N R Narayana Murthy, chief mentor and chairman of the board, InfosysTechnologies, delivered a pre-commencement lecture at the New York University (Stern School of Business) on May 9. It is a scintillating speech, Murthy speaks about the lessons he learnt from his life and career.
Dean Cooley, faculty, staff, distinguished guests, and, most importantly,the graduating class of 2007, it is a great privilege to speak at your commencement ceremonies.I thank Dean Cooley and Prof Marti Subrahmanyam for their kind invitation.I am exhilarated to be part of such a joyous occasion. Congratulations toyou, the class of 2007, on completing an important milestone in your life journey.After some thought, I have decided to share with you some of my lifelessons. I learned these lessons in the context of my early careerstruggles, a life lived under the influence of sometimes unplanned events which were the crucibles that tempered my character and reshaped my future.I would like first to share some of these key life events with you, in thehope that these may help you understand my struggles and how chance events and unplanned encounters with influential persons shaped my life andcareer.Later, I will share the deeper life lessons that I have learned. My sincerehope is that this sharing will help you see your own trials and tribulations for the hidden blessings they can be.The first event occurred when I was a graduate student in Control Theory atIIT, Kanpur, in India. At breakfast on a bright Sunday morning in 1968, Ihad a chance encounter with a famous computer scientist on sabbatical from a well-known US university.He was discussing exciting new developments in the field of computerscience with a large group of students and how such developments wouldalter our future. He was articulate, passionate and quite convincing. I was hooked. I went straight from breakfast to the library, read four or fivepapers he had suggested, and left the library determined to study computerscience.Friends, when I look back today at that pivotal meeting, I marvel at how one role model can alter for the better the future of a young student. Thisexperience taught me that valuable advice can sometimes come from anunexpected source, and chance events can sometimes open new doors. The next event that left an indelible mark on me occurred in 1974. Thelocation: Nis, a border town between former Yugoslavia, now Serbia, andBulgaria. I was hitchhiking from Paris back to Mysore, India, my home town. By the time a kind driver dropped me at Nis railway station at 9 p.m. on aSaturday night, the restaurant was closed. So was the bank the nextmorning, and I could not eat because I had no local money. I slept on the railway platform until 8.30 pm in the night when the Sofia Express pulledin.The only passengers in my compartment were a girl and a boy. I struck aconversation in French with the young girl. She talked about the travails of living in an iron curtain country, until we were roughly interrupted bysome policemen who, I later gathered, were summoned by the young man whothought we were criticising the communist government of Bulgaria. The girl was led away; my backpack and sleeping bag were confiscated. I wasdragged along the platform into a small 8x8 foot room with a cold stonefloor and a hole in one corner by way of toilet facilities. I was held in that bitterly cold room without food or water for over 72 hours.I had lost all hope of ever seeing the outside world again, when the dooropened. I was again dragged out unceremoniously, locked up in the guard's compartment on a departing freight train and told that I would be released20 hours later upon reaching Istanbul. The guard's final words still ringin my ears -- "You are from a friendly country called India and that is why we are letting you go!"The journey to Istanbul was lonely, and I was starving. This long, lonely,cold journey forced me to deeply rethink my convictions about Communism.Early on a dark Thursday morning, after being hungry for 108 hours, I was purged of any last vestiges of affinity for the Left.I concluded that entrepreneurship, resulting in large-scale job creation,was the only viable mechanism for eradicating poverty in societies.Deep in my heart, I always thank the Bulgarian guards for transforming me from a confused Leftist into a determined, compassionate capitalist!Inevitably, this sequence of events led to the eventual founding ofInfosys in 1981.While these first two events were rather fortuitous, the next two, both concerning the Infosys journey, were more planned and profoundly influencedmy career trajectory.On a chilly Saturday morning in winter 1990, five of the seven founders ofInfosys met in our small office in a leafy Bangalore suburb. The decision at hand was the possible sale of Infosys for the enticing sum of $1million. After nine years of toil in the then business-unfriendly India, wewere quite happy at the prospect of seeing at least some money.I let my younger colleagues talk about their future plans. Discussionsabout the travails of our journey thus far and our future challenges wenton for about four hours. I had not yet spoken a word.Finally, it was my turn. I spoke about our journey from a small Mumbaiapartment in 1981 that had been beset with many challenges, but also of howI believed we were at the darkest hour before the dawn. I then took an audacious step. If they were all bent upon selling the company, I said, Iwould buy out all my colleagues, though I did not have a cent in my pocket.There was a stunned silence in the room. My colleagues wondered aloud about my foolhardiness. But I remained silent. However, after an hour of myarguments, my colleagues changed their minds to my way of thinking. I urgedthem that if we wanted to create a great company, we should be optimistic and confident. They have more than lived up to their promise of that day.In the seventeen years since that day, Infosys has grown to revenues inexcess of $3.0 billion, a net income of more than $800 million and a market capitalisation of more than $28 billion, 28,000 times