leadership series: military to management A Soldier and a Scholar

A decorated soldier and scholar, Lt General A ArunLt General A Arun, YSM, SM, VSM, Chief of Staff, South Western Command and Col The GRENADIERS, talks on his journey so far in the Indian Army many challenging roles he undertook, and inspiring cues on personality development, leadership development, corporate management and much more

A decorated soldier and scholar with 38 years of commissioned service in the Indian Army, Lt General A Arun, YSM, SM, VSM, Chief of Staff, South Western Command and Col The GRENADIERS, has taken upon many challenging roles including raising and commanding a Rashtriya Rifles Battalion in Pulwama (Jammu and Kashmir), Command of a Rashtriya Rifles Sector in Handwara and a Mountain Division in North East India. Lt General A Arun is passionate about personality development, leadership development and public speaking. The scholar soldier is popular among youth and the corporate, not only because of his position in the Indian Army but also as a inspirational speaker and management guru. He left IIT to join the National Defence Academy (NDA), in Pune, to pursue his dream to become an Army officer and serve his country. In an exclusive interview with Corporate Citizen, Lt General A Arun, talks on his journey so far in the Army, the lessons he has learnt, what it takes to lead and much more

"Leadership is best displayed and non-spoken. Therefore, leadership is a verb—it’s an action word and has to be done, displayed and exhibited continuously, whether it is a corporate office or a battlefield, this is a constant"

- Lt General A Arun

Delegation, assigning responsibilities, educating, empowering, encouraging teams to take decisions and holding people accountable for their positions and their actions, are all components of growth and organisations that do this will create leaders

Corporate Citizen: Take us through your early years of education, joining NDA and the Armed Forces. You turned down an IIT-Madras seat with AIR 13 ranking in JEE and decided to join NDA. What inspired you to join the Indian Armed Forces?

A Arun: Probably thirteen is a unlucky number for some and lucky for others. I guess it was both for me. In the early 80s, we grew up in a very different India. There were and remain today, many factors which actually decide the choice of education and career. Very few of us could pick what we liked for a career. We did it either out of necessity or because somebody told us—this is one way you can have a reasonably good life and therefore we did it. Reading stories about the 1971 war as a very young boy and later seeing our Armed Forces, had a profound impact.

I was born in Madurai in Tamil Nadu, but I grew up in a culture, in Secunderabad city, Telangana, where academics was very high. So, at home one was encouraged to study. We went to a school which encouraged academics—had great lecturers and teachers, who taught us well and taught us to explore and reach.

There was no spectacular single inspirational or motivational factor, but there were a lot of things that came together at that time that directed me to joined the Army. Do I regret having made this decision? I don’t—given a choice today, I would make the same decision, because the Army has given me life, a full life, a wholesome life that I have enjoyed every bit of, in these 40 odd years in uniform. Given a choice to rewind I would do the same thing.

CC: In one of your statements you had said, “Any other place, any other college, any other education may give you a job... The Army will give you a life.” Can you elaborate as to why for you serving in Army is a way of life?

Let’s trace the life of a normal person who goes through college. They may aspire for a Masters Degree or more. Then there is a job and few years down the line possible marriage, have children, move through two or three cities and different jobs—a normal pleasant life. In the Army—I am from the infantry and our job is essentially fighting the single largest resource is human beings. The most beautiful and potent resource, because they can do what no other can. Therefore, when I go and speak outside, my single message is, “No matter what kind of a company you are in - a tech or tech services company, pharma, service, manufacturing or finance, at the end of it, it is about the human beings that make you succeed or fail. If you take the human out of your company, you will be without a heart and soul. That’s been the single most important factor that has exhilarated me through the journey. It also takes you through so many places, and meet so many people across the length and breadth of our country.

So, which is the place in India, which I have not seen or served? There is probably none. Have I been overseas, serving the Indian Army, as its representative? On numerous occasions. Have they been fruitful? Enormously.

Now when you put this together and now in the sunset of my service, as I look back, this is not a journey that would have been possible, had I a normal job in a corporate, no matter at what level. I owe this to the Army and the country, for which I am very grateful. That is what I meant when I said that the Army will give you a life, a full life.

I’ve also been shot multiple times—each time you get shot or wounded and live, it’s a blessing, a boon. You see life differently, after such significant events. You become grateful for the small things, which normally one takes for granted. The Army has given me a life, a wholesome life, a buffet, a smorgasbord of the most wonderful activities, emotions and experiences. Allowed me the luxury and the privilege of picking what suits me the best, and that has been priceless.

