I Diversify My Investments And It's My Decision Where To Park My Money Which Is Done Very Wisely With Help From My Financial Advisor.

Ritu Grover (The Global HelpDesk) - With a substantial experience in the area of administrative outsourcing solutions, Ritu Grover started ‘The Global HelpDesk’ 19 years ago to provide programmes and lifestyle management solutions to corporate houses. Translating her idea into reality, she built this empire and today she successfully provides services to more than 400 top multinationals and companies across India. 

Tell us about the journey that you have travelled so far ?

Starting from the beginning, I studied Interior designing along with pursuing graduation in arts from Delhi University followed by specialised Interior architectural courses from USA and Australia. After specialization, I came back and started doing Interior designing projects and running my organisation specializing in turnkey projects which is successfully running till today. I started with doing residential projects for 5 years moving on to executing corporate turnkey interiors with the advent of the corporates in Gurgaon for the next five years before diversifying into facility management. 

We have executed residential projects for large industrialist houses and even done lots of hotels for ITDC and ITC group. In the year 1997, I have also had the honour of having tea with Queen Elizabeth after successfully renovating the British Council Division in 1997 which is at Kasturba Gandhi Marg, Delhi. 

In 1996 , I got married and in 1998 , I had my daughter but I continued doing Corporate Interiors. Interiors is a profession with tight timelines and especially last month of the project is very tight. Twenty – four hours , your team has to be on site including your engineers , architects and you yourself. Moreover, couple of projects are going on at the same time , couple of projects are ending at the same time , so , the pressure is at its peak. At the top of it, I was married with a daughter due to which lot of responsibilities were piling up. There were  times when I used to leave for home at 12 midnight. 

Although , my family supported me completely but everything else was on a spin as I was unable to give any quality time to my family and friends , utility bills remained on a backfoot, cars not getting serviced for months, etc. and I wondered that there would be many more like me in the same boat, desperately trying to balance it out  So, the birth of an idea that everybody needed somebody who could assist them took place and that was 'THE GLOBAL HELPDESK'.

I wanted to give assistance to the busy professionals to balance their work life so that they could bring in more productivity in their daily work as well lead a balanced work life . But it was just a thought and when you are busy, these thoughts actually don't take shape. In order to implement my thoughts, I hired two marketing boys, designed and gave them a few leaflets and told them to go to corporates and give them this leaflet in exchange for their card. This process of leaflet marketing was slow and took me about two years to crack my first client.

One day, I got a call from TATA Consultancy Services and they said that they wanted to meet me regarding an interesting leaflet that they have received. This was a time when TATA Consultancy was growing and their campuses were coming up in Noida. Noida was hardly developed at that time and it was tough to send employees that far and the concept of providing them basic employee benefit initiatives like concierge services would do the trick.

So, we started with 15-20 essential services for working professionals such as grocery shopping, paying utility bills, train and air tickets, attending to repairs etc. TATA Consultancy gave us two months to prove ourselves as a valued partner and we proved ourselves to their satisfaction that till today after 19 years they are the most valued client that we have in our galaxy. Our next client was McKinsey then Pepsi , Wipro – and the rest is history. Today TGH ( The Global Helpdesk ) is operational in 8 metro cities across India employing more than 400 employees and providing a gamut of services to over 350 corporate houses. All the business verticals are backed with the latest technology platforms.

 

What obstacles have you faced in your journey ?

My biggest obstacle was to educate our clients regarding the necessity of outsourcing all their business support services. They were used to a certain way of managing everything themselves. I am talking of 1990 when there was no internet and I was telling the companies to optimise. I was telling them to outsource which is a very recent concept.

For example : AMEX  has been our client for the last 12 years, but when I first went to AMEX with my business proposal,  I was told that “why should we take your services as we pay our employees a lot and they have to find time for themselves. We also give them 2 days off in a week.” Today all offices of AMEX are taken care by my team.

So, my obstacle was to educate them and tell them to outsource so that their employees could bring in more productivity and balance their worklife.

 

Now , since you have talked about your journey , we would like to know from you if it is important for women to have financial awareness and build a financially aware community ?

 

Yes, women must have financial education and should be financially independent  so that they can take wise decisions and do not have to depend on any body in case of any uncertainties of life.

 

I am completely aware about my investments which have been planned out very strategically, keeping my goals in mind .

 

What advice do you have for young entrepreneurs as to how can they go about in order to gain knowledge about finances and be successful ?

According to me one can follow the below mentioned aspects to achieve financial knowledge :

1) Develop a little bit of interest in how to multiply your earnings.

2) Spend some time with your CA for the knowledge sake.

3) Question him as to where is he investing your money.

4) Turn uncertainities into your strong point , do not fear from them.

5) Financial goal setting is a must.

6) A part of your earning must be invested on a monthly basis.

"I diversify my investments and it's my decision where to park my money which is done very wisely with help from my Financial Advisor.”

 

SUCCESS MANTRA 

My success mantra given to me by my mother is that one should 'Never Look Back' and “Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible.”