At BrilliantReadMedia, we always strive to bring to you some of the finest and compelling stories from the entrepreneurship world. This week we invited Anupam Chatterjee for an interview with us to understand more about his journey as an entrepreneur. He is the Founder and CEO at TheDecisionLabs (CEMPIA) which stands for Customers Experience Management Platforms for Insights and Actions. CEMPIA is a Multi-channel, Multi-lingual, Digital Patient Experience Management Platform. It understands Patient Experience at every touchpoint in the Hospital, helps in capturing patients feedback, suggestions & complaints through a series of applications, and solves any dissatisfaction real-time. Let’s read more in detail about his journey, way forward and his advice for our growing community!
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with Anupam :
Tell us a little bit about yourself (background) and your journey as an entrepreneur, please;
My name is Anupam Chatterjee. I am the Founder and CEO of TheDecisionLabs. I did my MS from Indian Statistical Institute and after a few years of service in Analytics, went to do my MBA at HEC Paris and later got transferred to MIT Sloan (IEP) and also attended Harvard Business School in the fall of 2009. Post my MBA, I worked in Business Innovation and Capability Creation, leading teams in building new products and platforms. I was fortunate to work with great people and won several innovation awards at this time. So in 2014 October, launched TheDecisionLabs. However, the first 12 months was tough as I was more of a product/innovation/data science professional. However, getting down to core sales/client relations job, made me a better entrepreneur and from the end of 2015, started tasting success in India through 2016 making multiple sales across leading healthcare brands in India, through our flagship product CEMPIA Patient Experience Management Platform. In 2017, I moved out of India (to Malaysia) and since that time, we have got clients across several countries including the Middle East, ASEAN and have signed 9 international partners across Asia and Europe.
Overall in the last 5 years, it has been a fascinating journey, learning from the best professionals across countries and creating a best in class experience management platform – which we are now exploring in some other industries as well.
Why did you choose entrepreneurship over a job?
I have always had the urge to know the unknown, see the unseen, and take the path less travelled (in the words of my Alma Mater). This coupled with winning various entrepreneurial challenges and business innovation awards, helped me to take the final plunge in 2014, after almost 10 years of service.
How do you find the industry/niche that you’re in?
Health Tech is an exciting space and Patient experience is almost non-existing across Asia. This makes the venture much more than general entrepreneurship, but a sense of creating new value and tapping unexplored territories
What gets you out of bed in the morning i.e. what’s your source of motivation?
The fact that we are touching hundreds of thousands of lives and making a difference to them. is the most exciting part; the feeling that I have touched a small part of their lives is what helps me spring out of bed, and experience the world in a new way every day
What challenges/obstacles did you face in your journey so far?
As patient experience is a relatively new concept in Asia, we have the extra responsibility to share the knowledge and benefits of an application like CEMPIA, and how it will help both the hospitals as well as the patients.
Having said that every interaction creates new possibilities and has helped me evolve as a professional and our technology offering more robust
What comes first for you – money or emotions?
Money can never be the final motivation – changing lives is what inspires me – you can call it an emotion or a purpose; the feeling that somewhere you made life better for somebody is something which money cannot buy!
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
The strongest steel is forged by the fires of hell. I think the ability to take the pressure and excel under adversity is what differentiates a true leader from the rest. I go for long walks in late evenings, and that distresses me significantly. I also travel a lot for my work, and meeting new people and learning for them acts as fresh air to keep me going.
What is one strategy that you believe has helped you grow as a person/startup?
The question takes me 30 years back when in a summer afternoon I asked my grandmother how everybody from the society came to seek to advise from her and trusted her so much. Her answer was simple. “Put yourself in the shoes of other people”. Whether in professional or personal life, if you can relate to what the other person is looking for and how you can make him/her better, you know they will always reach out to you.
In entrepreneurship you deal with all kinds of people within the organisation and in clients; the ability to relate to them and offer them something they are looking for is a huge factor to derive success and growth naturally.
In your opinion what are the keys to success?
I would say hard work, interpersonal relations, well-informed/read on latest technologies/developments, passion and relentless commitment to the cause will automatically reflect in the success
What advice would you give to someone starting out as an aspiring entrepreneur?
I would say – be clear in what you want, if you can figure out the destination, you will find a way to reach it – don’t go with the herd, all of us have a unique capability, success is not defined by raising money or valuation. It is the sense of using your resources most optimally to reach your goals; all of us are uniquely blessed, let’s work on them and go for it. You don’t need to prove anything to anybody. Be yourself, enjoy life and seek out good mentors to help you out.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
