I joined work on May 16th. I was supposed to take charge as a product manager (marketing) and take over from a guy who was supposed to move to US in a month. I was supposed to handle a "market appropriate" product. Dangerous name, since it kinda insinuated that all the other products were market inappropriate. What it actually meant was that this product had been designed for markets like India, China and Russia.
Two weeks in to the job, I was still clueless as to what my predecessor had been doing for the past 8 months, besides travelling to remote places like Bagalpur and Imphal. Then I realized that he was selling the product, not marketing it. He had an entire sales force at his disposal, but they weren't too excited about this product. Bottomline - not enough incentive for the sales force to invest time on selling this product.
In two weeks, I had kinda formed a very vague idea of where I wanted to take this product in a year's time. That's when the bombshell was dropped on me (and my predecessor). His assignment to the US was indefinitely postponed. So he had to stay back and continue doing what he had been up to for past 8 months. As for me - I was asked to head the Mumbai metro sales team. I was pretty pissed. It's not everyday that a company changes your job profile drastically, 2 weeks into the job. But I thought about it for 3 full days before accepting the new role.
Upside - I won't be spending my life in airport waiting lounges; I will be handling a team of 8 managers; Opportunity for turning around Mumbai metro; Young, fresh team.
Downside - Mumbai metro is in a mess; Veterans in team have quit; no marketing role till 2009 end.
So I'm back in sales!! And this is pretty much what I'm going to write about my job, for a long time to come.
Next post - Experiences in SE Asia.
