'Trail Blazers' A MTHR Initiative - Leadership Lessons Through Sports

MTHR stands for More Than Human Resources and they organise not for profit events for corporate executives to hone their skills. MTHR organised an event at the IMT, Hyderabad titled 'Lessons in Leadership Through Sports'. My writer friend Dev Prasad was invited to speak and he kindly invited me to join him for a panel discussion. Dev had written a book called 'Pitch It' which had sixty lessons from cricket for corporate managers and I wrote '50 Not Out' which is 50 life lessons from cricket.

Dev, Me and Rajesh Kamat 

MTHR's team of Vikram. Rajesh, Vipul and IMT's student community were wonderful. The panel of speakers comprised of Dr. Rohini Rau (India's medal-winning sailor, a medical doctor, TED fellow, playback singer, lyricist, theatre person, Facilitator - Human Centred Design, Hospital clown and so many more hates), Dev and Me, Meghna Gundlapally, Rhythmic Gymnast at Commonwealth Games (and all of 19), Yogesh Maurya, Tech and Sporting Director, Fateh Hyderabad and Ramesh Nagapuri, Dronacharya awardee and coach to Indian athlete Dutee Chand.

Vikram, Rajesh, Me, Dev, Dr. Rohini Rau, Vipul

We met the Director of IMT, H, Professor Satish Aliabadi and it was nice chatting with him. Then Rohini blew us all away with her astounding body of work, humour and humility. You can watch her many TED talks on diverse topics and several interviews and profiles. Currently she is a practicing doctor who dons all these hats. Meghana spoke with complete assurance and confidence and clarity.

Yogesh Maurya, Rajesh and Ramesh Nagapuri

Dev and I fielded questions about leadership and cricket and some about our books. One question that Dr. Raza asked which I wanted to elucidate on and couldn't - about followership - struck me later. If Dr. Raza is reading I wanted to tell you this - 'the full import of followership becomes stark when you step down as a leader, especially after a downtrend. that is when we fully understand what a leader wants from his followers and that's when we become followers in the true sense - contributing to our best in our roles, expanding it on our own, stepping up and patching up gaps the leader might have missed.'

The Dhoni story about how he stepped back as a member of the team, and yet contributed to his fullest is a case in point. Rajesh was energetic and fun and had enough energy for all forty of us. Fantastic.

Group pic with the IMTians

Anandita, Anmol and other IMTians thanks. Richa, Meeta and the Synergy team, the HR club of IMT, thanks for the interview. Great initiative and wonderful work. Unfortunately, I had to come away when we broke for lunch but I enjoyed myself thoroughly and look forward to going back.

Met Veda Vyas and his mother Vijayalakshmi there. Was wonderful meeting a lot of new people - MTHR team, Prof Satish Aliabadi, Rohini and Meghana.