Meet The Sheroes: A QnA with Summi Gambhir
Summi Gambhir - Pregpreneur; believer & creator of user experience centered business value; Leaning-in; Monday-lover; enabling SME & startup networking @GlobalLinker shares her story today.
Tell us a little about your life & how you became an entrepreneur?
Born and brought up in Delhi in a business family, I had always dreamt of being an entrepreneur. Having witnessed the upsides and downsides of business, closely watching my family business, I was quite aware of challenges small & medium business owners face.
After completing my schooling and undergraduate qualifications in Design, I worked with two leading publication houses in India – India Today and Hindustan Times. After working in Delhi for a few years, I chose to widen my exposure and went to US (Michigan State University) to pursue my Masters in Communication. I later, worked at a Silicon Valley start-up that supported the efforts of other start ups in creating a digital presence. All through my study and career, I would dream of business ideas, waiting for an opportune time.
Why did you choose to name your blog pregpreneur?
I have always wanted to share my own story of starting my venture and in some way inspire other women to take to entrepreneurship. I have also strongly felt the need for more women entrepreneurs in India, to encourage increased employment and also help build sensitive, mature and strong businesses (I believe a lot of qualities required for being a good entrepreneur come most naturally to women). I also saw, the ‘fear’ of having to quit once they were married or more likely when they are known to be pregnant, being a major deterrent for many women from taking to entrepreneurship. I decided to chronicle my experiences - a very candid account of my challenges and areas of support, as I waded through my entrepreneurial journey during my pregnancy. I feel an account of this kind will help more women see it from the eyes of someone who has gone through the stage they possibly fear and also for others – men and women, to realize how their positive attitudes and support can make the woman entrepreneur much stronger in her resolve to do justice to her family and her business venture.
This is a personal account of a pregnant entrepreneur, suggesting it’s perfectly ok to carry on an entrepreneurial journey during pregnancy, thus the title of ‘pregpreneur’. I hope in time to come, this becomes an acceptable and generic term and a way of life for women.
Tell us about a typical day at-work, how does it start? What is your normal working day like?
I am a more-than-full-time entrepreneur, and on most days have felt 24 hours too short to complete tasks of the day. I can definitely do with more, as there is so much I want to achieve with my startup and life. I don’t have a typical work-day but if I had to summarize issues that get my attention the most, it would be all customer issues. As the Chief Experience Officer of GlobalLinker, my greatest commitment is to determine what users of GlobalLinker are seeking to do, to make their business growth simpler, more profitable and enjoyable. I invest a lot of my time in determining new ways to address SME opportunities and better ways to deliver such services to SME members.
How do you manage work in two different time zones? US and India? Is it difficult?
I am one of the three co-founders of a start-up, and all three of us live in different cities. Additionally, I shuttle between New York, which is home and Delhi, India where a part of my start-up is based.
I have designed my own life to be location agnostic and with the right learning’s and changes, I would say location agnostic businesses can be effectively managed. Here are a few learning’s based on my personal experience:
Support structure - You need a supportive spouse or partner, who will value and share the passion for your business.
Independent team - You need to have a good team who co-own the business and key objectives as much as you do. Our team shares a common dream and passion, and independently manages day-to-day business issues. This one is not easy to achieve, as several team members with traditional thinking will not appreciate the founders being location independent. That said we today have an extremely committed and passionate team who take equal responsibility for the success of our business.
Discipline & routine - In addition to operating from two different locations, I have the additional the complexity of operating in two widely different time zones. But having a set routine and providing several windows of availability to team members and client partners during their working hours, has helped bridge the divide.
On your home page of pregpreneur you mentioned you are fortunate to have great support system. Would you like to elaborate more on this?
I have received tremendous support from everyone – my husband, my family, my co-founders and my entire team came together to offer rock like support to my pregpreneur journey. This is extremely helpful and something which I value a lot. It is also a fact that such support and confidence is tough to earn and easy to lose. I believe it is important to match the support I get with my personal sincerity and unwavering focus. I can best describe the relationships and support as one of strong mutual respect.
What’s your perspective of motherhood?
Motherhood, to me, is a very special privilege, which comes with a very deep sense of commitment & responsibility. It brings with it a permanent change and an acute consciousness and thankfulness of the role parents and society play in our development. Feeling another human take birth within you is closest to witnessing a miracle and with it, brings a great degree of humility & is the most sobering experience ever.
How you are planning to continue your entrepreneur journey once your baby is born?
As I mentioned in one of my blog posts ‘Superwoman is fictional. No?’, my pregpreneur journey has taught me that a woman can choose, at will, to be a super-mom, a super-spouse, a super-boss or a super-peer and so on. But a superwoman is one who is effective without being super-stretched. And that’s what I intend to follow – balance my priorities without putting pressure on myself to be a superwoman. I will try my best to balance both my responsibilities in appropriate ways without intent to neglect one or the other. This may be done best by not shying from seeking help when required or necessary and also recognizing when which of the two needs my personal attention more.
What advice would you like to share with our readers on how to succeed?
I have always believed, we all have immense potential and when we stretch ourselves, we discover even greater latent potential. When we can add a purpose to our potential, it takes us to a totally different level. I believe in what I am doing. I have stepped out of my comfort zone and also found a purpose I truly believe in.
Did you ever had a bad experience or faced gender discrimination at work? If yes, what did you do?
I think inequality is a way of the world - gender, age and occupation are three I have had to deal with. However, without meaning to generalise, I can say a lot of the traditional biases gave way to very fair and respectful interactions as my attributes as an individual came to the fore.
As a woman or as an entrepreneur or as someone younger than most in a meeting room, it would be unfair for me to expect concessions and yet complain about inequality. I have experienced respectful dealings for far longer than the initial period of 'gauging', where people around me appeared to test me for seeking concessions on account of either of my 3 attributes. Separately, I have been fortunate to be in a position to establish and mould certain core values and principles in my own organization, where diversity in age, gender, physical attributes, preferences and religion are respected and valued rather than ever being a reason for any discrimination. The continued and interesting battle I personally keep engaging in is of breaking stereotypes. I do this by expressing my views on subjects freely and openly. That’s what led me to capture my personal experiences of pregnancy while relentlessly pursuing my entrepreneurial dreams in my blog pregpreneur.com
What’s your approach to work and how has the journey been so far?
I believe that if you dream of positive solutions to issues and challenges; you can find a way to deliver appropriate results. I have dreamt of a world where SMEs and start-ups (especially women-owned businesses) aren’t disadvantaged and are instead respected for being the true pillars of economic growth and development. I do believe we are on our way to deliver to that goal and will offer an increasing number of SMEs and start-ups the solutions, services and facilities we believe will help them enjoy advantages similar to those enjoyed by bigger businesses through GlobalLinker .
Equally, I have dreamt of a happy and healthy child who can get an insiders view of multi-tasking and staying happy. I am hopeful of delivering to both my dreams and to date, it has been a wonderful journey being a pregpreneur.
As a business owner what are the steps taken by your firm to help women in pregnancy?
We at GlobalLinker are committed to supporting women in the work force to lead more balanced work lives. We ensure implementation and communication of fair workplace rules and are sensitive to the cause of women in the workplace, including when they are seeking to enjoy the joys of pregnancy.
In our young and small venture, we have seen 3 women colleagues work till almost the last day of their pregnancies and our team stood-in for them during the period they were away. As an organization we have implemented six months paid leave and a staged ‘return to work’ process, including part time hours and flexibility to work from home post pregnancy.
