law school. While she has always stayed connected with her Indian roots, it's her work as immigration lawyer that drew her closer to India through the clients she helped.
 
Nandini is a gifted storyteller, so listen to her speak about her breaking the mold and becoming a lawyer (which wasn't as common a career choice for Indian women as it is now) or when set up her own successful law practice which she gave up to join a big law firm. Her story is all about grit and hard work yet filled with humorous moments.
 
I would recommend listening to this episode while sipping a strong Indian filter coffee, because it's filled with morning freshness. I hope you enjoy the talk.

ILP 01: Indian Leaders Featuring Saum Mathur

Hello fellow leaders, my name is Prasad Vadlamani and I am your host of the Indian leadership podcast. I am delighted to welcome you to our first episode with Saum Mathur, who shares his leadership journey of seven careers during his lifetime thus far, which spans from Robotics to Program Management to Information technology to Big data engineering and AI to currently holding senior level business leadership positions. Saum talks about influencers and mentors during his life and career, where he acknowledges the importance of reverse mentoring to keep himself updated with current work culture. His entry to leadership was just to boldly take on larger and meatier roles and sometimes even seek riskier tasks which come with higher rewards. Saum's advice is not to limit yourself to the assigned role, but always step beyond what is expected. His take is, if you are ready to take initiative, there will always be people willing to take a chance on you. I hope you will be as inspired as I am after listening to the talk. Enjoy.