“The Most Powerfull Lady In the World.”

India has a long history where women’s have shown that they are not only the homemaker, however, with their sheer strengths and courage, they have ruled over India from the Medieval History period of India take the example of Razia Sultan, then Rani Laxmi Bai, then Sarojini Naidu, then Indra Gandhi, then Ashiwarya Rai and latest entrant in the block is the Indra Nooyi, a superwomen, who has been placed 4th in the list of worlds topmost influential women’s by the Forbes Magazine.

Indra Krishnamurthy Nooyi is her full name and she belongs to the Southern Indian city of Chennai. She was born in 28 October 1955 in Madras, now Chennai. She has done her graduation from Madras Christian College (MCC) in Chemistry, Physics and Math. On completion of her graduation she went to Indian Institute of Management in Calcutta for doing Masters in Finance and Marketing. Soon after completion of her MBA she joined ABB and then Johnson and Johnson (J&J) in Mumbai. One of her achievement with J&J is her close association with launch of the sanitary napkin “Stayfree”. From there she has been no stopping her life.

While growing up with her sister, Indra Nooyi's mother encouraged them to deliver a speech on every night about what they wanted to be. After the speech the winner would get a piece of chocolate. This activity installed confidence and ambition in these little hearts, which helped them to pursue greater heights in the later parts of their life

Joined Rock Band

In an era in India where it was considered unseemly for young women to exert themselves, she joined an all-girls' cricket team. She even played guitar in an all-female rock band while studying at Madras Christian College. After earning her undergraduate degree in chemistry, physics, and math, she went on to enroll in the Indian Institute of Management in Calcutta. At the time, it was one of just two schools in the country that offered a master's in business administration degree, or M.B.A.

Nooyi's first job after earning her degree was with Tootal, a British textile company. It had had been founded in Manchester, England, in 1799, but had extensive holdings in India. After that, Nooyi was hired as a brand manager at the Bombay offices of Johnson & Johnson, the personal-care products maker. She was given the Stayfree account, which might have proved a major challenge for even an experienced marketing executive. The line had just been introduced on the market in India, and struggled to create an identity with its target customers. "It was a fascinating experience because you couldn't advertise personal protection in India," she recalled in an interview with the Financial Times 's Sarah Murray.

Nooyi began to feel that perhaps she was underprepared for the business world. Determined to study in the United States, she applied to and was accepted by Yale University's Graduate School of Management in New Haven, Connecticut. Much to her surprise, her parents agreed to let her move to America. The year was 1978. "It was unheard of for a good, conservative, south Indian Brahmin girl to do this," she explained to Murray in the Financial Times. "It would make her an absolutely unmarriageable commodity after that."

"Behind my cool logic lies a very emotional person."

Could Not Afford Suit

Nooyi quickly settled into her new life, but struggled to make ends meet over the next two years. Though she received financial aid from Yale, she also had to work as an overnight receptionist to make ends meet. "My whole summer job was done in a sari because I had no money to buy clothes," she told Murray. Even when she went for an interview at the prestigious business-consulting firms that hired business-school students, she wore her sari, since she could not afford a business suit. Recalling that the Graduate School of Management required all first-year students to take—and pass—a course in effective communications, she said in the Financial Times interview that what she learned in it "was invaluable for someone who came from a culture where communication wasn't perhaps the most important aspect of business at least in my time."

Indra’s Personal Life and Diffiulties to handle……………….

Despite her busy schedules Indra Nooyi has managed to balance equally central responsibility as a mother and a wife. She still follows the traditional practice at home be it the practice of taking off shoes before entering the Puja room or any other simple Indian beliefs and practice. She attends PepsiCo board meetings in a sari, for she believes the corporate world appreciates people who are genuine. She has an ability to blend high-powered career with a family and her Hindu heritage. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Farifax County, Connecticut.

To this day Indra Nooyi banks on the true values of life that had been imbibed in her from her childhood. The most successful businesswoman in the world marks her identity with her tradition, unfeigned demeanour , perserverance and hard work.

