 Startups play a crucial role in driving innovation, fostering economic growth and addressing various societal challenges. What drives entrepreneurial spirit? What needs to be done to meet success? How does one navigate through the maze of business? We met Vishal Nair, the master trainer from Badmani Foundation, to get all these answers. He started with telling us what leads people to become entrepreneurs and take up the startup journey. So according to my experience in these past 6-7 years that I have been training and have come across many startups, there are two triggers basically for any startup to come into existence in the world itself. And the first trigger is always passion. Somebody is extremely interested about a field or somebody is expert in an area, maybe it is a technology or maybe it is an art form, whatever it is. So out of the passion and out of the excellence that person has in that field, he may think about a startup in that field. And though this is very undervalued in our Indian ecosystem till now, but still there are a lot of startups coming from that. And this is a startup with the highest possibility of satisfaction, which goes beyond money, which goes beyond personal pursuits and all these things. So this is the first trigger that I have found, where a person finds a deep-seated passion and he comes up with a startup idea. At the same time there is one more trigger and that trigger is when somebody sees a problem around them. And this is the majority of the cases. And when we educate students per se, we focus on that because out of 100 people, let's say 99 people would not have discovered a passion which was deep-seated. And somehow even if they have discovered, thanks to our education system in school days, they wouldn't have given enough time for it, seconding it to their education. So what happens in that way is we educate students to find a problem. So a lot of startups come through identifying a problem. And most of the startups who are solving these problems, these problems are very local to them. So they have seen it, they have lived with it, they have grown with it and they have identified it. So this is also a great trigger. But once they have this trigger, they have identified a problem or they have identified a passion, now is the time when an idea starts turning in their mind. They have an idea to capitalize upon. So in the ideation phase, they have a very good solution for it in their mind. So they have a solution to address the problem, but they do not have an idea to convert that solution to a product. So in any startup to become successful, they have to go through two phases. They have to get the problem solution fit and they have to get the product market fit. So problem solution fit, our students are extremely well at it. Startups in India are extremely well at it. Whoever thinks about it, they come up with an idea, they come up with a solution and they quickly merge that and they get the problem solution fit quickly. But where we have seen a lacuna is when they go to the product market fit stage, where they assume out of their own gut feelings that this product the market will accept as it is. And this is basically because we consider product as our own baby, we are very product centric. So the first focus that we kind of turn for students is don't be problem, don't be possessed about your product, be possessed about your problem. And that is where we find a key differentiation starts, where they second their gut feelings and they start getting possessive about the customer they are talking to. So they start interacting. So this is a place where we talk about empathy, we talk about being customer centric, we talk about talk to customers, go to the field, talk to your stakeholders. And this is where they really identify problem from the eyes of a customer. And this is a very key mindset change that the student especially a student in technology comes up with because a student in mostly in technology education, they are let's say they are electronics engineer, mechanical engineer or biotech engineer. They mostly find a problem that is associated with their field and they are not willing to talk to customer because they have a confidence that the product they are coming up with is great. But it's not the rockstar product as such that the customer wants, the customer wants a product that addresses this problem. So once he comes to that stage where he has this problem solution fit and now he's thinking about a product to the market, now he needs a very deep understanding about the market. So the next stage we make students understand or we need to make students understand and even startups understand who is your customer? Where is your market? Why should they buy from you? And these are little deep questions and mostly people who are very product focused never think about it. To a great extent, team imbalance plays a very vital role in the failure of a startup also but at the same time a lot of these startups start with a single founder and later on they build a team. So partly I would say it is also an ignorance to the available facts out there. So as I said if somebody is really good at the technology, he does not think beyond his sphere of influence. So he's not willing to collaborate or complement with somebody else's expertise. Sometimes it is because of the reservedness that they have with somebody leak my idea, would somebody make benefit out of my technology, my solution. So this is where we say come out open talk, open up about your idea. There are ways to protect what you have and it's always good to complement with other partners. So for example in today's context if you see some of the best startups out there, they were impossible without great complementers. If it was Microsoft, people recognize Microsoft and credit Bill Gates for Microsoft's accomplishment but Microsoft would have been impossible to be established unless there was a Paul Allen. Steve Jobs is recognized for Apple but Steve Jobs couldn't have made Apple possible unless there was a Steve Wozniak who was a tech genius. Steve Jobs was a creative genius. So you see some of the greatest companies in the world today established are with co-founders who had complementary skills. In the same way if you look at Google, it was Larry Page and Sergey Brin. If you look at Flipkart, it was Sachin and Bini Bansal. If you look at Ola, it was Ankit Bhatian Bhavishagarwal. All these individuals if you look they had complementary skill sets. And yes one of the main element of a successful startup is complementary individuals coming together bringing their ideas on table and collaborating with each other to make a startup possible. So it's always good. So in fact when startups come to me or startup comes to go to investors they have more confidence on a startup which has co-founders rather than a startup which has a single founder. So if you have created a great team then it's absolutely important that you delegate and forget. So delegation is very important. So as a startup there is a possibility that in the beginning that you will not trust your teammates. Because you are not an expert. You may have an inclination