Amlan Sarkar: A Seasoned Business Consulting Professional Steering Happiest Minds Technologies through its Digitalization Journey
Amlan Sarkar
Director
After a significant portion of his career working for many reputed Tier-I IT firms in multiple portfolios at different locations globally, Amlan finally decided to use his overall experience and start a career in business consulting currently working as the Director Business Consulting at Happiest Minds Technologies. Amlan holds 20+ years of Industry experience(Retail, Consumer Goods & Digital Commerce) helping major Digital Business Transformation programs globally. Passionate about Merchandising & Supply Chain and the use of digital tools and techniques to make businesses sustainable from an economic, societal and environmental perspective. Amlan is a Management graduate from the Indian Institute of Management(Indore) and holds a bachelor of engineering(chemical) from Jadavpur University, Kolkata.
In an exclusive interview with CEO Insights, Amlan shares his prior industry experiences the unique features that help Happiest mind Technologies stay ahead of the curve, and much more.
Shed some light on your professional background and experiences. What motivated you to take up the role of Business Director at Happiest Minds Technologies?
My education is a blend of technical & management skills. I did my schooling in Kolkata & passed out 12th standard from St Xavier's College, Kolkata. I graduated as a Chemical Engineer from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. During that time, the IT sector was in a booming phase and I got an offer from TCS. So even though I always wanted to be a Chemical Engineer and had no intention to join IT, I joined TCS and that decision transformed my life. Later on, I worked for multiple organizations with a focus on the retail & consumer goods segment and continued to thrive there with different portfolios, and opportunities while moving to different parts of the world. While traveling to new places, I learned the languages as well as the cultures, which gave me immense exposure as well as experience and helped me immensely as I,later on, started my consulting career.
Consulting is all about getting to the roots. Consulting is all about knowledge. You need not be a capitalist to venture into it. The deeper you dive, the more comprehensive the outcomes are
and an obvious shift for the customer to the next level of the value chain. In a career spanning over twenty years, I have been fortunate with wonderful peers and continuing to fulfill my career aspirations.
Could you talk about the learnings and
experiences that you had acquired from IIM Indore and how you apply them in your current role?
IIM changed the paradigm in terms of how I look at things. It is an MBA program that fulfills the current industry’s growing demand for techno-managerial leaders who shape the neo-industrial revolution. Laden with the latest management skills and cutting-edge technology knowledge, these vanguards are being readied for meeting the challenges offered by the new wave of business enterprises that thrive on information as they strive for the 'Triple Bottom line, Profit, people, the Planet'.
Learning beyond the classroom is an equally important facet. While case discussions enrich the practical experience of unraveling real life business puzzles, informal discussions on varied topics from thought fully chosen adjunct readings broaden individual perspectives. The immersion program helps future business leaders hone their skills while tackling real world challenges. Individuals also make time to participate in business case competitions, branding exercises, and self-interest career advancement clubs.
Such experiences have helped me in my consulting career, understanding the nuances of brand management legal aspects of business, valuation, operations management, partnership building, organization behaviours, merger and accusation has helped me to understand the complete ecosystem and varied business model that exists in the value chain. One of the important features I learned at IIM is about networking. The value of net working is immense. The whole journey at IIM makes you more satisfied, content and helps you feel more prudent.
Define Happiest Minds Technologies as an organization and its position in the market.
To get more out of your business or to have more customers, it is important to standout, out rather than just fit in it. Happiest Minds Technologies, a Mindful IT Company enables digital transformation for enterprises and technology providers by delivering seamless customer experiences, business efficiency and actionable insights. We do this by leveraging a spectrum of disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud, digital process automation, internet of things robotics/drones, security, virtual/augmented reality and so on.
Positioned as ‘born digital, born agile’, our capabilities span digital solutions, infrastructure, product engineering, and security. We deliver these services across industry sectors such as automotive, BFSI, consumer packaged goods, e-commerce, edutech, engineering R&D, hitech, manufacturing, retailand travel/ transportation/
Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving
Could you talk about the learnings and
experiences that you had acquired from IIM Indore and how you apply them in your current role?
IIM changed the paradigm in terms of how I look at things. It is an MBA program that fulfills the current industry’s growing demand for techno-managerial leaders who shape the neo-industrial revolution. Laden with the latest management skills and cutting-edge technology knowledge, these vanguards are being readied for meeting the challenges offered by the new wave of business enterprises that thrive on information as they strive for the 'Triple Bottom line, Profit, people, the Planet'.
Learning beyond the classroom is an equally important facet. While case discussions enrich the practical experience of unraveling real life business puzzles, informal discussions on varied topics from thought fully chosen adjunct readings broaden individual perspectives. The immersion program helps future business leaders hone their skills while tackling real world challenges. Individuals also make time to participate in business case competitions, branding exercises, and self-interest career advancement clubs.
Such experiences have helped me in my consulting career, understanding the nuances of brand management legal aspects of business, valuation, operations management, partnership building, organization behaviours, merger and accusation has helped me to understand the complete ecosystem and varied business model that exists in the value chain. One of the important features I learned at IIM is about networking. The value of net working is immense. The whole journey at IIM makes you more satisfied, content and helps you feel more prudent.
Define Happiest Minds Technologies as an organization and its position in the market.
