Know Your Colleague: Keeping Active
My name is Samarendra Nayak and people started calling me Sam during my college days, merely to not mispronounce my name and eventually that became my identity mostly. I grew up in the heritage city Puri of Odisha, the place well known for Lord Jagannath and sea beaches. My 2 very caring elder brothers, my beloved mother, my soulmate, my wife, my beautiful little daughter, my nieces and nephew and my in-laws make my entire family. Studying in Puri all the way to my Masters in Commerce, I moved to Bhubaneswar, the capital of Odisha, for Post Graduation Diploma in Management (MBA) from Asian School of Business Management.
I started working in 2010 and over the years I have worked in multiple organizations in the areas of Finance & predominantly in Fashion Retail space out of the Green City, Bangalore. Basically, I would love to phrase it this way- “Born somewhere, shining here”.
Apart from education and work, I have always been super active in many other areas including Sports, cultural and social activities. I have represented my state in Cricket, Baseball and Softball for multiple years at different age groups. I won many awards in these sports, athletics and badminton, despite that they were very struggling early years of my life as my father was bed ridden for 20 years before he passed away in 2018. The prolonged medical situation left the family in a financial crisis. In addition, I too went through a phase of health nightmare in 2011 when I was badly affected by multiple slipped discs and was hospitalized for 3 months. Just to be able to walk, doctors imposed many restrictions in my lifestyle, leading me into mental depression. We all know sports make you mentally strong to fight adversities. Being from sports background, I was able to slowly gather back courage and I was in no mood to accept all of these restrictions for the rest of my life and reminded myself “You have one life, live it to the fullest”.
That’s the turning point in my life. I gathered the will power to live a happy life by all means. I started doing strengthening exercises and gradually started walking, slow running. Over the years all these efforts made me stronger and with the blessing of the almighty, I was able to get back to normalcy and now I run marathons, do long distance cycling and play badminton and cricket. While I have managed to overcome my illness in this process, I don’t encourage others to disregard doctors advice as a practice. However, I managed to bring in a lot of my friends to running, cycling activities over the years and have been able to become a source of inspiration for many who were bugged down due to slipped disc issues or back pain problems and guided them ways to become physically fit again (Disclaimer: I basically share my experience of how I came out of my own illness, just to keep them motivated). Till date, I have participated & completed 23 Half Marathons (21.097 KM) and more than 60 10k events (Officially).
During Covid I got a ligament tear accidentally and eventually could not do any activities for a couple of years and I became badly obese. I wasn’t really able to find a proper way to restart them all over again due to lockdown restrictions, office timings and of course my lost enthusiasm. This not only makes you feel uncomfortable physically, but mentally too, it has a tremendous adverse effect on your lifestyle.
My Journey with Groupsoft:
During early 2021, I was going through a challenging time as the organization I was working for was in hard times too and I was looking for better opportunities. In the process, I managed to bag multiple offers which included offers from really big corporates. That’s where I got a call from Groupsoft, got interviewed directly by the CEO and the VP HR. While I had options to choose from, I chose Groupsoft US to continue my journey. There are multiple factors which helped me make the decision.
- The warmth I felt when I was interviewed by the CEO, followed by VP HR. The level of humility by them is unparalleled. People say “First Impression, lasts long” and of course, I am not an exception to this thought as well 🙂
- Working in big companies might benefit you satisfying your whim, but working in small scale organizations, with a great value system, can take you to wonders. In big companies, you will just become a face in the crowd. On the contrary, you can become the FACE of the company if you work in a small company and do well.
- The role that I was getting in Groupsoft has driven my decision even more.
- The work-life balance seemed to be much better than all my previous organizations I had worked for.
- I could foresee my journey in alignment with the future plans of the company as discussed by the CEO himself.
I joined Groupsoft with a lot of energy, excitement and hopes of reaching heights, delivering up to expectations and what not. Meanwhile I was blessed with my daughter “Sampriti” and what wowed me the most is the culture this company could manage to instill in its system. Most of the leaders including our CEO, my colleagues, everyone personally congratulated me and that was heart-warming. And I felt as if Sampriti had become a new member to our Groupsoft family.
I joined Groupsoft US as a Retail Planning Consultant and over the period of time, have been promoted to Senior Business Consultant and given the role of a Process Leader in the company.
With the new role, initially I was facing a bit of challenge understanding the technical specs, being from a non-technical background. But with the constant support from all my colleagues I became an integral part of the Dev Apps team. The best part of working here is there is no bossism, no discriminations and you get a chance to work with all the leaders of the company, which gives you a lot of opportunities to grow as a leader.
If I have to name a few who have been a great help in my transition in to the new role, Mr. Amitabh (CEO), Mrs. Priyanka (VP HR), Mr. Arjun (President), Mr Anoj (CFO), Mrs.Sabina (Tech Leader), my colleagues from Dev Apps team like Anand & Denish and HRs like Angela and Ritika. Needless to say, all other employees of the company have been phenomenal in every way.
I have been attacked by Covid twice during my tenure with Groupsoft. The amount of support, care and attention I received from the Groupsoft management is unmatched. It was the end of January 2022, when I was celebrating the 6th month birthday of my daughter, I felt uncomfortable because of the obesity (I had become 89 kg) and I took an oath that I have to fight it out, if not for me, for my daughter. And that’s when I restarted my cycling. I started 30 km daily, improved the distance and speed gradually and today I do 75-100 km regularly with an average speed ranging from 27-30 KMPH. I have covered almost 5000 kms this year and challenged myself to complete 12k kms at the end of 2022 and if I am able to do so, I have an aspiration to gift myself a Road bike to pursue this passion further. In the process I have already shredded 12 kgs and all I need to do is to prevent myself from getting older physically :-). In the process, I feel more energetic and active throughout the day which helps me work with a clearer mind.
Groupsoft, however, has helped me in the process, be it directly or indirectly.
- The work life balance as presumed earlier by me was absolutely right. You get to plan your day as per your flexibility.
- When you work with a bunch of great people, you don’t have any additional baggage when you go to bed and that helps you wake up early and pursue your activities. I am blessed to be a part of a team where the environment is so toxic-free that helps me immensely in my fitness journey.
- The Fitness Challenge Initiative by Groupsoft has given me a boost towards my fitness goals. Glad I was able to win the contest, but eventually it made my habit even stronger.
- When the HR team, the management, your colleagues constantly appreciate your fitness activities, you certainly feel more motivated. And that has been the exact case for me here.
It has been a wonderful journey for me with Groupsoft and I wish I can grow older along with this organization. I personally value a better workspace than a bigger workspace. Groupsoft, in all facets, have been amazing. Be it, recognizing and rewarding you for your efforts, encouraging you to pursue new initiatives, standing behind you at your challenging times and most importantly creating the environment of a very friendly work culture. Having said all of this, I also acknowledge to the fact that, this company have not expanded exponentially over the period of last 19 years and the reason is “It believes in becoming the master of one trade at one time instead of trying to become jack of many trades and master of none”. Meaning it believes in delivering quality work to clients instead of trying to get hold of multiple projects and compromising on the quality of delivery.
I have been working in Dev Apps team, where I see the future is going to be amazingly high-yielding. The company is currently focusing on a lot of unique application solutions, which will, in the due course of time, cater to many industries, helping the companies in multiple dimensions. I am currently enjoying my responsibilities as business consultant and process leader and I dearly wish my journey with Groupsoft will unfold many more learnings, responsibilities, opportunities and success over the years to come.
