New Delhi: DMA Trailblazers CMO Awards, co-hosted by ABP News, SAP and ValueFirst, recently brought renowned brand experts together to reveal their passionate stories and success mantras.
The initiative by DMA Asia aimed to create a circle of excellence for marketers and marketing with the event held in Mumbai and in Gurugram.
Speaking at the event, Madison World Chairman Sam Balsara said days of "safe advertising" are gone.
"With every passing day, the days of safe advertising are gone. In the old day, if a brand got an advertisement on Doordarshan, it succeeded, however silly the ad was. Today things have changed, in a world where Social Media rules it's impossible to not offend anyone. If you tried to make an ad that offends no one, I think it will also appeal to no one."
Also present on the occasion was Sumeet Singh, Group CMO, Infoedge India Ltd. She said: "My mother taught me to celebrate life as it was too short to complain or to hold a grudge. I still remember when I came out of B-School my peers were advised to buy certain policies to save money but my mother asked me not to even think of saving for the initial months and just enjoy ourselves. I am just glad she taught me to celebrate everything worth it and not to wait for that big success."
Madison Digital Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Vishal Chanchankar talked about his experience of soul searching which led him towards a passion for cycling.
He shared several lessons from the experience with his biggest learning being to stay invested. “If you are really invested in what you really love you start to value it more,” the Madison Digital CEO said.
He also emphasised the need to network with a wide range of people.
Chanchankar also said that “the idea is if you have long goals and if you invest for long term, you will probably achieve them”.
“I realised that every success, smallest of the smallest success, you need to really enjoy.. cherish the moment and make the best of it,” he added.
Other entrepreneurs who graced the occasion to share their experiences included Bandhan Bank's Marketing Head Apurva Sircar, ValueFirst CEO Vishwadeep Bajaj, INFIDIGIT Founder Kaushal Thakkar, Senior General Manager and Head Marketing, Ecommerce & Modern Trade, Blue Star Ltd, Girish Hingorani, CMO, Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd, Karthi Marshan, Aditya Birla Capital CMO Ajay Kakar, and ABP Network’s Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) Mona Jain.
Bandhan Bank's Apurva Sircar said: "Imagine youngsters who just came into this field within such a situation. They are far less prepared for the challenges and one thing that we can practice with them is Empathy. Instead of pointing out fingers towards what's wrong, we need to drive our teams towards understanding why someone is doing something."
Addressing the gathering, ValueFirst CEO Vishwadeep Bajaj listed the "four values" he created for the company.
"In 2003, I decided to set up ValueFirst, I took a call to build this company in the context of spirituality. So I created four values of the company. The first is to love each other. The second is truthfulness in each action, the next is faith in oneself and the universe and the last is excellence in each effort. These are the ethics that drive us towards our goals," he said.
INFIDIGIT founder Kaushal Thakkar said: "In life either you can be positive or negative at a particular moment. You can't have both these feelings together so it's better to fill up yourself with such positivity that there's no space left for the negative emotions to take over."
For Girish Hingorani, Senior General Manager and Head Marketing, Ecommerce & Modern Trade, Blue Star Ltd, happiness is very critical in career.
He said at the event: "A thing that I believe is very critical in career is happiness and we have to be in pursuit of it. The major problem that comes in its way is that we keep comparing ourselves to others. We are not in a rat race, everyone can build their own individuality and their own mark as long as we set standards for ourselves which is what matters."
Karthi Marshan, CMO, Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd, said: "I think I am getting the credit of young people's hard work, that's why I am least happy for winning this award. My achievements are the result of my bosses and teams always supporting me and nothing else. The main reason behind my happiness is to meet new people after so long and see great work being appreciated."
Vatsal Asher, Founder & CEO, DMAasia, said: "To address the blizzard of challenges facing our world, we need bold, courageous ideas that disrupt the status quo. We had an illustrious Jury led by Sam Balsara who reviewed the eligible candidates from the 400+ nominations at the DMA Trailblazer CMO Awards. I congratulate all the recipients for the well-earned accolade. Their Trailblazer stories we believe will serve as inspiration for all CMOs & all of marketing."
Talking about her work experience spanning several decades, ABP Network’s Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) Mona Jain said: “The secret of professional journey and survival for this long has been always having the willingness to learn the new. I began life in this profession of media and communication way back in 1989 when probably a lot of you would not have been born or would be still in school or early life in college."
Jain said there was "limited supply" when it comes to media platforms and options.
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