Case study

A Strap Hanger's Guide To Business Paradise

By Shreyasi Singh

Photograph by S. Radhakrishna

Chandrashekhar Hariharan defies neat introductions. Describing him as the executive chairman of BCIL, a Bengaluru-based builder of eco-friendly homes would be factually correct. But, it would, in no way, capture the sheer range of this gritty entrepreneur's fascinating life. A chartered accountant by qualification, Hariharan was at one point a financial journalist. He also has a postdoctorate in econometrics, and worked on water and energy conservation in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Uttarakhand for several years. Plus, he's taken a shot at no less than half-a-dozen business ventures— most of which bombed—including starting a library, a magazine and a photocopier unit.

Today, his Rs 120-crore BCIL, which was founded in 1994, is a leading developer of ecologically sustainable homes. Over seven projects, Hariharan has shown how enterprise and sustainability needn't be locked into a can't-be-won battle. BCIL's homes have pioneered green solutions, using forgotten tradition, knowledge and sophisticated building technology, and survived doing it. That didn't seem even remotely likely when Hariharan first sketched out a rough business plan on the back of a calendar, in the middle of a night in 1994. But entrepreneurship, he says, is about sticking it out. "Like a commuter who hangs on to the bus or metro strap, you can't let go. Just stay there and in an economy like India's, even if you don't win big, you'll certainly move." He breaks down his often turbulent business journey to give us a unique take on survival.

1. Do you have what it takes?
Through the eighties, I did a variety of things. I may have been trained as a chartered accountant but I could never limit myself to doing one thing all my life. In 1985, I was a turf correspondent for the Times of India. One day, I was told by a punter that if I invested 5,000 in the game, he could triple it for me by the end of the day. I needed the money to fund my plans of launching a new magazine on horse racing, Turf Talk. I borrowed some money to give the punter. But, I lost the entire amount. Despite the setback, I was determined to make a go at business. I was clear that I didn't want to work for a living. Merely making a living wastes too much time. I wanted to blur the lines between "living" and "making a living". Sadly, my ventures would never take off like the photocopier unit I set up with another chartered accountant in 1982, or the lending library. Around that time, I remember reading something that has clung on to me ever since. In an article on entrepreneurs, a little box item emphasised the question, "Do you have what it takes?" I've always felt the line was mocking me. For decades, I've worked to prove it wrong.

2. You can't change the world.
Reset your expectations and have realisable dreams By the mid-nineties, after working for several years in Uttaranchal on forestation of watershed areas and ecological preservation, I realised I can't change the world. The need was to make a demonstrable model that could, in turn, inspire change. We were dreamers definitely. But we were pragmatic enough to know that dreams must be realisable. Ecologically, there were two areas screaming for attention—one was the core ecosystem of biodiversity in our hills and rural areas, and the other was our growing cities that consumed nearly everything from timber to minerals. In rural areas, projects were driven by donor funds and government schemes. I wanted BCIL to exist in the real market. When you are accountable to the consumer and they benefit from your product, that's sustainability. This could only be done in the cities where people had money. We wanted to offer solutions to city folks who shared our need for reducing the abuse of natural resources even as they stayed in comfortable, lovely homes.

3 Make madness and sheer obstin acy your best friends
When we started out in 1994, people wondered why we named the company Biodiversity Conservation India. Many warned me that it would be difficult to connect with home-buyers. But, we were not your regular builders. We wanted to create a community of families who would inspire a new lifestyle that would focus on conserving. So we stuck to our name. We were confident that the deeper value of conservation will be served effectively over a long period with a name that focused on this core mission. Still sales calls for our first project, Trans Indus, located on the outskirts of Bengaluru would often draw a blank. We would wonder why the world couldn't see what was obvious— that we couldn't continue to consume resources like this. But this was early 1995, way before global warming was a concern. We told our customers our homes will reduce, if not totally eliminate, dependence on the city grid for water and electricity. We had master-planned an elaborate system for enhancing groundwater retention, installed a biogas digester that supplied 20KW of power. Our waste water was to be treated, and our swimming pool would be chlorine-free, and not use ceramic tiles. But nobody looked or cared for those things then. In 1998, we very nearly shut down. In three years, we had managed to sell only five homes. Things were at a crawl. In fact, there was one day where we asked all our 21 employees to leave. Salaries were not paid for many months. We told them honestly we would help them find jobs but we couldn't afford them anymore. Two of these people came back a month later and said they wanted to continue working despite these issues. We rode on this optimism and slowly overcame the bad patch. Actually, in those days, we didn't have anything much except this bravado. My team and I had a few years of experience in alternate energy systems, watershed management practices and sustainable architecture because of the work I did in Uttaranchal. But our people were mostly from the development sector. There was little experience of the demands of an enterprise. All that I'd learnt from my earlier ventures was not how to successfully run businesses, but how to successfully close them! It took us five years, or till 2000, to sell all the 60-plus homes in the Trans Indus project. In fact, till 2002 we were essentially an NGO-turned-enterprise. We did only three projects during that time.

4. You can't do it alone. you'll often be lonely
The first three years were full of pain. Everything was a challenge— customers, finances, sales. I especially didn't know how to on-board professionals. There was a lot of people movement in the initial years. None of us are our best when chips are down. As an entrepreneur, I was essentially the backroom boy who was just taking care of the market. In my anxiety, I didn't outline our objectives. I would delegate tasks, not ideas. I micro-managed. Today, I can see how foolish I was. The middle layer was not professionalised even as late as the mid-2000s. If you are the visionary, you have to have professionals who know how to convert that vision into a process and execute it. But this isn't easy. There are so many variables in a small business—how can you pay well if you are down, how can you get revenue till you complete projects, how do you complete projects till you sell? It's a vicious cycle. An outsider doesn't understand this. Unlike an entrepreneur, a professional doesn't want to battle uncertainties. Sometimes an entrepreneur is forced not to be transparent. In 2004, we took on a project seven times larger than anything we had done before. I knew by then that without scale, we would never attract professional talent. Today, our team is 230-people strong and we have some incredible architects, designers and conservationists.

5. Don't get stuck being you. Evolve
When the organisation moves into a rhythm, an entrepreneur must let go. All he should ask for the vision to get nurtured and protected. The trouble with many of us is that we either grow too fond of the organisation we have created, or we don't seek an identity outside of the company we've built. It's like you dreading the moment when your daughter will move away from home. You know it is time, but you refuse to relent. After 16 years of running the organisation, I am slowly coming to terms with this. I am learning to step back. All I do is urge my senior colleagues to internalise the core environmental values of the company. But I let them bring process maturity and delivery effectiveness. I don't want to stand in the way of our ambitions to scale up. Today, that finally looks possible. With a project value base that is close to Rs 250 crore, BCIL is ready to enter the big league. We want to build 20 million sq feet of homes by 2020. We want to lead the industry with our model of energy efficiency, that is far beyond what is seen even globally. We've built an enviable track record in the last decade. BCIL has got awards from the most distinguished jury panels in the world. The mainstream building industry will take about eight years to catch up with us. I'm being conservative, my colleagues say. They think the competition will easily take over a decade.

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