Berbekal etos kerja dan tim yang tepat, Madhusudan Gopalan sukses membangun fondasi pertumbuhan bisnis Procter & Gamble di Indonesia.
TUMBUH di lingkungan keluarga yang menjunjung tinggi pentingnya kerja keras, Madhusudan Gopalan menyaksikan orang tua dan pamannya membanting tulang mengelola pabrik. Nilai itu meresap ke dalam benak pria kelahiran India ini dan menjadi bekal baginya dalam menahkodai P&G di tanah air.
“Tiada jalan pintas. Mau sukses? Harus kerja keras,” tegasnya pada tim Warta Ekonomi di kantor P&G, Sentral Senayan III, Jakarta pada Rabu siang, 14 Maret 2018.
Rekam jejaknya di industri FMCG meyakinkan. Ia berkarier sejak 1999 di P&G, melanglangbuana dari India, AS hingga kawasan Asean. Di bawah kepemimpinannya, laju bisnis P&G di segmen consumer goods terus melesat.
PERSEPSI SUKSES
Nilai lainnya yang ia pelajari saat kecil ialah pentingnya pertumbuhan bersama dalam sebuah kelompok. ”Prestasi pribadi penting tetapi tidak berarti apa-apa bila tidak memberikan faedah bagi orang lain,” tuturnya.
Hal ini jugalah yang ia temukan pada masyarakat Indonesia tempatnya berkarya. Selama sewindu di nusantara, ia belajar mengenai solidaritas dari para rekan lokalnya. “Bagi orang Indonesia, sukses berarti keberhasilan individual dan komunal,” ucapnya. Karena itu, dirinya bangga bila dapat menyaksikan anggota timnya berkembang dari bawah hingga mencapai puncak potensi mereka.
TIM TEPAT
Indonesia ialah salah satu pasar yang penting dalam karier sang CEO. Ia bangga dengan pemberdayaan timnya yang berbekal SDM lokal. Dan mereka juga diberikan kesempatan berkarier di luar negeri. Raihan lain ialah kesetaraan gender. “Sebagai buktinya,” ucap Madhu, “50% manajer disini dan hampir 40% teknisi di P&G Indonesia ialah perempuan.”
Prestasinya itu berkat gaya kepemimpinannya yang menekankan pentingnya tim yang tepat. “Dengan adanya tim yang tepat, bersemangat tinggi dan kompeten, bekerja terasa lebih mudah,” ungkapnya. Agar tim bekerja maksimal, P&G membuat kebijakan yang mengedepankan kesetaraan, keterbukaan dan fleksibilitas. Kebijakan bekerja di rumah, misalnya, ternyata membuat karyawan lebih produktif.
Berkat tim yang tepat, Madhu sukses dirikan pabrik manufaktur bernilai investasi jutaan dollar AS. “Ini sumbangsih kami pada Indonesia,” ujar alumni Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, itu.
LITBANG SEBAGAI KUNCI
Madhu bersuka cita dengan perkembangan iklim bisnis yang makin kondusif. Bila dulu regulasi kerap jadi sumber kecemasannya, dalam 3 tahun ini ia mengaku ada banyak kemajuan.
Selain itu, ada banyak alasan bagi Madhu untuk optimis. Terutama karena Indonesia ialah jenis pasar langka; skalanya besar dan tingkat pertumbuhannya tinggi. “Karenanya Indonesia menjadi pasar fokus P&G,” tandasnya.
Dengan Litbang yang kuat, Madhu meramu pengalaman globalnya dengan perspektif lokal untuk merebut pasar. Produk-produk P&G pun laris manis karena mampu memecahkan masalah khas konsumen Indonesia.
Kini ia berhasil membangun landasan kokoh untuk P&G di sini. “Inovasi akan terus muncul. Kami juga akan mengekspor ke pasar LN,” pungkasnya.
“Kepindahan ke Indonesia ialah momen yang bermakna besar bagi keluarga kecil kami.”
DEMIKIAN tutur ayah dari dua anak laki-laki yang kini tinggal bersamanya di Jakarta.
Saat itu menjadi istimewa karena bertepatan dengan ultah kedua anak sulungnya. “Di antara kata-kata yang anak saya bisa ucapkan saat itu ada juga kata-kata bahasa Indonesia,” terangnya bangga. Tak lama setelah itu, anak keduanya juga lahir di sini. Tak heran Indonesia baginya sudah mirip rumah kedua.