CC: Leaders are made, but leadership means responsibility. Leaders visualise the tomorrow and think of solutions. What does it take to lead?

I say this all the time as I speak to numerous companies, to top leadership, middle-level leaders and juniors, and they all say the same thing—issues which human beings face are the same, whether you wear a uniform or wear a formal-informal civil dress.

What is that we look for in an organisation? We look for integrity. Everybody wants to work in an organisation that is respected for its values. Secondly, you look for inspiration—one must be inspired at work to be happy and successful.

Recently at a major IT company, in a hall of about 300 people, I asked the youngest person there, “What is it that you expect from your leaders?” The first thing she said was, “My leaders must inspire me”. So, leaders at all levels must inspire the rest of their team. The other response was, “My leaders must care for me”. Now that caring comes from a concept of a large family, one that treats members and their extended families well and with empathy. Within these two factors, there are many other sub-factors - communication, assurance, encouragement, empathy, education, concern—all are very important. The ability to enhance professional growth is important, as is being treated with respect. People being asked for their opinions as contributions to decision making, even if they are junior, is important. These are the factors that bind the organisation. Those that have better scores will always be efficient, profitable and most importantly have very happy teams. Last but not the least, companies that invest in the families of their employees are always known to prosper. If the company you are working for has also invested in improving the lives of your parents, children or spouse, you will end up contributing more.

These factors are identical in the Army and outside, not similar but identical. In the Army we are probably bonded better, as the consequences are more grave. So the bonding in a high risk space is always higher. As our mistakes come at a very high price, our support net is much stronger we don’t allow for those mistakes. In non-lethal businesses, it is possible to encourage people to make mistakes, because everybody learns from mistakes. In our case the mistakes come at a cost, so we don’t like mistakes. Therefore, we train harder and ensure hundred per cent risk mitigation, that is probably the only difference.

"The Army has given me life, a full life, a wholesome life that I have enjoyed every bit of, in these 40 odd years in uniform. Given a choice to rewind I would do the same thing"

CC: Every company develops its own organisational culture over a period of time. An employee joining a company, judges it by the organisation culture it follows. Is it the same within the Army wherein soldiers benefit from its culture and what can the corporate organisations learn from the Army culture?

Organisational efficiency is directly proportional to investment in organisational culture. In the Army there is a large pan-Army culture, but there are multiple small units and each unit has a leader, with their own histories and unique culture—different levels with different leaders. Similarly, in a company, there is a corporate office with the CXO suites and possibly manufacturing units, marketing units, R&D, training establishments across the country or world. Some aspects of the culture will remain the same, can be listed, captured in a document, acknowledged and maybe spoken about. But at the end of it, each sub culture must contribute to the organisational goals—they are all important.

In the Army, we minimise the individual, so that the organisation becomes more important. No matter how big or powerful an individual is, his or her nature or character must remain part of and aligned to the organisational culture. The second thing is a very robust architecture for implementation of HR policies, which have to be firm, consistent and long-lasting. Any inconsistency or dilution will cause the organisational culture to deteriorate. Lastly, every member has to follow the culture that is articulated in letter and spirit.

In the Armed Forces we are sworn to the constitution of the country. There is no union, there can be no union and there shouldn’t be any union. However, there is a robust and effective system to address grievances. So, the organisation culture and structure has taken care of what otherwise may have been an irritant. Culture is very important and every organisation must create its own. Which is why reputed companies who have been around for decades, are those who have built culture. Sometimes because of sudden change in management, the old culture gets shaken suddenly and when it happens, productivity could drop. This is something business leaders have to be very careful about, when managing change.

"The person who without being told, is happy to do somebody else’s job, will always be an asset. Because, whether or not you become successful, you will remain very happy and content and eventually probably that is a better definition of success, than the title, the pay, the perks and the other material benefits"

Q: The HRM in companies deal with people from different culture and demographics and make them work together. The Army also draws its people from a diverse culture and demographics. So, how does the Indian Army manage demographics and cultural diversity?

First is the acceptance of diversity. Organisational culture should never be so rigid that it intrudes into the space where personal culture or habits and traditions exist. It shouldn’t discourage, criticise or condemn you from doing something because you belong to a part of the country, eat certain foods, dress or speak differently. Who I am is less important than what I bring to the team.

The other issue is that normally aspirations of human beings’ cross boundaries of language, religion, caste and community. We aim to ensure that all the members have a shared vision, a common goal. We make no reference to anybody’s background. So, each of us is welcome here and finds a place here because of the skills we bring. Our handicaps are actually welcome because they add to the overall value of different perspectives. So, that is how we see it in the Army.

