Ep 7: Design Organization for Scale : Holistic Perspectives for Market Fit & Success with Hari TN from Big Basket

Topic: Design Organization for Scale: Holistic Perspectives for market fit & success

TN Hari heads the HR at Big basket and is an advisor and sounding board to numerous young entrepreneurs and startups. He is also a Strategic Advisor at ‘Fundamentum’, which is a homegrown growth phase VC fund set up by Nandan Nilekani and Sanjeev Aggarwal. He has studied at IIT & IIM and worked at an executive level with multiple start-ups/scale-ups and has been through four successful exits in different industries that are (Daksh, Virtusa, Amba Research &TaxiForSure). His passion is in scaling organizations through clear thinking and relentless execution. He writes regularly on LinkedIn &  LinkedIn has identified him as one of the Top Voices in India for three consecutive years in a row (2016, 2017, and 2018). He has Co-authored three books. The last two books were “Cut the Crap and Jargon – Lessons from the Startup Trenches”; and also the other book “Cutting the Gordian Knot – India’s Quest for Prosperity” was published by Bloomsbury.  

Few questions I ask Hari TN on Building Organizations for Scale, business strategy, clear thinking, and execution concept is as follows: Time Stamps: 2:25 to 41:45

• His background and how he got to where he is today
• Why do we need to design an organization for scale while every CEO aspire for growth and expansion?
• So what must change to keep the organization from breaking as you have witnessed the explosive growth of the kind especially in your tenure in Taxi for sure? What’s your insight…
• What would be your focus or a strategy when you want to venture to scale up?
• How do we enable the organization and people to be prepared to manage that scale/growth—and to learn new ways of operating and behaving—as that stands a much better chance of making it in the long term success?
• Is there a churn at the top level? Especially the senior leadership level in the process? As these business leaders must be able to think strategically?
• How do you instill thinking in the leaders in the journey of scaling for entrepreneurs or organization?
• Have you come across the very skills in execution often make these c-suite leaders or top management ill-equipped, since their strategy thinking muscles have withered from disuse?
• When you say Execution – What does it involve, what is the role people play in the management ladder and in the organization as a whole?
• I’m sure with such c-suite leaders involvement – I’m sure there would have been a time you had to be firm in saying no? what was it like?
• Sometimes it is brutal to talk about the facts and figures...which is not a nice thing to hear...however can you tell me what kind of steps you took to ensure everybody is aligned from the very beginning as you have been a part of the Management Team at multiple start-ups/scale-ups and helped shape four successful exits in different industries?
• Is there a biggest failure/mistake you have made along the way and what have you learned from it?
• In one of your article, you learned how to handle three questions that haunt everyone: ‘So what?’, ‘Why?’ and ‘What if?’ In the process, You learned problem-solving. You learned to handle aggressive environments. You developed internal customer orientation. Can you explain to my listeners with one of the example and how this method helps?
• What are the key things one should do to be more part of the business strategy in this phase?
• What is it like to work at Big Basket?
• What is your opinion on the trends in the industry with regards to talent development?
• Reskilling /continuous learning is something important to grow …what is your views on the same?

"Powerful question" to my guest to unveil for my listeners.  to engage, enlighten and empower (& that’s the mission of my podcast too) Time stamp at 42:00 to 50:35

1. According to you, what is the “STAR” moment?
2. What “inspires you” to do everything that you do?
3. If you owned the company, what’s one thing you would do differently in learning?
4. What are the three most important things you would like to accomplish right now?
5. What are your strengths?
6. What’s the best book you’ve read this year? or anytime you recommend for my listeners.
7. What are the characteristics of the best boss role models or mentors/coach you ever had? What made that person great?
8. Are there any tools that you use on a daily basis to be a better you?
9. Are there any resources (blogs/website) you would recommend to our listeners?
10. Your advice to people who are new and want to accelerate their career in HR?

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Execution
• Zero to One

Connect with Hari TN @

• LinkedIn

We love your recommendations!

If you have any recommendation on the topic you like us to cover or any leaders who you want me to interview…Please drop a line in the comment section.

Please visit www.prajvitaknowledge.com/podcast for complete show notes of this episode. For questions, comments and guest suggestions, contact the host, Jyothi G at LinkedIn or email @ prajvitapro@gmail.com 

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