Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan, Serial Entrepreneur and Author
- Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan is a serial entrepreneur and author.
Podcast
Overview
A rich career repository – with unique exponential ideas, courage, passion and authenticity, nurtured on the fertile bed of wisdom that has evolved over 39 years of professional experience to rock solid mettle. A non-conformist, disruptor, industry leader, and a well-entrenched successful serial start up visionary, Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan or GR as he is fondly called, is a name that is synonymous with Midas or the man with the golden touch who has illuminated the startup firmament.
GR is a much sought after and reputed speaker, networker, and influencer. He is an acclaimed thought leader who is passionate about establishing and scaling up companies that eventually carve a niche for themselves and culminate into win-win partnerships. He exemplifies strong business development and relationship building skills, and has an exemplary innate ability to build high performance teams.
00:42- About Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan
- Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan is a serial entrepreneur and author.
- He has supported startups like Gold’s Gym Tower Capital, Image Ads, Currux, I global technologies, Safe house, Serena Spa and many, many more.
- He’s also a director of the Keiretsu Forum.
01:00- What do you mean by mentor capitalists?
- According to Gopalakrishnan, a mentor is more like a person who helps you in your development, as opposed to a coach. Whereas the coach may give task oriented activities, a mentor gets into a relation to the relationship driven activity.
- As a mentor, his chief purpose, according to him, is to guide the entrepreneurs as capitalists, because it’s a capitalistic society they’re living in.
03:09- Things to look for before investing?
- The first thing that Gopalakrishnan looks for is passion. He believes passion and intense focus is a must for a startup.
- According to him, you can’t be an entrepreneur, if you don’t have some madness in, much like a scientist.
- Especially in the startups, he or she has to be obsessed with their thought, a wonderful, and bordering on magnificent obsession.
- The second criteria is that they should have an idea of how their startup is going to function.
04:35- How involved do you get in a startup?
- Gopalakrishnana says he’s totally involved in all the projects.
- He says he may not be physically present, but he has two or three basic elements to be in place.
- He says that a startup needs to adhere to a structure, conduct, and performance. They need to be disciplined. And he’s the one who puts these measures in place to keep the startup disciplined.
05: 58- What is the advantage of going solo versus getting a co-founder?
- Gopalakrishnan is of the basic belief, that never set up a startup as a solo.
- One is a lonely number, and then they don’t have a sounding board.
- Men need to have complementary skill sets, especially in India. A one-man army is trying to do a technology, plan market strategy, the business plan, and advocate budgeted numbers, which is given to the CA, and then he’s clueless. And then suddenly, when he has a team of people below him, and he’s not able to, he or she is not able to handle the whole thing.
- He feels that we need startups where people with complementary skill sets get together, apply their mind, and then create a great entity with creative disruption as their thought process.
08:14- Basic mistakes a lot of startup entrepreneurs make?
- According to Gopalakrishnan, the startup entrepreneurs start with a technology product and end up with a service product.
- The problem is, we start seeing that we have innovation, when we feel going to the market, the GTM is appalling.
- He feels that what we say as a vision is merely on paper and what we say as budgets is only an Excel and our PowerPoint has no power, no point.
12:59- What advice can you give entrepreneurs planning to raise money?
- The first advice is to have to first bootstrap it with co-founders.
- He is also a firm believer that you need to get your money, immediately.
- Something he is very clear about is that you have to raise money at the right time.
24:50- Three lessons to take away from the conversation?
- Focus is very important. He says that when you are into a startup, or you’re into your profession or into your career, stay focused.
- Second, courage of conviction and commitment.
- And the third, one must have passion to do it and understand that I can, I shall, and I will succeed.
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Profile
- Ramachandran Gopalakrishnan is a serial entrepreneur and author.
- He has supported startups like Gold’s Gym Tower Capital, Image Ads, Currux, I global technologies, Safe house, Serena Spa and many, many more.
- He’s also a director of the Keiretsu Forum.
