John Kuruvilla

John Kuruvilla: I have worked in over 20 companies but there was none who could run John even close on sheer class and managerial ability; he had the kind of personality self-help authors would approve enthusiastically. I first met him in June, 1994 while awaiting him for a job interview and he saw me an hour later. He was profusely apologetic and attributed it to a sudden client meeting.

The written test was even more foreboding but at the end, I heard John’s sonorous voice on the phone,” I am going to make you a job offer. You will start at a 4 K package and is it okay? Then come and meet us in the evening”.

John explained,” From the test you have some potential but a long way to go. You will be working with the best advertising talent in the city and not many people have survived the 6 month hurdle. So, help you God”.        

The office was in Lavelle Road, that runs left of the famed Richmond circle and it is a two-storey building. All the cabins were in grey decolam sheets with a red horizontal life, the office looked a MNC. Behind the receptionist stood a tall painting of J Walter Thompson in a grey beard, sailor uniform, and a cigar. John had a separate room for himself and from where he ruled the office with an iron fist.

John was only 32 and already a Vice-President of a large advertising firm. He was nearly 6’ in height though stout for a healthy buffalo look, dark complexion, short hairs, square face, and a very prominent mustache. When he spoke, it was almost studio quality loud. I have never seen a person generate this kind of charisma before even at a glance. He looks a military commander out to inspect a parade in an office setting.

Contract was the ideal office I have worked; one cannot talk loudly on the phone and disturb others in the vicinity, a telephone etiquette I have not found elsewhere. Two, one cannot read newspapers and magazine – as an agency they get every possible trash – during office hours except the lunch hour. At the register, one has to log out the “in” and “out” time. As a client executive, you cannot brief creative unless the T-plan was approved by the reporting head; the creative team must visit retail outlets with a camera in tow once a month. Contract was so full of rules but that showed a kind of professional excellence I have not seen hence in other places.  

John would come in his Gypsy (that vehicle suited his huge figure to a T) at 8’0clock to the office and be the last to go at 7 or 8 in the evening. John used me for those consumer surveys and I can claim to have walked every bye lane of commercial Bangalore. He would command,” Sathya, draft a questionnaire for a perceptual study of HMT watches”. I would report back within half-an-hour and even with brief glance at the printout, he would squeeze it to a ball and throw it into a bin. “Try again and this time more slowly,” I would retreat much chastened. I would consult other colleagues, dust off books from college days, call up friends and come up with a better effort. Then John would scrutinize,” For this objective, why this question?” You were left in doubt that you were in the midst of a master. John even explained,” I am not a singer, dancer, athlete, painter, broker anything in life. I am an advertising person and let me be the best in the city”.

This passion for excellence had rubbed to every member of the team; Saurabh was the best account executive in town, Sudhir the best account planner, Ganesh Shenoy the best media planner, Swami was making waves in direct marketing, Amit Kumar the production guy, and Nishad a good hand at copy.   In my 25 years of work experience, never has a team with such skills and expertise gather in one place. You could see sparks of brilliance in the air. We could have sent a man to a moon with such attitudes and discipline.

Most of the senior executives lectured at IIMs or other management colleges as visiting faculties and  it was the only time I saw “advertising” to be intellectually stimulating. I just worked there for 3 months but those were the most memorable part of my work-life.

As for me I was a wild rough diamond that John and his team polished me for life. The three months stint in Contract, Bangalore got me so drilled in the “Thompson way and the T-plan” that you wake me up in midnight and I’ll hold a seminar on Single-minded proposition, target audience, brand image and brand positioning and all that crap.

Post Script (2017): John did correspond to my blogs and I even mailed across my “Darling India”. I follow him on Facebook and he still has that magnetic presence about him. On the career front, he ventured into new territories like startups. As a marketing man, there was simply no one quite like him. He steels himself to a goal and spares no effort in accomplishing them and what’s more he usually succeeds.

Verdict: Sattvic

Lessons to be learnt:  One in a million professional; make for good friends and learning