To get more out of your business or to have more customers, it is important to standout, out rather than just fit in it. Happiest Minds Technologies, a Mindful IT Company enables digital transformation for enterprises and technology providers by delivering seamless customer experiences, business efficiency and actionable insights. We do this by leveraging a spectrum of disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud, digital process automation, internet of things robotics/drones, security, virtual/augmented reality and so on.
Positioned as ‘born digital, born agile’, our capabilities span digital solutions, infrastructure, product engineering, and security. We deliver these services across industry sectors such as automotive, BFSI, consumer packaged goods, e-commerce, edutech, engineering R&D, hitech, manufacturing, retailand travel/ transportation/
hospitality.
Tell us about the unique services that are provided by Happiest Minds Technologies that make it stand out from the rest in the market.
Happiest Minds is a born digital, born agile organization and more than 98 percent of projects are executed in an agile fashion. While we focus up to some extent on the legacy application modernization, our intention and focus are to serve the digital and the niche technologies such as Microsoft Azure, Amazon AWS, Google Cloud, and so on. We have the capabilities in terms of supporting different cloud transformations such as onpremise to cloud or cloud-to-cloud transformations and have an extremely strong understanding and capabilities when it comes to IoT. One of the strengths is IoT offerings backed up with big data and analytics frame works as well as digital process automation. There is also a strong impetus that we are growing in the robotic process automation, robotic process orchestration, and intelligent automation. So the unique proposition of the firm is being digital savvy that focusing on digital transformation.
What has been the success mantra that constantly helps you arrive at positive outcomes?
Being an eternal optimist, I never complain about a thing. I believe in one of John Maxwell’s quotes that says “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails”. What I believe is that everybody's going to fail one day at some point in time. You will experience both success and failures in life. However, a true leader can influence and come back from failures. Unless you have wisdom, knowledge, and balance in your life or your approach, you will not be able to come back from the failures and the person coming back from failures is going to thrive and become a true leader for the generation. You need to work hard and have dedication determination and perseverance. But on top of that the approach, the adjustment and the balance in life, the understanding that failure is going to happen and how you come back from it are something very important and that’s the mantra that I believe.
Amlan Sarkar, Director, Happiest Minds Technologies
An established consulting and business transformation professional with an industry experience of more than 20 years, Amlan has worked in many portfolios and reputed organizations with a specialization in retail and consumer goods before moving into consulting. An alumnus of the reputed St. Xavier’s College, Kolkata, Amlan has done his graduation in Chemical Engineering from Jadavpur University and his Postgraduation in Management from IIM Indore.
Hobbies: Traveling & discovering to offbeat places, Trekking on mountaineering route, Listening to old songs, Playing badminton with my daughter
Favorite Cuisine: Bengali and Japanese
Favorite Travel Destination: Ladakh, San Francisco, Mexico City & Stockholm
Favorite Book: A beautiful mind by Sylvia Nasar, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Feluda by Satyajit Ray and the works of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay and Sunil Ganguly
Tell us about the unique services that are provided by Happiest Minds Technologies that make it stand out from the rest in the market.
Happiest Minds is a born digital, born agile organization and more than 98 percent of projects are executed in an agile fashion. While we focus up to some extent on the legacy application modernization, our intention and focus are to serve the digital and the niche technologies such as Microsoft Azure, Amazon AWS, Google Cloud, and so on. We have the capabilities in terms of supporting different cloud transformations such as onpremise to cloud or cloud-to-cloud transformations and have an extremely strong understanding and capabilities when it comes to IoT. One of the strengths is IoT offerings backed up with big data and analytics frame works as well as digital process automation. There is also a strong impetus that we are growing in the robotic process automation, robotic process orchestration, and intelligent automation. So the unique proposition of the firm is being digital savvy that focusing on digital transformation.
What has been the success mantra that constantly helps you arrive at positive outcomes?
Being an eternal optimist, I never complain about a thing. I believe in one of John Maxwell’s quotes that says “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails”. What I believe is that everybody's going to fail one day at some point in time. You will experience both success and failures in life. However, a true leader can influence and come back from failures. Unless you have wisdom, knowledge, and balance in your life or your approach, you will not be able to come back from the failures and the person coming back from failures is going to thrive and become a true leader for the generation. You need to work hard and have dedication determination and perseverance. But on top of that the approach, the adjustment and the balance in life, the understanding that failure is going to happen and how you come back from it are something very important and that’s the mantra that I believe.
Amlan Sarkar, Director, Happiest Minds Technologies
An established consulting and business transformation professional with an industry experience of more than 20 years, Amlan has worked in many portfolios and reputed organizations with a specialization in retail and consumer goods before moving into consulting. An alumnus of the reputed St. Xavier’s College, Kolkata, Amlan has done his graduation in Chemical Engineering from Jadavpur University and his Postgraduation in Management from IIM Indore.
Hobbies: Traveling & discovering to offbeat places, Trekking on mountaineering route, Listening to old songs, Playing badminton with my daughter
Favorite Cuisine: Bengali and Japanese
Favorite Travel Destination: Ladakh, San Francisco, Mexico City & Stockholm
Favorite Book: A beautiful mind by Sylvia Nasar, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Feluda by Satyajit Ray and the works of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay and Sunil Ganguly