Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Apr 27: Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA), J&K Regional Branch today organized 6th Shri Ram Sahai Memorial Lecture on “Family Run Business- Challenges and Way Forward” in memory of Late Shri Ram Sahai, one of the founding members of the Regional Branch.
Dr Nupur Pavan Bang, Associate Director Thomas Schmidheiny Centre for Family Enterprises, Indian School of Business, Hyderabad delivered the memorial lecture. Prof Ashok Aima, Vice Chancellor, Central University of Jammu was the chief guest of the function.
The function was held under the guidance of Dr Ashok Bhan, Patron IIPA, and J B S Johar, Vice Chairman, IIPA J&K Regional Branch and was attended by over 100 eminent citizens, members of IIPA and businessmen of Jammu.
Dr Nupur Pavan Bang, in her interactive lecture, said that the key to transformation of family businesses is to create family governance systems, bring professionalization, succession planning and creating written family values. Citing examples from various leading Indian business families, she said that many family firms fail to maintain the balance between the goals of a business and expectations of the family which leads to erosion of wealth in the long run.
Prof Ashok Aima, Vice Chancellor, Central University of Jammu, in his address emphasized the role of business in national building and community empowerment. He stressed that for Jammu & Kashmir, entrepreneurship is the way forward and that existing business should handhold the youth in generating innovative business ideas.
Earlier, S K Gupta (IIPA) paid rich tributes to Ram Sahai and recollected his immense contribution to the growth of IIPA in J&K. Dr Ashok Bhan, while remembering Ram Sahai, said that his qualities of being a great learner, ability to effectively manage time and network with diverse people should be imbibed by business community at large.
Dr Anil Gupta, Joint Secretary, IIPA J&K Regional Branch, formally introduced the speaker and set the platform for the lecture.
Rahul Sahai, Chairman, Sahai Group of Companies in his concluding remarks said it is the resilience, power of compounding and visionary approach that can help small business families to scale up.
“Our family business is growing from strength to strength, reason being that I was taught the business ropes by my father Ram Sahai, who also taught me that unity is strength. If as a family we unitedly work together, growth is sure,” he said, adding this value system needs to be instilled in children, only then small business of today and big ones of tomorrow can succeed.