The fact that we are diverse is actually an advantage and not a disadvantage. Sometimes when you have excessive homogeneity, you don’t have divergent thoughts or views. Thinking differently provides variety and fresh solutions. As leaders one would always like multiple views to be discussed before a final robust solution, combining the best of all is arrived at, meeting everyone’s requirements and fitting in to the organisational culture. That is how divergence is both encouraged and handled.

The caution here is to cater for the smaller voice—each individual is as important as the other. All of us have certain strengths and certain weaknesses at certain times. Good teams always compensate for some weaknesses with strengths of others to achieve peak efficiency at all times. That’s what we do in the Army and it is done beautifully.

Q: Talking about grooming future leaders, it is said that leaders are not made, they are born. Leadership means responsibility— they visualise tomorrow and think of solutions. What does it take to lead?

My view is that leaders are made. Leadership comprises numerous qualities, attributes and mostly habits that can be exhibited, all of which can be learnt with diligent effort and practice. Every organisation has the ability to create leaders and every individual has some capacity to be a leader. The difference is in the choices that they make and manner in which the organisation treats and handles them. Those that allow members to flourish will create leaders, while others that suppress initiative and function in rigid systems may not. So, I am saying leadership is a choice. Do you want to take that responsibility or do you not want to take that responsibility? A young child who wants to organise a dance competition, saying I will make the arrangements, puts few students together and practice, is showing the first signs of leadership, because, he/she has volunteered, made a choice and taken the initiative. When that is encouraged, another child will volunteer and soon we will start a tradition, a culture. So, leadership is a choice, you have to encourage people to make that choice.

Leadership instincts, of course they play a role. But, in the absence of instinct, education is a fantastic alternate option. There are some who are naturally gifted, but its not a very large percentage. Most leadership traits can be taught, learnt and practiced, and that is where organisation culture comes in. When you start giving responsibility down the line, decision making and problem solving gets transferred downwards, providing the senior leadership valuable time to chart future courses, instead of being bogged down with the mundane. This creates time to think and strategise for what next must happen and to plan for the future—a key leadership function.

If you are not delegating down, you are solving todays problems yourself. You won’t have the time to think about day after tomorrow, and a few years away may not even be contemplated. A leader who doesn’t delegate, deals with the minutest of problems. You will destroy initiative all through the organogram. Consequently, every problem will transfer upwards, because you retain excessive control. Delegation, assigning responsibilities, educating, empowering, encouraging teams to take decisions and holding people accountable for their positions and their actions, are all components of growth and organisations that do this will create leaders.

From a leadership perspective, it allows people of junior rank or position to take decisions. You don’t have to delegate every authority, but some can be moved down, subject to certain criteria. This encourages decision making and caters for the occasional mistake. Now, this is where the next step of leadership is—communication. When communication is robust, multi-directional, continuous and devoid of clutter, mistakes get rectified during implementation. When such processes become continuous, education gets transferred and multiple leaders are created. So my view is that a good leader is one who creates leaders. In my little team, only when I create enough able replacements, will I qualify to be a leader.

The entire spectrum of soft skills can be taught. Personalities and decision making can be improved and developed by education, orientation and encouragement. Decision making is often improved by the knowledge of how to mitigate the risks accompanying a decision. Of course some things cannot be taught. You cannot teach physical courage. But, my argument is that most of the time you don’t need physical courage, the need is of moral courage and ethical courage. This can be an outcome of inspirational leadership or organisation culture. They can be taught by examples within the company, from stories which are recounted of people who have done often unnoticed and significant small things with disproportional effects. And, not being punished or penalised for having spoken the truth or making a mistake. So, that is how you encourage people to speak the truth.

CC: The corporate world is also a dog-eat-dog world, you need the killer instinct and competitive-drive to survive and achieve success in business.

To begin with dog-eat-dog is a phrase which exists and I am not denying the fact that even the attitude may exist. But the fact is, there is no dog that eats another dog. Irrespective of who you may be serving for, at what level you may be working for, whatever your organisation my be, it is extraordinarily difficult for a superior to let you go if you’ve been honest, committed and hardworking or a team member, who is straightforward, who goes by the book and does the right things. Short-term successes may not come to that person. But, the fact is any company looks to stay and remain in business for a long time. There is nobody who starts a company with the intention of closing down in three or five years. The reason a company has closed down is because of non-adherence to the things that we spoke about. The unwillingness or the inability to create a team; the chasing of those short-term objectives often at the cost of the values and principles, which you may have ensconced yourself. So, there will be companies that will fail and companies fail most of the time because of management decisions and not any other factor. Others contribute, but it is significantly the inability of the leadership or management, to accommodate those changes in the environment. So while dog may eat dog, but integrity, commitment and sincerity of purpose will make it almost impossible for one to become a meal.

