Automobile Manufacturing / 5 years 9 months

Qn: Tell me briefly about your work experience.

A: I worked for about 3 years for XYZ and now I have been working for Toyota for last 2 years and a half. I got a good mix of rural and urban marketing experience awhile working for XYZ, being strong in rural marketing and Toyota particularly strong in semi-urban n urban markets.

Qn: What was the XYZ market share?

A: About 45%.

Qn: I meant the rural market share of XYZ for its total sales.

A: Rural markets contributed almost 60% to its sales.

Qn: What did you do in XYZ?

A: I was working as a Territory manager-Service for North Bihar market, primarily worked for business development. I was responsible for services and parts target achievement, customer relationship management and network expansion.

Qn: How many dealers did you make in XYZ?

A: 3

Qn: What was the target?

A: 3

Qn: What was your contribution to your responsibilities as a dealer network developer?

A: I developed a format for dealer selection. It included information such as how many petrol pumps, how many banks etc are there in the market.

Qn: It’s market research, not dealer evaluation.

A: Yes, it was the first initiative to assess the market. Then, I made a dealer evaluation format that included information such as site details (front/depth etc), financial capability etc.

Qn: How did you develop the format for dealer partner selection? What were the parameters?

A: Basically it was based on 3i approach that I learnt from my 1^st boss, an ISB 09 batch pass out. 3i would be investment, infrastructure and involvement.

Qn: I don’t believe it. *Client Name* is such a big organization. Why wouldn’t they have the standards in place?

A: Yes, a structured approach wasn’t there.

Qn: What could be the reason behind this?

A: I am not very sure. But, may be, since Patna area office was set up recently in 2009 and there wasn’t much network expansion in first year and half. That could be the reason.

Qn: How are those dealers that you appointed doing?

A: Those dealers were appointed in FY12-13 and I left XYZ in May’13, so don’t know much about their performance.

Qn: How did organization benefit from your initiative of developing such format?

A: It was used by my colleague as well, it was made as standard for dealer selection activity.

Qn: Why did you leave XYZ?

A: I learnt the basics of business operations and customer management, had a great learnings about rural marketing as well. Learning curve had become a little flat, so I thought of making a move and Toyota gave me the right opportunity as in my current profile I got to work for dealer development dept, it offered a good exposure to semi-urban n urban markets.

Qn: In XYZ you were making dealers, in Toyota also, you’re making dealers. How did your profile improve?

A: Here, I am in charge for network expansion activities for entire North2 region (U.P, M.P, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand). In past, for one year, I also took care of East India.

Qn: How many dealers did you make in Toyota?

A: 5 in Aligarh, Moradabad, Gaya, Gangtok, Kaithal

Qn: How long does it take to create a new dealer?

A: It depends, whether it’s a green field project or brown field. For a green field project it would take about 10-12 months.

Qn: If you have to develop new distribution network in U.P, what parameters would you set for a distributor selection? You have a minute to think and explain.

A: First, I shall evaluate the business volume that I am targeting from the market. Then, I shall study my competition for benchmarking purpose.

Qn: I want to know the parameters that you will use.

A: I would use the same 3i approach…. I would also like to know about his current businesses so that I can evaluate whether he will be able to allocate time for new business.

Qn: About achievement essay- what did you do? Was conducting mini championships your achievement?

A: No, of course. Conducting the mini championship was part of the process. Achievement was that for the first time in 3 years, a technician from Bihar secured the 1^st position.

Qn: What was the process?

A: First, I had conducted mini championships at all my six dealerships to identify the right candidate who would represent my territory in the championship.….I monitored their progress for about 02 weeks by calling them on alternate days and kept on helping them.

Qn: So, you set a process that gave you a result, will this process deliver result every year.

A: No, process needs to improve year on year as per the requirement.

Qn: Anything that you want to improve in that process?

A: I couldn’t visit my all dealerships during this preparation period, had I visited each dealership, I could have assessed whether the development plan was implemented in the right spirit at all the dealerships or not.

Qn: Already, you are working to build networks and have developed businesses, why don’t you try to get into brand management now? Why MBA?

A: I can try that. But, doing an MBA is linked to my long-term goal. 15-20 years down the line, I want to head the marketing function of a firm, preferably an FMCG and for that I need to learn the holistic approach to the marketing function as whatever I have learnt so far is gained through my own work-ex and interactions with colleagues, supervisors etc. An MBA would help me reach to my long term goal.