At BrilliantRead Media, our aim is to bring to our community some of the finest stories from the leadership world. As part of this endeavour, we invited a passionate entrepreneur – Pranav Joshi for an exclusive interview with us. Pranav is a Leader, Entrepreneur, Consultant and Mentor. He is the Co-Founder and Partner of RSJ Food Industry LLP. Let’s learn more about his exciting journey, his background and his advice for our growing community.
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with Pranav:
Talk us through your background and your journey as an entrepreneur, please;
My journey started way back when I was just a school going kid but always was surrounded by the small and medium business running people that made me think about starting my own business someday down the line. I did my schooling from SMPR School (Mumbai) and further did my higher studies (Masters Degree in Business Entrepreneurship) from St. Petersburg University from Russia.
As being told by my friends and close relatives, I was always passionate to do something out of the box and that to make my own way in terms of doing something different than to recklessly following the expected 9 to 5 job profile and earning a livelihood.”
In my mind, I always dreamt of delivering high performance in whatever life had to offer me. There were times when I was lost and couldn’t foresee my path due to family expectations and societal peer pressure. At this point, books came to my rescue and those were the only aspects that helped me gain clarity and set a clear goal set to be achieved within 5 years down the line.
I adopted this habit of reading with simple books which increased my interest which turned me towards the intelligent and advanced reading of business books which gave me better clarity towards my goals. During my initial learning days, I met a few entrepreneurs who had similar backgrounds like mine and after years of hard work and continuous efforts were successful enough in their respective fields.”
I noticed a common trait of calculated decision making which is the key to becoming a successful entrepreneur and I was wise enough to adopt that trait in myself development which has helped me achieve whatever I am right now. At this point, I understood that success does not depend on hard work, it depends on how many times you don’t give up on your goals and how tactfully you learn from the mistakes of other people.
My mantra for strength is “LETS TRY ONE MORE TIME”.
What attracts you towards entrepreneurship instead of a corporate career?
I chose entrepreneurship when I realized that FREEDOM is achieved only when you are working for yourself. In my corporate career, I realized that there is only a limited scope of learning but as opposed to entrepreneurship, it is a whole world in itself.
You can learn from your own failures and success mantras which you hardly get in the corporate career which offers you routine and repeated assignments.”
I was inspired by my relative, a successful entrepreneur, who had always pushed me to the edge and challenged me to bring out the best in me.
‘RSJ Food Industry LLP’ is such a unique name; talk us through more about it, please. Our audience would also love to know what kind of problem you are solving?
Our name “RSJ” is a short representation and combination of the surnames of its partner “ Mr. Pranav (“RANGANI”) and myself Pranav (“ JOSHI”) and since we both are from Gujarat we added “SANG” whose English translation is together. As a result, it means our goals of working together and making “RSJ” a brand in itself have what resulted in “RSJ”.
Our company is into manufacturing and supplying disposable and eco-friendly products and we expertise in manufacturing Paper Straws and other disposable items to eliminate the use of and pollution caused by single-use plastic straws problem worldwide.
Plastic pollution is a pressing problem for our planet as a whole and we are strived to work upon solving this issue. Paper straws are biodegradable and eco-friendly and are the only solution for saving our Mother Earth from pollution caused by plastic.
What does your company specialize in?
Our company specializes in manufacturing Customized and Export Quality Paper Straws as per the requirements of the customers and we believe in the continuous development of our products through exhaustive R & D on our products.
We offer the following products:
White Straws (Wrapped and Unwrapped)
Stripped Colour Straws (various colours as per requirement)
Customized Colour Straws
Other Disposable Products (Paper Bags, Paper Cups, Areca Items)
During this COVID-19 crisis, what are the measures you have undertaken to continue your business without disruption?
As our business had kick-started just prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, we had to ensure that our business model aligns with the greater challenges of the pandemic.
Primarily, as a startup company, we had our initial challenges of capturing the market base which became a secondary issue as we had to primarily deal with survival as the outbreak of COVID-19 wiped out most of our competitors.
> In order to survive and run our business, we temporarily engaged in trading of products including but not limited to masks, sanitisers etc in order to cover our running overheads.
> Secondly, during the complete lockdown period, since there was no sale for the company, we shifted our focus on working on research and development for our products so as to manufacture improvised and export quality products which could demand better standing against our competitors.
> After a certain period of time, when the restrictions were lightened, we worked on capturing the market base by offering our improvised products with an increased price range and which lead to creating our USP against our competitors.
What are the business mantras you have embraced as you sought to establish your success story?
The following are my business mantras:
~ Patience
~ Always Hope for the best
~ Don’t downgrade your dream just to fit your reality, upgrade your conviction to match your destiny.
How do you manage to keep going despite the challenges? What drives you?
As I have always been a strong believer of the mantra “LET TRY ONE MORE TIME”. It was always the time when life threw challenges upon me, I would keep on reminding myself that it is nothing but my patience and very giving up approach has helped me in my journey and that nothing but my trust and patience upon myself will help me face any challenges that will ever come my way to success.
Without a doubt, my patience and self-trust have driven me so long till date.
Given the rapid pace at which the world is changing, what are the leadership traits that are necessary for success?
Vision
Determined Goal
Self Belief
Never give up approach
Perseverance
Transparency
What are the three most important lessons you have learned building your startup?
(i) Never lose patience even when situations go worse or against your plans
(ii) Keep going and trying
(iii) Don’t lose hope even in situations when no one believes in your dreams
Please share with us, what has worked well for you so far?
Patience and Self Belief have worked well for me.
Who do you believe has been the biggest source of motivation in your daily life?
My biggest source of motivation are:
(1) Self belief
(2) Patience
(3) Books
(4) Self Trust
What are some of the strategies that you believe have helped you grow as a person?
There are a few:
(a) Taking risk
(b) Having patience
(c) Positive Thinking
(d) Leadership
(e) Taking onus of your decisions
In your opinion, what are the keys to success?
– Setting up goals at proper age
– Continuous learning
– Positive Attitude
– Self-belief
– Self-Trust
– Planning
– Trusting your product/service
What advice would you give students and young professionals who want to have a successful career?
I would have just one small piece of advice for young students and professionals who yearn to start something of their own.
If you have the vision and are determined to start something new, it is always better to start thinking and planning at a younger age during your college/university period. This will help you in better planning and taking up studies relating to your interest in the study and that will help you in taking better decisions for yourself.
There is so much to be shared, but this conversation limits how much I can communicate on this platform. Students and young professionals regularly reach out to me on LinkedIn with their specific queries.
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.