"What is that we look for in an organisation? We look for integrity. Everybody wants to work in an organisation that is respected for its values. Secondly, you look for inspiration—one must be inspired at work to be happy and successful"

CC: In your journey in the Army, you took many challenging roles. One of them is raising and commanding the Rashtriya Rifles Sector in Handwara and a Mountain Division in North East India. You were also seriously wounded in operations in Jammu and Kashmir. What are the learnings you got from these incidences?

I raised a counter-terrorist unit, a unit of The Rashtriya Rifles Battalions. A new unit of about 1100 men, who you never met in your life before—who come together and form one unit, to be deployed in very difficult and strenuous environments. And, you are the commanding officer of that unit and have to lead that unit in fairly hostile places in those years, in certain parts of Kashmir.

Operations were intense and often bloody. In one instance, there were five militants in a mosque and we had to clear it after what was a long and arduous two days of pursuit. To cut a long story short, I was badly wounded in the process and I was the commanding officer. For my unit it was the first—our first major operation. I was the first Commanding Officer, the first officer to be injured in operations. Later on, I was also privileged to be the first officer of the unit to be conferred with a Gallantry Award. Yes, a very satisfying operation in hindsight. In the fighting units these are amazing outcomes from a manpower, motivation or inspiring leadership points of view.

What did I learn? That leadership is best displayed and non-spoken. Therefore, leadership is a verb—it’s an action word and has to be done, displayed and exhibited continuously, whether it is a corporate office or a battlefield, this is a constant.

CC: The Agnipath Scheme has been started to meet the aspirations of youngsters aiming for a short stint in the Armed Forces and they will serve the Armed Forces as Agniveers. Is the Armed Forces creating through Agniveers, the real change makers for this country, who when they return back to the society, will bring the change?

I would think so—the first of the Agniveers are about to finish their training and they will join the units in the next few weeks. That’s the first lot, which also means that in the next three years many of these Agniveers will also be leaving the Army and coming back into the mainstream civil society. In the current policy 25 per cent of Agniveers will be retained.

What have the Agniveers imbibed in these four years? Everything that epitomises the Armed Forces in both letter and spirit. Trained, disciplined, focused, some with enough money to pursue further passions or study, and all of them much better individuals for a better India than when they would have joined. We are a country of 1.4 billion and a few Agniveers may make but a small difference on our landscape at this moment. However, the Agniveer policy is a step which will be invaluable to our country in the long term.

How do we exploit what it offers? The policy and the product is good, but to maximise and exploit what it offers, there are somethings which needs to be done. These are young boys and soon there will young ladies too, who will join and leave. So they would have been in the Armed Forces for four years, most of them will be an undergraduate at some level and some may be just 12th class pass. Four years of robust military experience—they would have served all over the country, had every exposure you can think of and they may also have some money for their immediate needs or for emergencies. Those with an entrepreneurial spirit will be able to start small businesses on their own. Its possible for universities in the country, to see how best they can accommodate those young people and facilitate them to get better educated. I can guarantee you one thing, every Agniveer when you look at them as they walk into the campus, will be better enabled to be a better citizen than the rest, with or without the same academic background. You cannot replace four years of service in an Armed Forces establishment with anything else.

Over time the numbers of Agniveers will increase. Some of them will acquire an undergraduate or postgraduate degree during those four years. They are the one’s who have that hunger. So, they will use a distance schooling programme, which is beautiful and which allows you a flexible learning. And, they will be ready to join a postgraduate or post-Masters programme in universities. See what you can do with them—they are self- driven, have four years of experience, they are young, physically strong, highly motivated—a priceless commodity.

These are the attributes one would look for. If you translate that to somebody who has to work in a factory, in a rural area where that person belongs, who wants to stay at home or nearby his/her house—if you are able to get five-six of them to form a small cooperative, pull their resources which they will get after four years of service and that would translate to about crore of rupees. Imagine what a crore can do in a small village for a startup. And it could be some farm related produce, it could be agriculture, could be marketing of agriculture produce, forestry, handicrafts, poultry, dairy, fisheries, transport, road building, contractual work and so on. This scheme has the potential to harness the power of the youth of our country. Potential has to be exploited. I am sure and its quite visible— so many companies and departments of government have offered the Agniveers opportunities to develop their skills further. And, as time unfolds, I am sure more and more will make this offers and we will make the best use of this resource. I could go on and on—we have been provided with a priceless asset. How we use it as a nation is up to those in government, industry and society.

