"The personality development classes at IIPM give one the ability to make their presence felt. Today I speak with confidence and can proudly say that at IIPM they know how to carve out your personality and make it shine."
He likes fancy cars, chartered jets and luxury brands but make no mistake Ashish Batra is a very grounded individual who has always believed that there is no short cut to success and only consistent hard work pays.
Always striving for perfection Ashish his come a long way since his days at IIPM where he transformed from a shy person into a confident speaker and leader.
Today Ashish has ventured into various businesses and each one of them is flourishing and growing under his leadership. He started with a franchise of Ozone - Gym Salon Spa which today boasts of a clientele of 2000 members. Next was the hair salon business and his brand Hair Masters Luxury Salon has 10 branches across India. By 2021 he plans to have 30 such branches.
From beauty and fitness Ashish then ventured into the food business. His restaurant Band Baaja Baraat is all set to open a second outlet. He has also taken the master franchisee of Delhi’s famous ‘Evergreen Sweet House’ and is planning on expanding this too.
Ashish shares with us his views on entrepreneurship and how he stays ahead in the game.
Q. What ignited the spark in you to start the business ?
A. After completing my graduation from Delhi university, I went on to pursue my management studies, at The Indian Institute of Planning and Management. After completing 2 brilliant years of transformation, I decided to follow my passion and ventured into various business. IIPM, gave me the confidence to turn my dreams into reality.
Q. What is the best advice you ever got ? From whom ?
A. One piece of advice I believe in is that, to be successful, one has be a good listener first.
My Professor at IIPM, Mr Mashkur Zafar, once told me ‘The sun sets to rise again’. This is what keeps me going. Who says there won’t be any bad phases and if you believe me there are more bad phases than good ones in this journey called life. So just remember, there is always light at the end of the tunnel. Don’t quit when the going gets tough. Keep going.
Q. “Great leaders are also great speakers” Do you agree? How did your personality development classes help you in your business ?
A. Great leaders play a very critical role in influencing others. They have the power and the capability to make a difference in the lives of others. During my days at IIPM my faculty of marketing Mrs Gopika used to say “When you are on the other side of the table you have the power to make a change”. Today when I interact with my 900 employees I realise how right she was. My position gives me the opportunity and the power to give their vision a shape, and that is when I realise how important it is to be a strong orator.
The personality development classes at IIPM give one the ability to make their presence felt. I remember how I was given ‘polka dots’ at my first extempore session and I was struggling to find words and make sense out of them. Today I speak with confidence and can proudly say that at IIPM they know how to carve out your personality and make it shine.
Q. What are the key elements to running a successful business ?
A. The key elements required to start and run a successful business would be -
1) Understand your market. - You need to have a very clear picture of who is your target audience.
2) Why You - Why should you do this? This is one question that you will be required to answer at various levels of your life. The answer to it can only be curated by your actions. You need to justify to yourself why you are doing what you are doing an if its worth it.
3) Be different - Its good to follow your passion. However I would like to add that follow your passion with a vision to be different from your competitors and your rivals.
Q. Marketing is the most important aspect of a business. How do you market your business ?
A. Marketing is the most important aspect of any business. I would say ‘creation is useless unless it reaches the right user’. If your aim is to be a successful entrepreneur then your vision has to travel through all the different channels which are described as marketing. My approach to marketing would be three fold - create, inform and serve.
A) Create -: the right product
B) Inform -: build awareness about your product
C) Serve -: to the right audience
Q. If you had one piece of advice to give to someone just starting out what would it be ?
A. My advice to the budding entrepreneurs would be to first and foremost study very carefully the current market and try and figure out a gap. Do not follow the existing trend, rather create your own trend. You can’t sell what you have already bought.
Apart from this it’s also very important to seek the right guidance and work in the right direction.
Q. What makes you happy ?
A. Achieving new goals and targets in life gives me a sense of happiness.
Q. What is the secret to your daily productivity ?
A. The support and encouragement I get from my wife is the secret of daily productivity.
Q. Which other company apart from yours do you admire the most ?
A. The Tata Group, for their versatility.
Q. Your favourite quote ?
A. “What happens, happens for the good.”
Q. Your favourite vacation spot ?
A. London
Q. Your favourite designer ?
A. Emporio Armani
Q. Your favourite actor / actress ?
A. Tom Hanks is my favourite actor and Julia Roberts my favourite actress.