During a video call with his team last week, Dipesh Shah, Managing Director of Samsung Research Institute-Bengaluru (SRI-B), found pressure-cooker whistles often interrupting the meeting. Serious discussions would pause abruptly, followed by giggles and jokes from the bunch of senior and millennial engineers.
This team at SRI-B, Samsung’s second biggest R&D center outside South Korea and one of three Samsung R&D centers in India, has been working from home for the past couple of weeks. Now, they are already toying with the idea of developing a filter that will suppress noise from open kitchens during video chats from home.
“This new way of life has thrown up its own challenges. But every challenge provides us an opportunity to rediscover ourselves, to think of how we can get better, how we can transform the society. Every small innovation counts,” Shah told Samsung Newsroom India. “At Samsung, we will continue to be at the forefront of creating meaningful innovations that would benefit everybody,” he adds.
Dipesh, born to Gujarati parents, but a Bangalorean at heart, was the first employee at Samsung R&D Center which started as SISO way back in 1996. He rose through the ranks to become its Managing Director. A people’s man, he has been following the WFH phenomenon very closely to understand employee behavior, customer needs, and so on.
These days, he says, he is rediscovering the value of relationships, as he spends more time with family. His parents live with him; his brother stays two blocks away in the same apartment complex. “My brother and I are into music. We have not met for the past few days, but all of us are in touch. Twenty of us neighbours even play Housie (Tambola) using group chats.”
“I am amazed by how our VPN and mobile networks are all holding up. Everything is working seamlessly. We may be staying apart, yet we are together, thanks to our smartphones, tabs, laptops, networking apps and social media,” he says.
His advice to young minds is that this is the perfect time to think, predict and innovate!
A group of kids in his younger daughter’s school recently connected through video conferencing to sing for a choir. “Isn’t it amazing? They were all home and connected by their home networks, and they made a whole song and uploaded it on YouTube!”
Shah is enjoying this journey of rediscovering himself. Apart from getting to bond more with family – playing card games, chess and even Monopoly – he is contributing to family chores, merrily mopping floors, as a daily exercise. And he has more time to pursue his passion – singing and music!
Three Mantras to Young Minds:
- Be positive, make best use of this time
- Think of meaningful innovations
- Pursue your passions
(Next Monday in Rediscover Yourself, we will speak to another Samsung India leader to share his or her experience. And tomorrow in another weekly column called Quick Techs, senior technology writer Mala Bhargava will tell us about her favourite Samsung innovation and share some interesting tips for #WFH. Stay inspired).