Title - The Ideal Entrepreneur : An Idiot's Guide to Building a 300 Crore Company!
Author - Rahul Agarwal
Genre - Autobiogaphy
Publisher - Future
ISBN - 978-9351201311
A truly inspiring autobiography whch would ignite the aprk in the minds of the entrepreneurs in the making. Rahul Agarwal had seen the ups and downs before he went on to establish himself as a force to reckon with in the insurance industry.
To start with, what I liked the most is this mention "Story more relatable, more believable and more doable". You could find out where this was used and in what context once you read the book.
The book emphasize on
1. Team Building
2. Fund Raising
3. Focus
4. Networking
5. Standrad Operating Procedures aka SOP and
6. Brand Building
There is no surprise that Rahul himself was the Founder of Kokata Chapter of BNI since he believes in Networking and is the pioneer in hosting the launch party in the Insurance sector which saw the presence of many industry stalwarts.
There is a saying/belief that business runs in the blood of Marwaris. Rahul is no exception to this.
Autor has mentioned his family members which includes his parents, wife, kid, siblings, uncle and cousin who stood thick and thin right from the start.
As an Insurance agent myself(back in 90's), I should appreciate the fact that Rahul has made it to the prestigious MDRT just at the age of 20 in the Country for Max New York Life Insurance. It is not a mean fact to achieve this. His age wasn't a deterent to achieve this which got him the opportunity to be introduced by the then CEO himself among the 3,000+ MDRT's from across the globe. The fact is, there were only 25 of them from India and from Kolkata, he was one among three members who got qualified for this event.
How he achieved this is another interesting story which you can find out by reading the book.
Despite an intelligent student he is with a score of 99.23% in CAT, he could not get the placement in the IIM's he desired but still got offers from 2 IIMs and SPJIMR and he decided to join the later.
How the life in the Corporate works was portrayed vividly by the author where in the presentation he did for a top brass in Wipro did not give any mention nor credits to his name. This was a turning point in his life that made him to decide to venture into the business.
He has also done MFAB - Management of Family Business in Indian School of Business(ISB).
His golden tip to those who wanted to start a business is to float the company as a Private Limited Company.
Author emphasise on a good name and logo for the brand and details the process of how the name Ideal was arrived at and the date of registration - 13.1.2005.
He also goes ahead in saying not to trust anyone blindly and needs to have a back up. An agreement in writing and not oral is desired to avoid any consequences in the future.
There are few prominent names which has found the mention in this brilliant book which includes but not limited to:
a. Amit Agarwal
b. Saroj Sripathi
c. Goutam Dey
d. Ravi Kothari
e. Rahul Mohata
f. Arvind Kajaria( Founder of 123greetings.com)
He also mentions why PR is important for any firm.
There is a full dedicated chapter for BNI (BNI members would love it for sure).
What makes a company successful? This is where ESOPs comes into picture.
There are references of Allan Mullaly of Ford, Narayanamurthy of Infosys. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book since the content was compelling and motivating and would surely recommend this for those who want to venture into business.
I wish Rahul and his team a very best on their vision of achieveing Rs.1,000 crore business by 2025.
This book is available on Amazon
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