towards because a person is very good at outgoing he is good at marketing does not mean he will become the right person for your startup. And not in the first few days. He himself is discovering. As you are discovering on the product side or somebody else is discovering in other field he is also discovering. So one very important part of this phase is you have to give time. You cannot judge a person within a month or even within 5 to 6 months. You have to at least go ahead with that person for a year. Provided both the teammates have the singular vision to accomplish for their startup. Because if they do not agree on the same vision then the team can never agree to work together. However complimentary individuals here. So if the team has a singular vision to achieve then the team can definitely work together, learn together, explore and maybe they will have one or two failures but they will definitely stick together. So vision is something that binds the team together. And this vision goes beyond the call of profit. It is about what are you ultimately accomplishing? What is the impact because of you in the startup? In the startup or in the realm of startup itself. Or in India. And that vision if it binds together two founders they go beyond the call of duty. Let us say it is not my strength to be a marketing professional. I will make that my strength. I will work over it. I will learn from it. I will find individuals. So I will go beyond my call of duty. So I believe the next thing is the team should sit together, find a vision and relentlessly work towards that vision. They should commit themselves towards that vision. A business model is something that will not be a static thing. It will be dynamic. An example if I should tell you there was a startup called Blockbuster. Blockbuster was a great example of a startup. We started selling VCR tapes and giving it on lease. And Netflix started in 1998 doing the same thing but with DVDs. Both had the same business model, rental, giving CDs. Netflix was giving CDs and DVDs on lease. As well as Blockbuster was doing it even 10 to 15 years before them with VCR tapes. Netflix had seen a market trend change. There was a new technology coming to the market CDs though it was very costly. But still Netflix had thought that maybe I will take a lead in that. But it was very costly and people were still not switching. But Netflix saw a future in it. That's why Netflix actually at a time went to Blockbuster and said buy us out. But they did not. Blockbuster said you are just having one or two percent of the market share. We are still a giant. This was a fortune-finding company to say. And so the business model both of both had at that time was same. But over a period of time technology shifted. People started adopting CD DVD players. Now in that market Netflix had a commandable presence. Now Netflix and though Blockbuster had converted to CD DVD rental. But still Netflix had got almost 50% market share in US. Now both were equal competitors. As time passed off and the advent of thumb drives and people started talking about IPTV, Internet Protocol Television. TV on demand. That is the time Blockbuster found that beyond this business I can't do anything. Beyond this business model I can't do anything. But Netflix was wise. They invested in business model. They started thinking beyond the business model of rental or lease. And that's where they shifted from rental and lease to subscription model adopting the IPTV. Again at a great expense. But today if you look at Netflix is a market capitalized company with more than 250 billion dollar valuation. Whereas Blockbuster has got bankrupt. And does not exist beyond one museum that they have in USA today. So if you see the next thing that a team needs to become successful is an amazing business model. Around which and this business model will keep changing. And this change let's say in 10 years in the past 2 decades but now it will change maybe every year. Because we are in a transient phase you know. We are talking about AI, data science. A lot of technologies coming together. Today the business models may change every year. Or you may have multiple multi-pronged approaching. You may need to adopt 2-3 business models. And go ahead with something that works. So what the team then needs to sit together and explore and discover is actually a great business model by which the business will go out there into the market. Definitely nothing would get sold by itself. You have a great business model is half the story. In the business model there are different elements. For example you have revenue streams. In that revenue stream or for example there is a value proposition. You will have to keep updating it. In the business model you have channels. You have let's say you have unfair advantages that you build over a period of time. And unless and otherwise we keep, we kind of keep updating them. We will not be relevant. A good example in recent days is there is a startup in Coimbatore which is called Raido. Though they are Coimbatore based startup. But they are established their operations in Tumkur. Tumkur in Bangalore. This startup has a different, if you look at on paper their business model is same as Ola or Uber. It's exactly the same. But the only difference that they have is on the revenue stream side where they are kind of differentiating themselves. So on revenue stream side where Ola makes money through commissions on each ride. Raido makes commission by subscription. So on Raido portal auto rickshaw drivers come. They subscribe for a day to ride and no commission per ride is taken by them. So what happens is here the auto drivers are more comfortable going with Raido because they don't have to pay higher commissions and because of that the ride, each ride price also reduces which is accessible for customer. So that's a winning proposition for them. So as time goes on, each elements of business model have to be actually kept on being updated based upon the trend and the requirement of the customer. And that itself can become a differentiator in the market. I would have three unconventional bullet points which I would like to mention here. So I always tell to these two startups. So at the center of any successful startup is a great character. So a lot of people think it's a great business strategy. It's a great funding. It's a great team. But I believe at the core of any successful business which has been successful and has grown successful and impacted a lot of people's life is a great character. Think about business like Tata. What comes to our mind first? Trust, faith, loyalty. That's signs of great character, integrity. Now I believe for any successful startup in today's trend for having a strong character they have to prioritize three things that can make them extremely successful. I believe they need empathy more than education. We think being a startup entrepreneur I need to get educated a lot, true. Without education you cannot be a good entrepreneur. But at the same time if they do not prioritize empathy over education I don't think they can ever know the pain point of the people from the people's perspective. So that's the first