Indie-Publishing: The Next Big Thing?
Bhavini Mehta, Founder and CEO at Infinity Business Solutions & is a first generation entrepreneur who believes in empowering and lifting people around her. She started her career at a very young age tasting the corporate culture, soon to realise that she was not made for it. A serial entrepreneur, Bhavini has founded multiple businesses including a loan channel partner company with HDFC Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank. Her current venture, Infinity Business Solutions is a shared services company serving clients across the UK, US, Australia, Canada and India. She has recently founded a self-publishing company – Publishbook.me.
A firm believer of women can achieve all that a man can and much more, Mehta feels, there exists a difficult phase in every woman’s professional life when she decides to plan a family. Bhavini faced it herself too and that acted as a motivating factor for her to create a workspace that is conducive to all the women in that special phase of their lives. Her business focuses on employing work from home mothers and women students who need support in their further studies. “There is opportunity for everyone, you must be vigilant to grab those” is her mantra for life and her advice for all. Excerpts.
I like being a CEO because....
I enjoy my role since it gives me a lot of freedom to toil with my ideas and follow my intuitions and gut, without having to worry about justifying my actions because more often than not, my decisions are based on what my heart says and then I work on the numbers to justify my decision in my mind.
Any Aha! Leadership moment in your professional career.
This was at a conference where I was presenting about Infinity Business Solutions and Publishbook.me. These are completely lateral organisations, where people are free to work from home or anywhere else and are also free to move across departments to learn and work on different projects. I just mentioned it casually as a matter of fact because it was an everyday thing for me, but the audience recognised the power of freedom at work and as soon as I was done presenting, I had people flooding in to ask for my business card and wanting to know more. This gave me a sense of pride along with great responsibility towards everyone around me.
Any toughest decision you made so far.
I had to turn down the funding to grow my business because the investors had a condition that required me to give away my freedom of allowing my team to work from home and also restrict them in terms of their working hours. 95% of my team comprise of either working moms or students (supporting their education). Getting funded is every start-up’s dream but I had to take this tough call to make sure I don’t dilute the interest of my team and my mission.
Tell us about the next big thing in your industry vertical.
Outsourcing industry has evolved in last 2 decades for low end jobs like data entry, transcription, tele-calling and medical transcription but going forward I feel companies like ours will take it further and will be involved in strategic and intellectual projects. As far as publishing industry is concerned, it has just stepped in a new phase of Indie-publishing and this trend is going to stay for a bit along with the massive trend of audio books, which is picking up slowly but surely. (Independent publishing or Indie publishing also called self-publishing, wherein one doesn't need a traditional publisher to approve the book, instead one can simply publish it by themselves.)
One thing that young entrepreneurs should do better.
Be Persistent. Must invest time in themselves to develop the ‘never give up’ attitude, it does not happen overnight and neither is one born with it. Have faith in your ideas and give in your 100%, 100 times before you discard it.
Where do you see your role heading in the future?
Well I think as the business grows, a leader has the following key roles;
1. Ensure culture is maintained and not sacrificed for size and speed
2. Continue to maintain the mindset of a startup
As Jeff Bezos says in his annual letter every year 'it's still day1'
The last book on your bedside and what you learnt from it.
‘Outliers’ by Malcolm Gladwell was the last book on my bedside. He says in his book ‘No one ever makes it alone’. Entrepreneurs very often suffer from the “I did it all by myself” disease and then pride swallows them. This book keeps me grounded and keeps reminding me that I am what I am today not only because of my hard work and persistent nature but also because of people, circumstances and opportunities around me.