Is it tough being a mother and a corporate executive? Nooyi admits it is difficult, You can walk away from the fact that you are a corporate executive, but you cant walk away from the fact that you are a mom. In terms of being a mother and a corporate executive, the role of mom comes first. a She believes that her husband has been a great source of strength for her. Adds Nooyi on a perkier tone, a always pick the right husband. I have a fantastically supportive husband. a What sees her through tough times? My family and my belief in God. If all else fails, I call my mother in India when she as there and wake her up in the middle of the night and she listens to me. And she probably promises God a visit to Tirupati! Nooyi has always seen the world through the prism of her mother as faith and beliefs and calls her the guiding light in her life.

While most of her personal anecdotes are obviously premeditated to humanise her, she refuses to be drawn on more private details, such as her daughter’s resentment at her focusing more on career than on being a mother. Nooyi speaks of her own mother frequently – incredibly, she had

to ask her permission before taking the CEO job at PepsiCo – and hints of resentment crop up there, too, but only fleetingly. She knows that however hard her mother has been on her, it is all out of a desire for her daughter to be the best she can possibly be. Perhaps she introspects about her own failings in private so she can present herself as a well-rounded leader in public… though where she would find the time to do so in-between meetings, flights and her beloved Yankees is a mystery.

Sometimes there were rumors of tension between Nooyi and Reinemund, but they maintained that constructive tension was essential to the functioning of a healthy organization, and PepsiCo's strong balance sheets seemed to support the contention. Between 2001 and 2006, PepsiCo's annual revenue increased from $24 billion to $33 billion, and in 2006 its total market capitalization (the value of a company's outstanding stock shares) passed that of longtime market leader Coca-Cola. Part of that growth came from international operations, which were placed under their own PepsiCo International umbrella in 2003. Some of the credit went to Nooyi. "Steve and I have worked closely for the past five years on everything related to PepsiCo," she told Deutsch, "from long-term strategy to day-to-day business. We complete each other's sentences." Despite their contrasting styles, the combination of Nooyi's planning expertise and Reinemund's operational focus was a powerful one.

How nooyi became nooyi………….

Starting off with Boston Consulting Group in 1980, she knew it would be harder work for her than others for two reasons - one, she was a

woman and two, she wasn’t an American but an outsider. She spent six years directing international corporate strategy projects at the Boston Consulting Group. Her clients ranged from textiles and consumer goods companies to retailers and specialty chemicals producers. Six years later, she

joined Motorola in 1986 as the vice-president and director of corporate strategy & planning. She moved to Asea Brown Boveri in 1990 and spent four years as vice president (corporate strategy & planning). She was part of the top management team responsible for the company U.S. business as well as its worldwide industrial businesses, generating about one-third of ABB $30 billion in global sales.

An interesting tale surrounds her joining PepsiCo in 1994. At that time she also had an offer from General Electric, one of the world’s best run companies under Jack Welch. The Pepsi CEO Wayne Callloway, in a bid to lure her, told her, Jack Welch is the best CEO I know, and GE is probably the finest company. But I have a need for someone like you, and I would make PepsiCo a special place for you. And Nooyi agreed.

She broke the glass ceiling when she was appointed senior vice president, corporate strategy and development after joining PepsiCo in 1994 but she knew that getting there was one thing while staying there was another. As she says, If you want to reach the top of a company, I agree that it can only happen in the United States, but you have to start off saying that you have got to work twice as hard as your (male) counterparts. Not only did she work harder than her counterparts, she also made her way up the ladder to become President and Chief Financial Officer of PepsiCo, and was also appointed as a member of board of directors of PepsiCo Inc - which she assumed in 2001.

Nooyi was 44 when she joined PepsiCo. Ever since, she has been involved in every major strategic decision the company has made in the last few years. That includes the drive to spin off PepsiCo fast food chain in 1997, acquiring Tropicana in 1998, and the US$ 13 billion move to acquire Quaker Oats. PepsiCo chief Roger Enrico announced her elevation following the Quaker acquisition saying, Indra’s contributions to PepsiCo have been enormous and she will make a great President. In addition to her new role as President and CFO, Indra will also be nominated for election to the Pepsi board. She is a terrific addition to our world-class board and her perspective will be invaluable.

