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Follow UsIt’s a pleasant surprise to meet a COO who has dollops of philosophy, reflections on life and profound thoughts. Minoo Dastur, VP and COO of Nihilent comes across as a sage who has traversed life on all axes. While he covers a huge breadth of experience, he also has accomplished depth of thoughts in his journey so far. ITTIAM is not just a phrase, for some people after all as Pratima Harigunani of CyberMedia News finds out in this chat.
Minoo Dastur, the man who has trodden successfully to this corner room at Nihilent, a business consulting and performance management company, does he really need to search for an answer to what would he write after 400 pages on his biography? There’s always a pleasure in discovering such answers.
Curiosity sparks and I urge him to go down the memory lane.
From Bio to Binary
For Minoo, a biochemist at heart, computers were a far cry. After a Bachelor's in Biochemistry and Chemistry with Microbiology, IT was nowhere on his map.
“I never wanted to be in computers. Chemical engineering and biochemistry always fascinated me. It was probably, a combination of events that changed the course of my life.”
And the compass turned towards computers, when he had to write software for his biochemistry work himself due to lack of pertinent systems then. “I belonged to a family of accountants, and doctors, and so ‘what are you doing- is a question I had to face.”
What however, really beckoned Minoo towards the then weird world of computers was the allure of systems. “The software part still fails to fascinate me the way the systems approach does. Coming from a bio-chem background, the big picture, when one things lead to another, was always my forte. At that point in time, projects were not around a language say Java but on how to approach and solve a particular problem,” he shares.
It was not a complete jump from the lab to the codes yet. He began his career in the Information Systems Industry in 1983, and has worked in most aspects of the systems development and consulting businesses. Between 1986 and 2000, Minoo had his next innings at Tata Consultancy Services. He headed their Corporate Banking Group and was a key player in the evolution of the Banking and Financial Services Business.
During this time, he established TCS’s operations in South Africa and negotiated a joint venture with South Africa’s most active IT business group - DIDATA. In the late nineties, he was also responsible for establishing the Corporate Marketing group for TCS.
He then came to the bend in the road when Nihilent happened. Today, he is the Executive VP, COO and Director on Nihilent’s global board.
Filled with philosophy
As he looks back at the changes life has offered him, he says, “I have become much more introspective and much less trusting.” And before one raises a skeptical eyebrow, and asks the reason for his choice between naiveté and cynicism, he offers a though-provoking answer. “Cynicism is not an evil if you go by the tenets of Greek society,” says this avid reader of philosophical books. “The fundamental principle was – doubt every thing. Philosophers debate and doubt every thing. Look closely, and cynicism is the ability to question everything. In fact, extreme optimism is the greatest of all evils because it can harm you as well others. Being too eager to believe is a tremendous evil as you allow the society to be vicious by being too trusting.”
For a self-confessed non-believer in religion, God lies in Minoo’s principles and perspective on life. “Theology by itself is worth debating. But priests interpret what suits their power structure. Religion and philosophy are not very far apart,” he explains.
He regards cruelty as the ultimate evil. “Cruelty is a powerplay of the weak,” he reflects, “There should be equity in everything. Willing, unjustifiable evil to some one who is unable to defend himself is the pinnacle of selfishness.”
As he takes the lane of many other such topics, one wonders at the degree of sapience and philosophical flavor that this businessman harbors so deftly, taking and applying them out just in the right measure, at the right time.
And to think, what a man who thinks so deep and so far, would write on page number 423 of his biography? Well, he surely has enough stocked in his ink, life and mind to even spare a moment’s thought on that question.
We would look forward to that page Minoo.
Inside Out
Goal: Try and achieve a level of self-actualization
What I would like to change about myself: Nothing, I am very comfortable with what I am
Hobbies: Reading and Cooking
Best moments: Getting married
A must-have: Time for myself
Worst fears: None
Passionate about: Learning. Till the day I die
Favorite gizmo: I hate them, they add more pain than joy
Favorite destination: Outdoors, anywhere in the world
What ticks you off: Sloth and cruelty
Life's Inspiration: Too many
Ambition: To achieve a state of equanimity
Star Sign: Scorpio
Fav book: I love Thudichum’s work
The turning point in your life: When I was 19 and chose to not do a normal degree and picked bio-chemistry
How do you unwind: Cooking, reading, walking as an exercise
Favorite Film: My Fair Lady. It is all about transformation and challenges, a beautiful portrayal of the play
Role Model: My father, for his enormous work ethics.
Minoo, a chartered management consultant with post-graduation in Business Management was also National General Secretary of the Institute of Management Consultants of India (IMCI) in 1999/2000 and has been active member of the institute for many years. He has also been an active member of the IEEE, the ACM, the BMA, the CSI, and similar associations.
Risking IT
“For me, LC Singh and other founders, we had the same interests and thus technology for us had a common connotation. It was a way to attack a business problem then something just for its own sake,” he explains.
And did the shift led to any regrets? None whatsoever. “IT is the only place where you can keep learning for free,” he quips. But quitting a well-paying, secure job at TCS had its jitters for sure. It’s the dissonance that sets in from doing the same thing over and over again, that spurred him for the transition, as he looks back. “May be I was young enough to afford the risk.”
But then that was not all that made the move tough. “When you start something based on you dreams and invite other people on board to be a part of it, you are risking their lives also. It took that one-year to get over these hiccups and jitters. Till you prove the model, till you reach the point when clients keep coming back and you have a steady stream of revenues, it’s not easy,” he admits.
Getting excited is easy, he adds. But sustaining and proving it is tough.
Laurels galore
Today, Nihilent is an ISO 9001:2000 and SEISM CMMI Level 5 certified global business consulting and solutions integration company, specializing in managing change. Headquartered in Pune, Nihilent’s operations span across North America, Europe, Africa and Asia. It claims a 50 per cent year on year growth for the last three years. Revenues grew by approx. 60 per cent in 2006-07 over the previous year and profits doubled.
Nihilent opened its second development facility in Pune doubling its staff strength from approximately 400 last year as it continues nearing the 1000 person mark.
Lessons for life
So what has Nihilent taught him?
“Putting your ego in the back pocket,” he smiles. “In a safe frontier like my stint in TCS, one can let the ego run about but in a venture, one has to keep ego aside completely. May be now, we can afford the luxury of dusting our egos again and flaunt them anew,” he winks.
Of all the people and moments that have left an impact on his life, Minoo singles out his slice-of-life at TCS with the great F C Kohli. “I am arrogant when giving such a compliment, but this man has an amazing mind. I have seen him incessantly exploring, questioning, doubting himself, unlearning, re-learning in a completely egoless state. His sheer guts and can-do attitude are extremely exemplary. No one has affected me as deeply as he has,” Dastur confesses.
Hungry forever
And with so much behind him, it seems that life has hardly begun. Looking ahead, Dastur is packed with ripe plans for future. “I want to see ahead how right our model stays apart from growth ambitions that we pursue. We would emerge more of a full-service player like Accenture in future.”
With a lovely wife and two kids in his family, his personal time is endowed with many more interests he keeps himself ignited with. Neurochemistry, astronomy and trekking are just some pursuits for this amateur astronomer and he intends to explore these horizons in detail. Barbecuing stays one of his favorite past-times. To him, it signifies the best of both worlds. “I carry books on barbecue and keep experimenting. It’s a science in itself.”