Chapter 31: Shekhar Introduces Himself

There was an electric sensation in the air as soon as Shekhar entered the conference room. The murmurs stopped and people became alert. He took a seat between Arjun and Rashmika. Arjun introduced him briefly then gave the floor to Shekhar. He got up and walked to the front where everybody could see him.

“Good morning!” Shekhar said “As you know my name is Shekhar Mansingh and I am appointed the Operations Assessment Officer for this upcoming merger. O-A-O, yes, I know that sounds more like a Queen song than a corporate job, but I didn’t pick this title.”

People laughed politely.

“As corporate titles usually are, this one is also useless so let me go into the details of my role here and discuss some of my plans. Then you can ask questions if I haven’t already answered them. In simplest terms my job is to assess how things are going at Event Genius and based on that, make a recommendation if the merger should go ahead or not. Officially, it’s a recommendation, but in reality, it will be what I say. Mr. Douglas will not question my judgement. He never has.”

He looked around and saw that people were listening. He carried on “My own background is that I am the CEO of Village Voice advertising agency within the Douglas Media International conglomerate. It’s a very successful operation and it is closest to your field of business. That’s one reason for Mr. Douglas to send me for this job. Another reason is that I have performed the same role twice before when DMI has acquired companies, one advertising agency in New York, and a radio station in France. Yes?”

Kajal Agarwal had raised her hand. She said “Hi, I am Kajal Agarwal. I am the HR manager. How big is your ad agency?”

“One thousand and fifty employees including me.” Shekhar said “The New York branch is about seven hundred people.”

“Thank you.” Kajal said. She was impressed. So were other people.

He continued “The news of the merger has been public in the company for a while so I know that there are many rumours afloat, everything from everybody will be fired, to everybody will be promoted, or even that DMI will buy Event Genius then close it. At this point, they are all real possibilities.” He raised his hands to quiet down the murmurs “If DMI doesn’t think, which means if I don’t think that EG can be a profitable proposition for us, then we won’t go ahead with the merger and it’s not a secret that the company will close. Personally, my preference is not to let that happen. There are a lot of good people here and there is potential for a good business. So, my choice will be to observe everything and fix any issues I find. I have two months to do it in.”

Malaika raised her hand “And if it can’t be made profitable in two months? That’s a very short time for a company that’s been in loss last four years.”

Shekhar nodded “Good question. My job is not to make it profitable in two months, my job is to prove that it can be done. If the changes I make are effective and the profit comes in 3 years, DMI will accept that as long as I can prove a business case in the next two months that based on the changes I make the trend of the company is changing.”

He waited for Malaika’s nod then carried on “As you can guess, it’s an aggressive target which means I will be looking deep into every single department and I will be bothering you folks with questions and suggestions. I have complete authority from DMI and EG ownership to change anything and everything, including replacing the whole staff if I think that will make the difference.”

Kajal raised her hand again “People are worried about their jobs and what you are saying doesn’t reassure me much. Are our jobs safe or not?”

“Not.” He said then continued “They are not safe, but I am not planning to fire anyone. The reason your jobs are not safe is that I would let people go if I find that they are a problem and cannot improve in due course of time. If you are doing your job well, even if there are improvements needed in your department, I won’t even think of firing a single person.”