Suryadeep Verma on brand trust and social media

Suriadeep, welcome to Trailblazers. Pleasure to be here. I was listening to the conversations and I was really going through some of the amazing things that everybody had to share. It really kind of helped me brood through some of these concepts that everybody was talking through. Well that's a fabulous endorsement of Trailblazers. We do have a very wise and experienced panel. Suriadeep, I'm going to start you off where we started with Anuja in what's in a name. Mama Earth, you know, milk of human kindness. Conviva. Talk to us about Conviva and this name because it doesn't, this is a very superficial way of starting, doesn't conjure, what does it conjure up? Is there something in a name?

Yeah, so we stand for, com stands for communication and we were stands for vivacious way of life. And what we essentially stand for is how we are activating lives, how we are enriching life through communication. And I think that's what the name really communicates. Right, well let's, okay, so let's dig into this because it is an interesting idea that again, a high spec, pure play tech business that's multifaceted, sort of has a human dimension, right? Talk to us about, I mean you've been with HCL, you've been with IBM, you're a veteran of this world. How do you humanize tech to create trust? Great question. You know, we are pretty much into a B2B domain, which means that we work with enterprises, we work with companies, be it telecom, others.

But at the end of it, you know, we are really activating systems, processes, technology, which are at the central of every organization. Now, when you really work as partners, you are trying to really run systems, which are at the very central of some of these companies. And when companies really engage with you, they want to work with partners who, whom they can really trust, right? Whom they can really rely on. And I think that's the relationship that we want to very build up with, with our customers. And we pretty much don't even call them customers, we want to call them partners. And how, on a practical level, how do you do that? Is it by training people to be better with people?

This is one of the criticisms you'll hear of the tech world, is that it's full of very deterministic people who are high IQ, low EQ. Absolutely. So I guess consistency is extremely important. You are, you know, in our organization, we have close to about 2500 people. How do you really deliver experience which is consistent across every employee, right? And how does every employee really exhibit the same value that the organization stand for? And actually that kind of really feeds on the trust. I think that is critical. But I think as a company, we fairly do a good job of inculcating our values, our credos, right from day one. And I think that pretty much becomes the underpinning of how we really deliver trust, deliver experience.

Okay, let's go one tech layer lower, right? So every single organization says it's all about delivering the promise. But you've worked for three big ones, HCL, IBM. Why, on a very practical level, does Commviva do that better than IBM? See, every company has their own DNA. You know, I heard one of my friends say that you need to live your values. And you need to exhibit your values. So every company is at the core of it very different. Commviva would be very different from HCL or IBM for that matter. And I don't think it's about aping others, but it's about standing for your values. Standing for what you promise. What your brand promises are you really able to deliver it. The organizations kind of partner you based on what you promise, right?

And not everybody is going to promise the same thing. And do you deliver on that? Is your intent right? There are times when you are going to probably slip. But do you own up? Do you respond in the right way? I think those are the nuances that companies and partners like to really see. I was interested in Anuja's point, which is quite right in terms of, you know, own up. It's not good all the time. But if you take the 2,500 people you've got, how do you inculcate a culture where people do own up? Who feel safe enough to do so? Yeah, so a lot of this actually is driven right from the top, right? How does your leadership behave? Because as a company, I think the leaders really show the way, right?

So, you know, at the end of it, the whole starting point is whether you practice that internally in your communication, whether your leaders exhibit that internally. And I think that's the starting point. When you meet customers, how do some of the senior people react? What do they stand for? And I think that trickles down. There was a big survey out yesterday, a global survey. And what it basically found was that of the people surveyed, people said that one-foot-third, a full one-third of their bosses were bad bosses. This is a global survey, right? So, I'm just trying to knock a bit of a hole in the, we all, you know, everyone demonstrates it through their behaviours, etc. But 30% of people apparently don't. I think it's a great point.

And I think that's why it is difficult to really drive culture, drive trust. I agree with you. I think that's the kind of common challenge that I see with organisations. Everybody wants to be very high on trust. Everybody talks about transparency. But I feel the starting point is internally, the way you really conduct yourself within. I'm not surprised 30% of the bosses being bad bosses. And I'm not surprised most companies are actually struggling on the trust side. And I think what you are saying pretty much is aligned with what I really see around. You don't see many companies really being high on trust. If you go around, see brands, you'll find some really limited ones which rank high on trust.

And I think this is pretty much kind of adding on to that. Because it's hard. And speaking honestly, I know I've been a bad boss tons of times. Right? But let me, let me ask you, I hope I've been a better boss more times. But I mean, to Anuja's point about the younger generation, right? Are you finding, and you all have a pretty young demographic, are you finding the millennials, centennials are better able to kind of stick up for themselves and call out the people with, you know, values they don't respect? I would believe so. I see a lot of confidence in the new generation. And I see them calling out. Digital media, social media has given them, given them channels. Everybody has a handle now. So they're calling people out, which is great.

And I see that confidence around. People are, are having that confidence that, you know, they can pretty much call out a CEO on a social media handle, which is great. And I think it is also throwing a lot of these senior executives, businesses, look within internally and try to reflect in terms of how they are really conducting themselves. Well, and especially in the Indian context where, you know, we all know of, of our generation, we've been through decades of a hierarchical, quite command control environment, right? The, the bosses are now having to up their game a bit. I think it's, it's, it's not particularly Indian. I would feel it's fairly global. It's, it's pervasive. And, I mean, I feel this is a very positive side.

And, and I think that's one part of it. Even businesses have been called out for their practices. You will see companies being grilled on the kind of labor practices that they have. Uh, companies, uh, companies being grilled on the kind of community responsibility that they have, which is awesome. It's sort of 360 now, right? But, okay. So we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're, we're in the final furlong. Um, so I think it was, here's a question about recovering trust. So I think it was Lady Gaga that said, you can break a mirror, right? And you can repair a mirror. But when you look in the broken mirror, you look a bit weird. Can you really recover trust? It's a great question. Or is it gone? I would actually flip it up.

Uh, what happens in a relationship when you break a relationship, right? Can you recover a relationship? Uh, there are times when you would be, and, uh, I think people see through you. Uh, I think what we need to make a distinction here is, uh, breaking trust versus a lack of performance, right? Uh, I think these are two very distinct things. Uh, a trust still can be earned with lack of performance, right? If you turn around your performance, but I think what is important is how you really behave, how you really conduct themselves, conduct yourself in those times. And, and I think that is, that is pretty much a very critical element of that. Uh, a lot of us spoke about transparency here.

You know, everybody wants to be transparent when the news is great, when the news is good. You will always be transparent about the awards that you have won. Uh, how many of us really talk about the goof ups that have been done? How many would have announced about a platform failure or about outage? I think those are fairly interesting things to reflect upon. Well, and it, it's a great place to finish up, Surya Deep, in the, in the sense that when we all reflect on that, you know, if any of us say, where are we on the journey? There's probably way more to go personally, right? On, on, on that basis. Trust is a, is a very challenging topic in, in that regard. I think it's very challenging, very nuanced.

It's the foundation on which your brand journey is built. And, uh, it pretty much is the most, uh, complex and intricate job of, uh, market, uh, a marketing leader. Well, well, beautifully said. And it's, uh, sometimes complex and intricate to be the last guest up. And as, as much as you learned from all the previous guests, we learnt a lot from you. Surya Deep, thank you so much for being on Trailblazers.