richer than the offerof $1 million on that day.In the process, Infosys has created more than 70,000 well-paying jobs,2,000-plus dollar-millionaires and 20,000-plus rupee millionaires. A final story: On a hot summer morning in 1995, a Fortune-10 corporationhad sequestered all their Indian software vendors, including Infosys, indifferent rooms at the Taj Residency hotel in Bangalore so that the vendors could not communicate with one another. This customer's propensity fortough negotiations was well-known. Our team was very nervous.First of all, with revenues of only around $5 million, we were minnows compared to the customer.Second, this customer contributed fully 25% of our revenues. The loss ofthis business would potentially devastate our recently-listed company.Third, the customer's negotiation style was very aggressive. The customer team would go from room to room, get the best terms out of each vendor andthen pit one vendor against the other. This went on for several rounds. Ourvarious arguments why a fair price -- one that allowed us to invest in good people, R&D, infrastructure, technology and training -- was actuallyin their interest failed to cut any ice with the customer.By 5 p.m. on the last day, we had to make a decision right on the spot whether to accept the customer's terms or to walk out.All eyes were on me as I mulled over the decision. I closed my eyes, andreflected upon our journey until then. Through many a tough call, we hadalways thought about the long-term interests of Infosys. I communicatedclearly to the customer team that we could not accept their terms, since itcould well lead us to letting them down later. But I promised a smooth, professional transition to a vendor of customer's choice.This was a turning point for Infosys.Subsequently, we created a Risk Mitigation Council which ensured that wewould never again depend too much on any one client, technology, country, application area or key employee. The crisis was a blessing in disguise.Today, Infosys has a sound de-risking strategy that has stabilised itsrevenues and profits.I want to share with you, next, the life lessons these events have taught me.1. I will begin with the importance of learning from experience. It is lessimportant, I believe, where you start. It is more important how and whatyou learn. If the quality of the learning is high, the development gradient is steep, and, given time, you can find yourself in a previouslyunattainable place. I believe the Infosys story is living proof of this.Learning from experience, however, can be complicated. It can be much more difficult to learn from success than from failure. If we fail, we thinkcarefully about the precise cause. Success can indiscriminately reinforceall our prior actions.2. A second theme concerns the power of chance events. As I think across a wide variety of settings in my life, I am struck by the incredible roleplayed by the interplay of chance events with intentional choices. Whilethe turning points themselves are indeed often fortuitous, how we respond to them is anything but so. It is this very quality of how we respondsystematically to chance events that is crucial.3. Of course, the mindset one works with is also quite critical. As recentwork by the psychologist, Carol Dweck, has shown, it matters greatly whether one believes in ability as inherent or that it can be developed.Put simply, the former view, a fixed mindset, creates a tendency to avoidchallenges, to ignore useful negative feedback and leads such people to plateau early and not achieve their full potential.The latter view, a growth mindset, leads to a tendency to embracechallenges, to learn from criticism and such people reach ever higherlevels of achievement (Krakovsky, 2007: page 48). 4. The fourth theme is a cornerstone of the Indian spiritual tradition:self-knowledge. Indeed, the highest form of knowledge, it is said, isself-knowledge. I believe this greater awareness and knowledge of oneself is what ultimately helps develop a more grounded belief in oneself,courage, determination, and, above all, humility, all qualities whichenable one to wear one's success with dignity and grace.Based on my life experiences, I can assert that it is this belief in learning from experience, a growth mindset, the power of chance events, andself-reflection that have helped me grow to the present.Back in the 1960s, the odds of my being in front of you today would havebeen zero. Yet here I stand before you! With every successive step, theodds kept changing in my favour, and it is these life lessons that made allthe difference.My young friends, I would like to end with some words of advice. Do you believe that your future is pre-ordained, and is already set? Or, do youbelieve that your future is yet to be written and that it will depend uponthe sometimes fortuitous events?Do you believe that these events can provide turning points to which you will respond with your energy and enthusiasm? Do you believe that you willlearn from these events and that you will reflect on your setbacks? Do youbelieve that you will examine your successes with even greater care? I hope you believe that the future will be shaped by several turning pointswith great learning opportunities. In fact, this is the path I have walkedto much advantage.A final word: When, one day, you have made your mark on the world, remember that, in the ultimate analysis, we are all mere temporary custodians of thewealth we generate, whether it be financial, intellectual, or emotional.The best use of all your wealth is to share it with those less fortunate. I believe that we have all at some time eaten the fruit from trees that wedid not plant. In the fullness of time, when it is our turn to give, itbehooves us in turn to plant gardens that we may never eat the fruit of, which will largely benefit generations to come. I believe this is oursacred responsibility, one that I hope you will shoulder in time.Thank you for your patience. Go forth and embrace your future with open arms, and pursue enthusiastically your own life journey of discovery!"
