RocketCEO #5 - Vikrant Bhujbalrao
Startup Mentor, Entrepreneurship Coach, Motivator, Entrepreneur & Investor
RocketCEO is an interesting collection of startup stories, where we interview inspiring CEOs and Founders who have taken a leap from Zero to One and tell their stories to the entire world.
Recently we got an opportunity to interview Vikrant Bhujbalrao - Startup Mentor, Entrepreneurship Coach, Motivator, Entrepreneur & Investor and below is the essence of the same, an incredible journey towards success.
Amit Unboxed: What service(s) or product(s) does your business offer/manufacture?
Our company, YourSarthi is into empowering startups through entrepreneurship development/training programs, 1 to 1 Mentoring, Fundraising & incubation.
We inspire people to choose entrepreneurship as a career choice, we handhold aspiring & early-stage startups to take them to the next levels by knowledge sharing and connecting with the right people at the right time.
Amit Unboxed: In which cities/countries you are providing services or operating your business?
Our office is based in Pune (India). Our clients are based all over Maharashtra and we deliver sessions & power talks pan India. However, our 1-to-1 clients are spread globally.
Amit Unboxed: What is your background? What you were doing before you got into the entrepreneurship?
I am a Management Graduate from PUMBA (Pune University’s Management Department). After completing my MBA from Pune’s top business school, I worked with corporates like Kelloggs India & Startups like Mobisoft Infotech.
After 5 years of stint in corporate & startups in various roles like Sales, Marketing, Business Development, Growth Hacking in various industries like FMCG, IT, IPR, and traveling across the nation, I decided to start my venture. I and my other two co-founders stepped into the health food chain business. We slogged hard for 5 years, investing 5 million in business, raising funds twice, hired-fired many people. But, we failed in our business and we closed it.
After the entrepreneurial journey of 5 years, learning a lot of practical business lessons through failures, I was again back to jobs for supporting my family and repaying liabilities. Fortunately, I landed up in a business consultancy company — Chrysalis, where my job role was to consult Entrepreneurs under the guidance of a renowned business coach, Dr. Manish Gupta.
Apart from Chrysalis, I also worked with 111 Startups, a tech startup incubation as a CEO & Mentor to help technology startups through mentoring, funding & co-working. After a successful stint in Both the companies, I was again back to business as a startup mentor & entrepreneurship coach.
Amit Unboxed: How did you get your idea or concept for the business? What made you work on that idea or concept?
I decided to get into startup coaching & incubation, because I have seen both the sides of corporates & startups, understanding the ground-level realities. Also, after losing 5million and meeting with 10,000 Entrepreneurs in my journey, I have learned many lessons through my failures and the startup founders’ successes.
I got this idea after evaluating 5,000 startup ideas (which was part of my job profile in business consultancy & incubation), I have identified the problems in startups, SMEs, and MSMEs. I have identified the training, grooming, funding & handholding opportunities for Early Stage Entrepreneurs.
Amit Unboxed: What is the unique selling/buying point about your business? How do you manage to deal with your competitors?
Our USP is that apart from knowledge sharing through training and 1 to 1 Mentoring, we have a robust team of 7 people & community of 100 Successful Startup Founders, Mentors, Industry Experts who support the startup founders through continuous follow-ups for implementation, review, sharing contacts, helping in business development, technology, digital marketing & fundraising.
Amit Unboxed: How do you advertise your business?
We advertise through a holistic & hybrid marketing strategy. We use Social Media for brand management.
Sometimes we also make strategic use of Seminars, Events, and Meetups for direct pitching. We use education-based marketing for our info products, and also collaborate and co-brand with some associates.
Amit Unboxed: What do you look for in an employee?
To onboard any resource or teammate, we look for the willingness to learn, teamwork, ability to unlearn, relearn, management skills, and alignment with company objectives.
Amit Unboxed: Have you ever turned down a client? Why?
No, we have never turned down a single client to date as we value every customer's problem as a business opportunity.
Amit Unboxed: Who is your inspiration idol in life? Why?
Dr. Manish Gupta — Chairman of Chrysalis Business Solutions is my inspiration. I have worked under his valuable guidance and learned a lot during my job tenure. Also, I have been following him for the past 10 years & I admire his consistency.
Amit Unboxed: How do you maintain balance with your family and business? Do you think if you were not in business, you would have been able to give more time to your family?
I maintain work-life balance by continuously learning priority management, planning (yearly, monthly, weekly, daily), effective team delegation of responsibilities, and using technology for reminders & schedules.
Also, I involve my family in business so that they are educated enough to understand business challenges, work demands & priorities.
I don’t think that if I would not have been in business, I could have managed work-life better as it’s about priorities management.
Amit Unboxed: What do you call “Success”? What are those things which you think made you successful today?
I have tasted, learned, explored & analyzed “Success” as:
A stage of your life where you are absolutely clear about what you are doing and why you have to do this.
You are satisfied with the feeling that you are doing enough justice with your talents, skills, education, experience, knowledge, resources, story & true potential.
You have gained enough wisdom & strength to:
be happy in whatever you have achieved
to overcome all the challenges (professional/personal)
to inspire others through your story, your thoughts, your efforts
to give back to society
Amit Unboxed: If you had one piece of advice or an important lesson to someone just starting out, what would it be?
After 37 years of Life, 15 years of Work Experience, 10 years of Business Experience, after meeting with more than 10,000 Entrepreneurs, and seeing loads of ups and downs, here are some insights for those who are just starting up:
Before jumping blindly into the game of business, analyze yourself, validate whether you have the right entrepreneurial mindset, check whether you have the mandatory skillsets, check whether you have a robust support system, and check whether you have enough resources, and capital.
Onboard the right Mentor/Coach/Advisor who has seen business, who will validate your ideas, who will advise you to take a wiser decision, who can motivate you consistently.
Connect with like-minded people and be part of the startup community.
Amit Unboxed: Anything else you would like to convey us about yourself or your business?
We at YourSarthi, apart from training, mentoring, funding, and handholding, have developed a community of Mentors, Entrepreneurs, Professionals and Enthusiastic Students. This is a not-for-profit initiative where we meet every fortnightly. We call it, “Let’s GTG”, where we do great kinds of stuff together. We watch motivational movies together, we walk together, we read together, we GIVEBACK together.
This community is open to all and there are no charges. Anyone who believes in the power of “Togetherness” and who wishes to join us is welcome.
To know more, please connect us at:
http://www.vikrantbrao.com
http://www.yoursarthi.com
+91 85304 23232
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That’s it for today :-)
Hope each of you has a great start to your day. I’ll talk to everyone tomorrow.
— Amit
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