In India and especially in the middle class, there is a lot of emphasis on academic accomplishments. Most parents want their children to study in the best schools and academic institutions and evolve as a professional. Till sometime back, many parents wanted their children to become doctors or engineers, as they could not imagine any other profession, which could make their kids successful.

I would like to dwell on how educational qualifications impact our careers. Having worked in the corporate sector in reputed organisations, I can state with experience ,that our educational qualifications ,can only take us to the gates of an organisation.

Once you enter the precincts of any organisation, nobody remembers where you studied from and what your qualifications are. We are assessed and recognised ,for the value we bring to the table, in whatever function we work.

The best of academic institutions can enable you to be shortlisted and interviewed in an organisation and you may be even get selected. But if we do not add value and behave well, we may not perform, commensurate to the qualifications we hold ,from the best institutions.

I am not stating here ,that one need not pursue their academic qualifications from the best academic institutions in India or abroad. What I am saying is that just acquiring a qualification ,is not good enough for us to be successful in our careers or even in our lives.

Having worked in the Human Resources function and been part of thousands of performance appraisals in my career ,I can authentically state ,that the best academic qualifications, may not take us far ,unless we display exemplary behaviour, are willing to be a learner for life and grounded in all our actions.

The best professionals I have met in my life ,have these in common. They may or may not have passed out from the most reputed academic institutions ,but they are life long learners, great team players and humility personified.

I used to jokingly state to my employees ,that we all need to leave our academic qualifications ,at the entry gate of the organisation, we work for. What we need to focus while we are at work ,is our performance, value addition and most importantly our behaviour towards colleagues, customers and suppliers cutting across hierarchies.

Most employees love to work with inspiring leaders and not necessarily with those, who have graduated from top notch universities. This is because ,they may not even know where their leaders have studied from. What they experience everyday in their work life ,is the interactions of their leaders with them and how they treat them.

Let me reiterate ,what I said earlier. Kindly do not get me wrong. All of us need to try our best ,to get into the most prestigious academic institutions ,in our country. But what I am stating is that the best educational qualifications are not enough ,to be highly successful in our careers. Our behaviour on and off the workplace ,makes all the difference.

Let us grow in our careers through our behaviour rather than depend on our qualifications alone.

S Ramesh Shankar

5th Feb 2025

One of the things which fascinates me ,is when individuals and organisations continue to learn. Our learning journey in life ,is like a tree. As the seed is sown, it grows into a tender plant and then a tree. It continues to grow every day with new leaves, then flowers, fruits and this cycle continues throughout the life of the tree.

Human learning is no different. We, as individuals descend on earth with minimal inborn intelligence. We learn from our parents, siblings, teachers, friends and colleagues ,every day. As we grow ,we learn from all people around us and this journey needs to continue, for our life time.

But, unfortunately, I have come across some people, especially in organisations, who not only cease to learn continually but prevent their team members ,to learn and grow. One of the things I have always done is to keep reading and writing ,about all the things I do. I have also encouraged my team members to read, write and share their learnings with others ,through publishing articles, paper presentations or participation in renowned conferences ,by presenting case studies etc.

However, I have come across some managers who would neither do it themselves nor allow their team members to do the same. This not only stunts their growth as individuals but also prevents their team members, to be agile and up to date ,in whatever field they are working in.

Interestingly ,many people do not realise that organisations are like living beings. An organisation is not a building, machinery in a plant or computers or gadgets ,used in offices. An organisation is matrix of people ,working in organisations. When an organisation ceases to learn, it means the people working in the organisation, start rusting and get out dated ,sooner than they realise.

While working in one of the organisations I worked in, we realised that we were not in touch with our key stakeholders like customers, suppliers and employees. We were not listening to them and learning from the mistakes ,we were doing every day. This impacted our business and it took us many years ,before our market share got impacted and our brand got eroded. When we realised and acted on this important aspect, we grew dramatically ,leaving our competitors behind and posted sustainable profits ,as well.

Organisations, which learn continually and grow are profitable and sustainable always. When we say an organisation is a learning organisation, we mean ,that individuals working in the organisation continually learn and grow. It is also when leaders in the organisation learn and enable their team members to learn and grow ,in multiple ways.

I have met leaders who discourage their team members to read or write articles and publish them. I have also met some leaders, who do not like their team members to participate in conferences or present papers or case studies. This could be either because they have an inferiority complex themselves or they are worried that their team members ,may become more popular and knowledgable than they themselves are.

Either way, when individuals cease to learn, organisations tend to decay. This decay could be in terms of ,drop in market share, stunted growth or lower profits. While it may not be very easy to link ,the rate of learning of an organisation to their rate of growth, a systematic time study ,could easily prove this correlation.

Let individuals and organisations continue to thrive to learn and grow .

S Ramesh Shankar

18th March 2025