Indra attributes a lot of Pepsi success to its great employees. She believes that a company remains great when there is a strong competitor, like Coke. She believes if you have no competition, a company will atrophy. Nooyi has a unique formula that keeps her work-life balance. She feels that you must have an extended family at work to give you that balance. To keep a company running at top speed, you need to attract the best employees.

At PepsiCo she has ensured that employees actually balance life and work. She views PepsiCo as an extended family and everybody at the company is there to help in every way possible. Sometime ago, when Indra was traveling, her daughter would call the office to ask for permission to play Nintendo. The receptionist would know the routine and ask: Have you finished your homework? Have you had your snack? OK, you can play Nintendo for half an hour. She then left a voice message for Indra saying a gave Tara permission to play Nintendo. Unheard of in most corporations, it as a team Indra has built up at PepsiCo which knows each other so well.

Despite the monumental successes of her career, Indra Nooyi remains a quintessentially Indian woman who has combined the high-octane energy of her job with the calm, collected demeanour required to manage the equally central responsibility of a mother and a wife. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Fairfax county, Connecticut. If you ever visit her Connecticut home, do remember to take your shoes off before entering. If you forget,

atleast remember to take them off before entering the large puja room where a diya is lit and the inviting air of incense greets you. She keeps an image of Ganesha in her office, and in fact, some PepsiCo officials visited India and received similar images besides being told of the Hindu belief about Ganesh being the symbols of auspicious beginnings. Many of them now keep images of Ganesh in their offices! Nooyi attends PepsiCo board meetings in a sari; for she believes the corporate world appreciates people who are genuine.

What is perhaps most inspiring about Nooyi is the seamless melding of cultures she brings to work. As Americans are implored to become more family-oriented, for Nooyi, this is a constant fact of life. Example: from the start of Nooyi’s tenure at the head of PepsiCo, she wrote personal notes every quarter to the spouses of her executives, but still felt she wasn’t doing enough to forge the bonds of a ‘PepsiCo family’. After a trip back to India, she was reminded that in the Indian family, you are always your parents’ children; she realised that her executives were all kids once, too, and decided to start writing to their parents every quarter as well – something an American CEO would never dream of. The response, in Nooyi’s words, was “huge”.

Supervised Quaker Oats Merger

When Enrico retired due to ill health, Nooyi found herself with a new boss, CEO Steve Reinemund. The two implemented an even bigger deal, a joining of Pepsi with the venerable Quaker Oats Company that was variously described as a takeover and a merger. The details of the negotiations were mostly handled by Nooyi. The fusion of the two companies was a difficult process, but once again Nooyi's instincts were vindicated, as PepsiCo posted strong growth in the early 2000s, even as Coke sales were stagnant. The deal gave PepsiCo ownership of Gatorade, the top-selling American sports drink.

Reinemund and Nooyi were portrayed in business circles as something of a corporate odd couple. Reinemund, a former U.S. Marine, was the classic buttoned-down executive, but Nooyi was less conventional in her saris or long scarves. Sometimes she went barefoot at the office. Nooyi, whose aunt was a noted Indian vocalist, said that she had music running through her head constantly, and she sometimes hummed during tense business meetings. "She has a sort of guileless, unencumbered quality," Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts president Gordon J. Davis told Business Week . "She'll say something almost naïve, very personal and romantic in a sense, but totally truthful." Spontaneous and often humorous, Nooyi had a brush with controversy after a Columbia University commencement speech in which she likened the five continents and their economic functions to the thumb and four fingers of the hand, with North America as the middle finger (she denied any unpatriotic intent, contending that her remarks had been taken out of context and misconstrued).

Indra Nooyi's Achievments Ranked third on the 2008 and 2009 list of The World's 100 Most

Powerful Women by Forbes magazine. Fortune magazine has named Nooyi number one on its annual

ranking of Most Powerful Women in business for 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009.

2007: Chosen as a recipient of the Padma Bhushan award by the Government of India.

2008: Named one of America's Best Leaders by U.S. News & World Report.

2008: Elected to the Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

2008: Elected Chairman of the US-India Business Council (USIBC)

2009: Named 2009 CEO of the Year by Global Supply Chain Leaders Group.

Indra Nooyi

“The Iron Woman of Pepisco”