it takes time.
If I wasn’t paid a lot of money,
I would still do what I do.
There isn’t enough hours in the day
to be able to do both extremely well.
There is nobody on planet Earth like you.
I set up pretty high goals for myself.
It takes and element of defining the ultimate destination,
then empowering people to actually go.
Let me apprentice you, let me show you how
to become good at it.
I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to be.
You’ve got to get comfortable with being uncomfortable.
But life is funny, you know, because you get
the money and you get the knowledge,
but life has passed you by.
(swooshes)
– He’s the CEO of Deloitte and Touche,
he was named one of consulting magazine’s top 25
most influential consultants.
He speaks regularly with top tier media
as well as premiere conferences and business schools.
He’s Punit Renjen, and here are his
top 10 rules for success.
(swooshes)
– Well I think there’s no substitute for hard work.
None, zero.
I was in India, I talked to 200 of the newly hired
individuals and I can say this because I’m of
Indian heritage, they always ask me when I go to India,
so tell us the one or two shortcuts
to get to your point.
And I always say there are no shortcuts,
you’ve got to put in the time,
and so I think the first takeaway is
there are absolutely no shortcuts.
It takes time, and it takes a lot of hard work.
I mean I really, really enjoy what I do.
I really do, and I think, a number of you probably
are interested in consulting, I think my only advice
and I hope that I’m a few years older than you
so I have the right to give you a little bit of advice.
But my only advice is pick something
that you will thoroughly enjoy,
whatever that may be.
And I think if you do that, you will,
to answer the first individual’s question,
you’ll probably survive in it, and potentially,
maybe you’ll thrive in it.
I mean I usually don’t say this,
but if I wasn’t paid a lot of money,
I would still do what I do.
I hope some of our managing partners don’t see
this program, because my units may get cut,
but I would still do what I do.
You know I’m surprised on a yearly basis
as to what kind of money I make.
I mean I just am absolutely surprised,
I would do it for a tenth of what I make.
So just find something that you really enjoy,
and I think you’ll thrive.
I define success two ways.
One, what I do here at the firm.
The impact that I create for my clients,
the impact that I create for the partnership,
now the new role that I have, the legacy that I leave.
That is one way that I will define success.
You know I’m not a great cricketer,
I love cricket, I wish I was as good as Sachin Tendulkar,
I’m not, this is my life’s work.
What I do here is my life’s work, it will define me.
And the second thing that will define me
is what my 11 year old son thinks of me
when he becomes a man.
These are the two things that define success for me,
and in that is a little bit of a conundrum,
because I love what I do, it is as I said my life’s work,
I love my son more than I love myself,
and there is a constant tug.
There isn’t enough hours in the day
to be able to do both extremely well,
and so that is my challenge.
There is nobody on planet Earth like you,
and you are unique, you have unique gifts
that nobody else has.
So as quickly as you can accept that,
the happier you will be.
Why try and be somebody else?
And why worry about others accepting you?
I am who I am, I’m proud of the fact
that I am this way.
And besides, I don’t have a choice.
(audience laughs)
This is who I am, and so I am very accepting
of the fact that I come with, and my wife is very
accepting of the fact that I come with a certain package,
and it’s taken me a while to get comfortable
with this is who I am and these are the gifts
that were given to me by my parents,
and I’m not trying to be somebody else.
I’m me and I’m happy about that.
So I would say to you, you’re unique,
you have your own gifts, there’s nobody else like you
and just get comfortable with that,
and that will give you a sense of peace,
and frankly, tremendous confidence
because you’re not trying to please somebody else,
you’re trying to please yourself.
Now it’s easier said than done,
because we’re trained from an early age
to try and please others.
I think that’s a losing battle
because you ultimately end up trying to be somebody else,
and I say that about our firm as well.
I mean, I say in the US that we aspire to lead
the profession.
We’re not defined or validated by comparing ourselves
to somebody else.
We don’t care.
We don’t care what PWC does.
We don’t care what McKinsey does.
We don’t care because we’re not going to be defined
or validated by comparing ourselves to them.
We’re unique, we’re special, there’s nobody else
like us, so we’re going to define the profession
in our image.
And I think that applies to individuals as well,
we’re all unique, and if you try and be somebody else,
I think you’ll be quite unhappy.
– I’m wondering if you have any personal tricks
on how you keep yourself motivated.
– I set pretty high goals for myself,
they’re usually higher than what I think most other
people set for me.
And I just am very driven to achieve them.
I’m a goal oriented individual, and I just am
very driven to achieve those goals.
– How do you motivate people to get things done?
– You know, the reason why I paused was I was trying
not to come up with a trite answer.
I think, and this is an overused term,
I think defining a overall goal
that’s reaching, in that it isn’t easily attainable,
and then empowering, and this is the overused word,
and then empowering people to actually go
try and get it, and ensuring that when they have
a misstep that you’re there to help them along
is probably the way to.
You know to be frank with you,
most of the people that we hire at Deloitte
are extremely smart, they’re self motivated,
they’re very hard working, and you’ve got to,
much like a race horse, you’ve got to make sure
that you give them the space to develop
and mature and accomplish.
So I think most of my partners would say the same thing,
it takes an element of defining the ultimate destination,
then empowering people to actually go to achieve it.
You never make it by yourself,
you always need others to help you.
I’m good at what I do, I’m really, really good at M&A,
and I’m not saying this with any level of arrogance,
the only reason why I’m saying that
is I’ve put in over 25 years perfecting the craft.
But one of the reasons why I’m good is
that a partner out of the Dallas office
took me under his wing and he said,
let me apprentice you, let me show you how
to become good at it.
He didn’t say it in exactly those words,
but in retrospect, that’s what happened to me.
So mentorship is incredibly important.
If you want to be successful at something,
you have to love it.
And we’re not fortunate enough
that we know off the bat that we love what we do.
I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to be,
and so I was in that bucket of individuals
that found myself in something,
and then taught myself to love it,
and so it becomes second nature to me
and I really like what I do.
And I think that’s another reason for being successful.
As you stay in the consulting profession,
you’ve got to get comfortable with being uncomfortable.
– [Interviewer] That’s a good point, yeah.
– It’s a constant state of flux,
my administrative assistant kids me on a daily basis,
my schedule changes in terms of where I’m going to be.
Every week is a different location
and every project is very different
in terms of the dynamics, what you’ve got to achieve,
the people issues, and so at a certain point in time,
you just become very comfortable with
what would be termed as stressful situations.
As you go along on this journey,
remember to stop and smell the roses for a little bit.
Frankly I didn’t do enough of that, I wish I had.
I mean this is the funny thing about life,
you realize, you know what I would love to do?
I spoke to a number of students in India
just a couple of days ago, and I said to them,
they said, in retrospect, what would you
like to do?
I said, well I’d like to be your age,
which is 22, with the money I have now
and the knowledge I have now.
(audience laughs)
But life is funny, because you get the money
and you get the knowledge, but life has passed you by,
and so my response to him is, this is a journey,
and take some time and smell the roses.
(swooshes)
– Thank you so much for watching.
I made this video because Aniket B asked me to,
so if there’s a famous entrepreneur
that you want me to profile next,
leave it in the comments below
and I’ll see what I can do.
I’d also love to know which of the top 10 rules
meant the most to you, leave it in the comments,
and I’ll join the discussion.
Thank you so much for watching, continue to believe,
and we’ll see you soon.
(swooshes)
”
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