thing I would say. Prioritize empathy over education. The more you talk to people, understand their pain point, understand their worldview, they'll definitely succeed. Second most important thing I would say that it takes for a startup to be successful and be successful over a long time is they should prioritize values over vision. So let me repeat once again, it's values over vision. So even I told about vision, you know and yes as a startup I should be possessive about my vision. I have a great vision, I have a target. As an institute I have a target to meet and I have accreditations to meet. But in pursuit of a vision I should not compromise my integrity. So if I compromise with my integrity what is the purpose behind doing what I am supposed to do? If that purpose I will compromise it because I can do things for a dikhava also for the sake of doing it also. If that is done then it becomes kind of a second priority. It loses its essence. So there are core values every startup has they should never deviate from it. And these values are human centric. These values are for the people. So you do not sacrifice your values on the altar of vision and this happens especially with startups which get funding. When a startup gets funding and they have this investors onboarded investors have different priority and their major objective is to make money. And when that happens sometimes for pursuing that goal or target they will compromise their values. And today we can see a lot of startups who are suffering from that phenomena. So if they do not compromise with their values for the vision sake, I believe in the logarithm they will be successful and they will keep growing. Third important bullet point that I would say startup founders should do they should always prioritize their character over charisma. So a lot of startup founders have this misconception that they should talk well they should look great. Yes they should talk well they should look decent but that does not define you as a great startup entrepreneur. They should have flowery speech giving ability they should be towering figure everywhere they go they should be part of different networks. All these things help but at the core is your character. If you do not work on your character your charisma will never sell. Your charisma will deceive people for a time being but it will not sell over a long period of time. So I believe at the core of any startup startup founder I would say he should work on his character more than his charisma. Because charisma is something that is not there it's something that I showcase but character is something that you are the real person. And at the end of the day if he has great empathy value as well as character manifestation will showcase in his startup every product he will bring out in the market every service he will bring out in the market these traits will showcase in his product or services and I believe humans connect with them better they understand empathy they understand values especially we Indians we understand empathy we understand value we understand character more than education or vision or even charisma. That is I believe is a kind of secret sauce for a growing startup. So do not expect any shortcuts do not expect to have clear certain vision ever in your startup journey every single day you are going to face uncertainty. I compare it with a driving lesson so on day one when you go take out a car and you start driving you are totally uncertain you are excited about learning to drive a car when you start going behind that wheel you do not know everything about the car you do not know what is the engine capacity of the car fuel capacity of the car what are the pressures in time and you do not have to know that but what is the misconception a lot of people have I know everything then I start and start do not wait for that best time do not wait for that time when you finish your MBA degree and start your startup if the best time to start startup is today so start quickly the magic is in the start do not think about a great royal startup start humble your startup or starts the day when you get your first customer start with that objective start quickly will you fail yes you will fail 97% of the startups are prone to failure but remember failure is a very learning is the biggest learning experience you will have you will not get this learning experience through any degree so do not be afraid to fail fail but learn from your failure and start again because when you start again there is a very high possibility that you succeed I have read this statistic somewhere the startup founders who fail and come back there is 67% possibility that they will succeed so that is a pretty good number that they will succeed so have a ruthless determination that I will be consistent over a long period of time and I will sustain with perseverance and I guess that is how you can become successful over a long period of time the average age of a successful entrepreneur in India is 42 so it is not 20 years old or 25 years old these quickly successful entrepreneurs get the limelight but remember that is not the whole story otherwise a lot of people go through struggle for 5 years 10 years but remember that struggle have a lot of learning and that 10 years what they work would sustain them for the next 100 years or more than that I was reading a statistic yesterday let's say that the richest billionaire billionaire entrepreneurs that we have in the world today let's say Jeff Bezos let's say he starts spending even $1 million a day he would be spending that $1 million a day for 436 years or something 400 plus years imagine the amount of wealth they have amassed now I am not saying money should be a priority always put people before profit if you want to grow up and other way if you want to blow up so if you put people before profit be consistent over a long period of time learn from your failures remember networking is the key do not be hesitant be humble to approach mentors get their guidance keep learning and as the time passes on and let's say as even in driving you do first day you will not be confident second day you will not be confident third day you will have a lot of uncertainties but if you just spend enough time behind the wheel over a month or two you will be able to mitigate every risk on the road the same way with start-up also first month, first year you will not be confident on but let's say if you are there enough time for one year, two year and you will allow yourself to cook in this start-up realm you will automatically find a way to mitigate risk and also make great use of your opportunity and definitely ultimately you will be making jobs changing lives supporting families and developing the economy of this country yeah start-ups are essential for driving innovation creating jobs contributing to economic growth and addressing a wide range of challenges they bring dynamism and diversity to the business landscape pushing boundaries and contributing to the overall development of societies and economies we hope you will take note of these important success mantras from Vishal Nair and go on to become the next successful entrepreneur