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Mr Nilekani’s office is a cosy, functional place with a cramped bookshelf, a big screen TV, a laptop, and papers and magazines strewn around. A blazing blue-flame “fly trapper” on the floor helps to keep the pests away.
A computer-generated paper warning in the men’s toilet on the same floor is a sobering reminder of curious challenges. “Do not spit tobacco in wash basins/urine pots”, it says.
But, more seriously, says Mr Nilekani, his four years in government has taught him patience and the art of consensus building.
“In the private sector, business takes a decision, you discuss it with your management team, get the approval of the board, go to shareholders, convince your analysts and so on. That’s about it,” he says,
“In the public sector, it an entirely different ball game – you deal with the government, parliament, bureaucracy, judiciary, activists, journalists. Then there’s the federal structure – central government, state governments, local bodies. You negotiate all this and still get something done.”
Working with the government and facing flak from opponents made Mr Nilekani also realise the “metric” of success in government is vastly different from that in business.
“In business, you are measured by revenue, cost control, profitability, new products, earnings per share, growth. The language of performance is identical no matter what the product is,” he says.
“In the government, what is success?
“Somebody who believes in the ID programme will say I am successful if I can get it done. But somebody who does not believe in it will say no matter what I do I am not successful. The success in government is linked to the ideology of how you see the world.”
Starting young
In many ways, that has been the story of Mr Nilekani’s life.
When he was 12, his father, a textile mill manager in Bangalore, sent him away to stay with his uncle in the small town of Dharwad. He says he grew up fast, living independently from his parents at an early age. At home, he listened to his father and uncle, both intensely political creatures, sparring on public issues. It was, he says, a lesson in public engagement.
He went to India’s top and fiercely competitive engineering school, got on to its quiz team, led the students’ group and became, he says, “a well-rounded person, developed lots of social skills, became street smart and learnt to negotiate”.
All this, Mr Nilekani believes, helped in his three decades with Infosys. He met global customers from a variety of industries, and constantly studied customers to see how he could “make a difference using technology”. At Infosys, he led a group that designed banking software which is used all over the world now.
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