CC: These Agniveers are youngsters, mostly GenZ and Millennials, who are very tech savvy. Through this scheme, is the Indian Army equipping itself to be future ready?

This is one of the benefits or intended aims of the Agniveer policy itself, which is to make the Army younger and more tech savvy, by gradually altering the entry level. So, when I joined the Army, you didn’t even needed class tenth pass to be a soldier—there were class 5, then 8, gradually became class 10 and it will come to class 12. There will be section of Agniveers who will be ITI graduates, who would have done three years of an ITI programme and then four years of being in the Army. So, they can be very skilled machinists who can work in our factories, in manufacturing units. There will be a few graduates as well whose numbers will gradually increase. The consequences are priceless and as big and impactful as one would like it to grow and become.

Each individual is as important as the other. All of us have certain strengths and certain weaknesses at certain times. Good teams always compensate for some weaknesses with strengths of others to achieve peak efficiency at all times. That’s what we do in the Army and it is done beautifully

CC: Does our country need more women to come forward and join the Army?

There are some jobs which women are inherently skilled to do and which can be done without an effect on the efficiency that is expected out of that organisation and within that, women are finding more and more place in the Armed Forces. There are numerous places and opportunities and increasingly women are finding more and more space. There is a benchmark which ones has to qualify and on that there are no compromises. As one grows older the demands on women inherently increase and some may not therefore choose this as a long term career. If you qualify you make it, if you can’t, then one does not make the cut. Women in the Armed Forces are not new. We have had women in the education corps, judge and advocate branch, doctors, nurses, support staff and so on.

"I have always believed in the principle of family-first. My argument is that, if you place family first, you will end up placing your job also first. Because, this first is a magical first, and there is always enough space for many people, activities, events and priorities to be placed within the category"

CC: Tell us about you as a family man. How do you manage your time between family, house and your military service to nation?

I have always believed in the principle of family-first. My argument is that, if you place family first, you will end up placing your job also first. Because, this first is a magical first, and there is always enough space for many people, activities, events and priorities to be placed within the category. Priority-one is never just one, you can put five-six things in priority-one. So, if you keep family first, you will also be committed and as devoted to your job. Like I said before, if your company invests in your family, you will give both the time they need and therefore when team members win, companies win.

Yes, I have been fortunate to be married to a beautiful person, extremely hardworking and ethical. I have no hesitation in saying that marrying her has changed me as a person. What she, Roopa Arun, does for others in society, for education and for our family, is priceless. As far as my daughter, Zephyr, is concerned, I have learnt far more from her than from anybody else. She currently lives and works in Mumbai.

Talking about work-life balance, I like to believe that I give 100 per cent to everything. When I am at work, I give it 100 per cent and when I am home that’s another 100 per cent. I don’t allow a conflict or friction between the two. In the Army we are encouraged to spend time with our families. The social fabric which we live in, is as important as our professional fabric and that’s one of the beautiful things of our organisational culture. So, when we go home we are encouraged to have fun and make the most of it. When we are in office, we are encouraged to give 100 per cent in the office. It is not uncommon for many of us in the Army to be asked by our superiors, “Why have you not gone on leave”. In a private company this may be quite unlikely to happen. But, when it does happen, that person will feel that this company has invested in him/ her and then become a more committed employee or team member.

I also like writing short stories on life, human relationship stories. I like to listen to all kinds of music, depending on the time of the day and spending time with pets.

CC: What is your message—success mantra for the young generation?

If I have to summarise it in one word, its commitment. I didn’t say intelligence, I didn’t say knowledge, I am saying commitment. Now commitment includes integrity, hard work, willingness to learn, willingness to help, willingness to lead. It also includes your willingness to place the organisation above your own requirements, particularly when its most needed. It includes an ability to teach others to create more leaders within your own space. The person who without being told, is happy to do somebody else’s job, will always be an asset. Because, whether or not you become successful, you will remain very happy and content and eventually probably that is a better definition of success, than the title, the pay, the perks and the other material benefits. You will be a happy person, you will have lot more friends, never be lonely and what is more—you will have a full life.