Ratan Tata: Decent, humble, humorous…But still a colossus

Ratan Tata’s passing leaves a significant void in the Indian business firmament. He possibly saved India’s largest and most respected business conglomerate from irrelevance and in the process became a role model for a generation of Indian businesses and start-ups. The man: In leading an over century-old enterprise with many “lifers”, Ratan Tata showed a path-breaking willingness to take risks and back young talent. Scores of Tata managers assigned major responsibilities in their twenties will attest to this, as will many appointed CEOs in their thirties. He didn’t mind ruffling feathers, constantly exhorting those around him to “question the unquestioned”.His response to my concern that this writer lacked an MBA qualification was: “All you need to succeed in the corporate world is good common sense”. That is pretty much how he conducted his affairs, backing his instincts on people and issues. At well over six feet in height and always immaculately dressed, Tata had an imposing physical presence. But he maintained a fundamental level of decency and humility, urging his office to show empathy when engaging with stakeholders with grievances and claims.We warmed to his ability to laugh loudly, sometimes at himself, and his incredible mimicry of colleagues. Given to doodling during long meetings, he once drew the bald heads of three senior Tata Sons’ directors, Shahrokh Sabavala, Jim Setna and Noshir Soonawala, to keep himself entertained. Sadly, this sense of humour began to vanish as pressures of office started wearing him down midway through his chairmanship. Senior colleagues retired and were replaced by a younger, more diffident lot who tended to be intimidated by his larger-than-life stature. As he neared retirement, business disappointments and corporate scandals such as the so-called 2G scam would cause him considerable pain.The strategist: Having assumed charge of the Tata Group in 1991, the year India began to liberalise its economy, Tata was forced to focus initially on consolidation. Convinced that individual Tata companies would do better if they were guided by a powerful Group Centre, rather than each trying to operate on its own, he saw off internal opposition from satraps like Russi Mody at Tata Steel and Ajit Kerkar at Indian Hotels. Parallelly, he undertook key initiatives to boost the competitiveness of the group, investing in talent and capabilities at the Group Centre; promoting a culture of quality consciousness via the 1995 launch of JRD Quality Values Award Programme; and securing access to intellectual property to help companies improve their competitiveness, including through joint ventures with global leaders like IBM, Lucent Technologies, Honeywell and AIG.Bold technology bets were sanctioned by him, including the project perhaps most closely linked with this original champion of “Make in India”, the launch of India’s first indigenous passenger car, the Tata Indica. Having successfully defended the Tata Group’s domestic turf from foreign competitors in the 1990s, Ratan Tata used the next decade to transform Tatas into a global enterprise. Buoyed by Tata Tea’s $450mn leveraged buyout of the much larger Tetley Tea in 2000, he advised other Group companies to internationalise, including through inorganic growth. A wave of acquisitions followed, culminating in the largest in corporate India’s history, the Corus Steel acquisition by Tata Steel. Resultantly, Tata Group consolidated turnover increased from $10bn in the early 2000s to over $100bn when Tata retired in 2012. The legacy: Overseas acquisitions allowed the Tata Group to substantially bulk up. However, the timing of many of these, just before the global financial crisis in 2008, was unfortunate. A number of acquisitions were subsequently unwound, and multiple overseas steel, energy, chemical, communication and hospitality assets were shed by Tata companies. Tata was committed to upholding ethical values, especially the Group’s intolerance for corruption. He pressed criminal charges against his one-time protégé, Dilip Pendse, resulting in his imprisonment for grave misconduct at Tata Finance. Yet, he also nurtured relations with several controversial individuals, and the so-called 2G scam would raise questions about his naivete and judgement about people.Perhaps most problematic for his legacy will be Tata’s treatment of his successor, Cyrus Mistry. He had embraced Mistry’s selection as the next Tata Group Chairman. Yet, within a short period, he apparently bought into a flawed narrative that his legacy was being undermined by his successor, and eventually exercised his influence to jettison him, creating an existential crisis for the Group. A giant: From championing a series of ‘Make in India’ moves long before it became policy, to backing his managers to make bold moves, Ratan Tata was the new-age leader Tatas needed in the wake of economic liberalisation. His post-retirement investments in young entrepreneurs and a clutch of successful start-ups won him a new generation of fans. Like all great personalities, Ratan Tata had his flaws. But this is a moment to mark the passing of a colossus.The writer worked for 12 years in Ratan Tata’s office and was later Brand Custodian, Tata Group