Leadership

Leadership Qualities, Skills, and Styles of Gautam Adani

by Sadnan Bin Sattar

Gautam Adani is the chairman and the founder of the Adani Group who was born on June 24 in 1962. He was born a Jain Bania family to Shantilal and Shanti Adani in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.

He is an Indian billionaire industrialist and he founded the Adani Group in 1988. Gautam Adani has become a global leader in infrastructure business which consists of major industry verticals, such as – resources, energy, agro & logistics. He was born in a business family but he did not follow his family’s business. Instead, he dropped out of school and shifted to Mumbai to chase his dreams. He started venturing into diamond brokering and he became successful and then became a millionaire within a short period. Adani Group’s vision is synced with the idea of Nation Building. Moreover, his company operates and takes the responsibility to contribute to the betterment of the society and country. Gautam Adani also delivers the benefits that help his company’s stakeholders. He has a net worth of around $11.5 billion as of October 2019 according to Forbes. He is now one of India’s foremost business tycoons. He is now ranked the seventh richest person in the world.

Leadership Qualities and Styles of Gautam Adani

Gautam Adani possesses distinguished leadership qualities and skills, some of which are being pointed out here.

  1. Determination: Gautam Adani was determined to become successful in the world from his boyhood. He left his school and shifted to Mumbai to start his own business. He established his business and now his company has made new heights in the business industry with serious determination.
  2. Visionary with a Foresight: Gautam Adani was a visionary man with foresight and this quality helped him to expand his business to Port business. Thus he has created a monopoly market in that segment of the business. Today he is the largest port owner in India and he is continuing to expand his port business.
  3. Global Leader: Gautam Adani was involved in trading and he used ports in his country. Later he realized there was more space to expand his own global trading. As a result, he strengthens his trading and transformed it into global trading. Later he bought a large mine in Australia for $10 billion.
  4. Works with Mantra: In an interview with the press, he once said that he works with a mantra which helped him to reach his success. He is always focused on trying to get results rather than obsessed with them.
  5. Philanthropist: From the Adani Foundation, Gautam Adani gives away around 3% of the earnings for philanthropic activities. This quality has made Adani a unique leader in the world. He also gives back to his society as a part of his commitment and also a part of his company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR).
  6. Quick Learner: Gautam Adani paved his own road to success. He never had an interest in running his family business. On the opposite, he moved to Mumbai and started as a diamond broker. He made his first million in his third year of Mumbai life. Later at the age of 20, he became a self-made billionaire. He learned everything about becoming a success in the short term.
  7.  Ability to Win over People: Possessing the quality of winning peoples’ minds is a great virtue of Gautam Adani. In the late 1990s, an employee of Adani Export made a wrong decision in the sugar industry which cost the company RS 20-crore loss. Gautam Adani did not fire that employee and instead, he motivated him to do better and to stay in the company.
  8. Keen Observer: Gautam Adani is a keen observer and he knew that investments in the early stage of business with accurate knowledge of demand and supply will bring a huge return. For example, Adani built his own airstrip and now he will make it an international passage or cargo terminal for high demand products like diamonds, pharmaceuticals, and precision engineering products.

Leadership Skills of Gautam Adani

Convincing Skill: Gautam Adani had remarkable convincing skills. With the help of his convincing skill, Gautam Adani got beneficial land allotment guidelines and policies from the government. He approached Nitish Kumar, the former Railway Minister of India, and convinced him how railway lines that connect the port to the main railway network would be of national importance. He encouraged the government that having a policy permitting all the ports to link with the railway network would bring greater advantages for both the country and all ports. After convinced the railway minister, the government’s port-rail linkage policy was crafted. Thus Mr. Adani helped the government to designed the national port-rail linkage policy. 

Negotiation Skill: Gautam Adani possesses the skill of negotiating with others. Mr. Adani has got the Udupi Thermal Power Plant for 6,000 crore rupees only. The whole negotiation process lasted for 100 hours. This deal was happened comfortably only because of his brilliant negotiation skill. 

Strategic Thinking Skill: Gautam Adani has the skill to think strategically. He is one of the best strategic thinkers in the world. In a strategic move to accelerate the data center domain, the Adani Group declared that they are partnering with San Francisco-based Digital Realty, who is the world’s leading global provider of the data center. Gautam Adani, the chairman of Adani Group, said that this partnership will leverage several capabilities established by the Adani Group in real estate management, power generation, transmission, etc. Moreover, this collaboration will help India to be digitalized and the data center infrastructure will be developed according to Mr. Adani. With the help of the skill sets of these two companies, Gautam Adani can deliver unmatched products and solutions to the customers in India. This is how Gautam Adani thought strategically to serve his country besides expanding his business.

Other attributes which reflect his leadership qualities and skills are mentioned below

  • Skills of Persuasion
  • Entrepreneurial vision
  • Hard Worker
  • Bold and Practical
  • Indomitable Spirit
  • Risk Taker

He follows such leadership styles which help him to become a role model for the young generation. He helps his employees even if they made grave mistakes for the company. Gautam Adani always follows the strategy of “One vision one brand”. He motivates his co-workers to invest and help the people wherever his company operates their business. He never involves himself with bad politics and he does not allow politics in his business. He is also well known for taking risks to meet his challenges. Leaders like Gautam Adani always choose to make a solid mark in the business world. He has become an inspiring business tycoon who possesses determination and focus. He always says that the key to success lies in constant learning. With these qualities, he can easily acquire another billion-dollar enterprise.

Related:

Reference Links:

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