TALKING

In my opinion , the only role of a manager is to hire great people and grow them , so the biggest satisfaction is seeing your team members advance into big roles . I ’ ve been leading teams for about 15 years and many of my former direct reports now hold senior leadership positions in companies like Google and Microsoft . Feeling that I played a positive part in their early career journeys makes me proud – it ’ s a small feather in the cap .

How did you first get into technology ?

Growing up in India in the late 90s , we heard a lot about this big thing called the Y2K bug . It was a very hot topic – people were saying how the world could come to an end if we didn ’ t fix it . My interest was piqued and I started reading about it . That got me interested in technology . I was about to enrol in an MBA and I decided to specialize in IT and marketing . That led to me learning how to program and code – and then that was the end of my plans to become a chartered accountant !

What style of management philosophy have you adopted ?

The servant leadership management philosophy really resonates with me . If your focus is on hiring and nurturing top talent , you don ’ t want to get too embroiled in the day to day stuff . I leave it to my team to complete their tasks and deliver their goals , and my job is to remove the roadblocks . It ’ s a modus operandi that requires you to be open and transparent and to share the values that drive you – mine are people , passion , purpose and positivity .

What has your technological focus been in recent times ?

For the last couple of years , it ’ s been Digital Transformation . Before Covid , I spent a lot of my time with customers and prospects convincing them of its importance . Then along came the virus and people realized it was the only way they could survive ! At ActiveCampaign , our piece of the puzzle is customer experience automation – helping businesses digitize

their operations so they can scale across market segments and geographies .

Do you have a way of turning negative experiences into positives ?

There ’ s no two ways about it , I ’ ve made plenty of

mistakes in my career . On the upside , those failure points were good learning opportunities . Experience really is the best teacher , even if the lessons are less than enjoyable at the time . And I ’ ve certainly never had any regrets about giving the bean counting beat a swerve – I would have made a terrible accountant !

What do you identify as the major areas of investment in your industry ?

For us , it ’ s all about creating a ‘ segment of one ’. Gone are the days when businesses could create a buyer persona and say , ‘ this is the typical customer for our business ’. We ’ re moving towards a world where every person and prospect is a segment of their own and to service customers in that way , organizations need to be able to automate at scale . It ’ s easy when you have just 10 customers but with 10,000 or 100,000 , not so much . That ’ s where we see a lot of time and money being spent .

Shahid Nizami , Regional Vice President , APAC and Japan , ActiveCampaign

Outside the office is a kind of fuzzy term now , with most people working from home !

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