Yang unik, Madhu waktu kecil tidak pernah bercita-cita menjadi CEO. Justru saat ia sudah dewasa dan banyak membaca majalah bisnis koleksi pamannya, ia baru berpikir ‘kerennya’ jabatan CEO. “Saya pikir para CEO yang memakai jas dan dasi di sampul majalah itu sungguh cerdas dan mengesankan. Merekalah orang-orang yang membuat dampak besar bagi hidup banyak orang.” Karenanya, begitu lulus dari Teknik Mesin, ia mendaftar kuliah MBA agar bisa bekerja di perusahaan multinasional dan meniti karier sebagai pebisnis top.
Bila tak sedang berlari pagi dan bersama keluarga, saat senggang penggemar aktivitas melancong ini memilih melahap buku-buku bertema kepemimpinan bisnis dan peningkatan kualitas diri. “Satu buku yang saya selalu tidak bosan untuk baca lagi dan lagi yaitu ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ tulisan Dale Carnegie,” pungkasnya. (*/)
VERSI BAHASA INGGRIS
Madhusudan Gopalan: Maju Bersama di Pasar Istimewa
Equipped with work ethics and an apt team, Madhusudan Gopalan succeeds to build the base of Procter & Gamble’s business growth in Indonesia.
HAVING been raised in a family that prioritizes the significance of hard work, Madhusudan Gopalan witnessed his parents and uncle worked hard managing their factory. That seeped into the very soul of the 42-year-old Indian man, serving as his provision for leading P&G operations in Indonesia.
“There’s no shortcut. If you want to succeed, work hard for it,” he told Warta Ekonomi team at the office of P&G, Sentral Senayan III, Jakarta in Wednesday afternoon, on March 14, 2018.
His track record in the FMCG industry is cogent. He has climbed up the career ladder at P&G since 1999, moving from India to the USA and Asean countries. Under his leadership, P&G accelerates its growth in the home products segment.
SUCCESS PERCEPTION
Another key value he learned during childhood is the importance of growing together in a group. “Individual achievements matter but it means nothing if it does not benefits others,” he asserted.
The CEO also found this in Indonesian people where he works. For eight years, he has learned solidarity from his local coworkers. “To Indonesians, success encapsulates one of individual and community,” he said. Thus, he takes pride in seeing his team members growing from the base to the top of the career ladder.
THE RIGHT TEAM
Indonesia is one of the key markets in his career. He is proud of the local team empowerment. And they are also given overseas career opportunities. Another attainment is gender equality. “As evidence,” he said,”50% of the managers and close to 40% of our technicians are women.”
These accomplishments came true thanks to his leadership style emphasizing on the significance of building a right team. “With a right, motivated and capable team, working is much easier,” he remarked. To get maximum results, P&G adopted policies encouraging equality, transparency and flexibility. The work-at-home policy, for instance, enables employees to enhance productivity.
Kudos to his right team, Madhu succeeded to build manufacturing factories worth milllions of US dollars investment. “It’s our contribution to the nation,” the alumni from Indian Instute of Technology, Calcutta, explained.
R&D AS KEY
Madhu is pleased to learn the increasingly favorable business climate in the country. Three years ago regulations used to be his primary source of concern yet in these last few years he has seen much improvement.
Besides that, there are many reasons why he is optimistic. One of them is because Indonesia is a rare type of market; its size is big and the growth rate is swift. “That’s why Indonesia is our focus market,” he claimed.
To win local customers’ heart, he mixes global experience with local insights by means of strong R&D. P&G products sell very well as they manage to solve Indonesian consumers’ problems.
Now his leadership has built a solid foundation of R&D here. “More innovations are expected to keep coming. We’ll also export our products to other markets,” he ended.
“Moving to Indonesia was a big move for my family.”
THAT is what the father of two sons stated. Both are now living with him in Jakarta.
Their move to Jakarta marked a key life event as it was on his first-born son’s second birthday. “Among his first vocabulary was some Indonesian words,” he remembered proudly. Soon after that, his second son was born. It was no wonder Indonesia is like his second home.
What is unique, in retrospect little Madhu never set his ambition of becoming a CEO. He realized how cool it would be to work as a CEO after being an adult, having read business magazines his uncle bought. “I thought those CEOs wearing suits and ties on magazine covers are smart and impressive. They are people making big impact on others’ lives.” Hence, once he graduated from the undergraduate program on Mechanical Engineering, he signed up for an MBA so he would qualify to work at a multinational company and work his way up to the top.
If he is not running or having a good time with his family, Madhu who likes traveling prefers reading books on leadership and self-improvement. “One book I’ll never get bored reading again and again is ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ by Dale Carnegie,” he noted. (*/)
