This Women’s day, MediaNews4U.Com is acknowledging women leaders of the Media, Marketing, Broadcast and Advertising fraternity who have given more than expected.
BrainGymJr is a first-of-its-kind child development initiative that enables application and problem solving for children. Conceptualized by Vidur Garg, BrainGymJr aides customized facilitation to build a strong foundation of logic, reasoning and critical thinking for children. This is done through an online subscription of daily exercises based on Mathematics, English and Real-world Skills with customized levels of difficulty. Children get a host of fun and engaging formats, unlimited practice questions and rewards for regular practice.
In this segment Sonia Notani – Co-Founder BrainGymJr shares her experience of becoming an entrepreneur and breaking the gender stereotypes and how she continues to inspire many other women who are true leaders in the making.
Journey
Exhilarating! A person’s journey is an outcome of the choices we make – be it job roles, co-workers, brands, industry etc. I have been blessed by opportunity; most of which I have grasped.
Born & brought up in a small business, joint family in Mumbai; one of the first critical & best decisions of my life was to attend St Xavier’s college. It was a whole new world with exceptionally talented people pursuing myriad hobbies. It is here that I knew I am ambitious & that I wanted to make a difference. In order to truly make a difference; one has to gain relevance. I went on to pursue my MBA at NMIMS, Mumbai and took up my first job at Aditya Birla Group. Post this I went on to gain experience at Citibank, Reliance Life, KPMG Advisory.
At this juncture, I believe I made the second critical & somewhat risky decision that went on to change my career trajectory. I chose to move from well-known brands & consulting to join a Life Insurance company that was yet to file & receive its licenses. As founder member; I joined what was known as the project team at an ‘insurancejvco’ (our email id read [email protected]!). This ‘risk’ paid off. I learned, contributed and grew with what is now India First Life Insurance. I got a management seat at age 28 and undertook a range of responsibilities over 12.5 years – ranging from Strategy & Product Development to D2C Sales, Channel development, Branch operations, Marketing, Communications, & Customer Experience to name a few. Holding CXO positions from 2016; I participated in a stake sale of the founding partner L&G UK to leading PE fund, Warburg Pincus.
In this period, I was recognized under the Fortune India ‘40 under 40’ list as well as amongst the Super 30 CMOs in India by IAMAI and by Assocham as Woman Leader in Insurance. I stay eternally grateful for the exposure, on-the-job training, long rope for experiments and utmost trust placed with me through the 12+ years at India First Life.
At this stage, I made the third critical & risky decision of my life. I was at the pinnacle of my career in a 3500+ people company; where I was amongst the top 5-6 people in the Leadership team. Just as I approached my 40th birthday, I decided to bet on myself. It was time to make the difference I dreamed off. I stepped down from India First Life & co-founded BrainGymJr; with an ambition to teach children ‘how’ to think through application and problem solving.
We pitched an ‘idea’ to make children future ready and got angel investors backing us in July 2021. Armed with 10 amazing supporters; we launched a fully automated ed-tech portal, BrainGymJr.com, offering a subscription of customized educational games delivered daily in fun formats for kids between 5-11 years.
In the last 5 months, we have launched our own BrainGymJr App on Android & iOS, listed on Amazon, integrated with Paytm mini-apps and also tied up with St Augustine’s day school, VISA cards, Axis Bank Cards, Bank of Baroda Card, Qwikcilver, SBI rewardz etc amongst others. We have crossed 15k downloads with 13Cr+ points scored and have users from India, UAE, US, UK, Canada, Australia, Singapore, South Africa etc.
We endeavour to be easily accessible & very affordable to every parent and child across the globe with a device & internet.
I have started on my path of making a difference by offering parents & children something that is socially beneficial & commercially viable. The journey so far has been exhilarating & only promises to be more so with a long road ahead.
Inspiration & Inspiring the team
I am inspired daily. Different people have qualities, traits, habits – that you can definitely learn from. A few also teach you what you don’t want to see in yourself.
A few traits & people who have inspired me are:
- Initiative & Passion – I am inspired by all those who took the initiative & had the passion to see it through – whether their own venture or in a job. A long-standing example for me is Richard Branson of Virgin.
- Persistence & Perseverance – Literally every woman in a leadership position would not have made it without these traits. Even if your own support system & management is fantastic; you are continuously up against odds of social trappings where people assume for you. My respect for Indra Nooyi to Naina Lal Kidwai stands strong.
- Moderation & Consistency – You need to be able to stay strong & stay on – daily traits of staying fit, balancing demands & ensuring consistent inputs are extremely underrated. My mother has been an early inspiration for me on this front!
It is important to view every interaction as an opportunity to learn something from. I believe a good leader enables and celebrates initiative & passion while being a gatekeeper. This includes direction & outcome orientation with minimum micro management.
Empowering Women
The first and foremost step is women need to believe in themselves. God helps those who help themselves! A few key aspects I try and drive amongst the eco-system as well as the women members of the team are:
- Women need flexibility, not concession – Organizational goals & outcomes need to be met. You need to deliver on committed tasks just as much as any other employee. If you have a personal priority that needs attention, ask for flexibility of space or time, but ensure outcome.
- Wear ambition on your sleeve – Nobody will believe in you if they don’t know you, your interest, your ambition. Women, more than anyone else, need to state their participation upfront – be it a project or a promotion. Never let anyone second guess for you.
- Ask for Help – Women often don’t reach out for support from family & friends – be it child rearing or play dates. Also, prioritization of responsibilities is important. We cannot do everything and that is absolutely fine. For example, being a working mother, we have to let go of probably cooking in order to fit in a project deadline & a school PTA. Enlist family, hire help and outsource tasks!
While on one end I encourage all women members of my team to follow the above tenets; as a woman leader I also drive the organization to appreciate & respect flexibility, accept & reward ambitious women without double guessing, stay sensitive to not falling prey to gender roles in the work place! It takes two to tango – only then will we have real empowerment and professional workplace participation by women!
