Soumya Rajan of Waterfield Advisors on turning a 'sceptical' idea into a resilient business

First Principles

“What is something you believe in, that no one else around you does?”

If you’ve heard episode 30 with Ritesh Agarwal, the founder and CEO of OYO Rooms, then you’ll recognize this as a question that he had to answer while applying for the Thiel Fellowship.

It’s a simple but powerful question that usually differentiates motivated, passionate and unreasonable founders from other equally capable professionals. Because what is a startup if not a mere belief in something that should exist?

This question is also equally apt for our guests today. Because Soumya Rajan believed in something that no one else around her did. Soumya is the Founder and CEO of Waterfield Advisors – India’s largest multi-family office and wealth advisory firm which manages over 40,000 crore – that’s over $4 billion – for its clients.

But in 2010, Soumya was working at Standard Chartered Bank, a bank she’d joined straight from college after back-to-back mathematics degrees. A bank where she’d worked at for 17 straight years – her first and only job. She’d been the head of Standard Chartered’s Private Banking arm and reached the top. But having reached there, Soumya wondered why she wasn’t interested in playing the same game.

2010 was also the year Soumya turned 40. The age when many professionals hit their mid-life crisis. If you remember, Karthik Jayaraman, the co-founder and CEO of Waycool, decided to start up too after hitting 40.

Soumya too decided to quit her job and start on her own by making a contrarian bet – that it was better to charge her wealthy clients directly for financial advice instead of making money via commissions paid by financial services companies whose products she would recommend.

Soumya says that in 2010, this went completely against the tide in India’s wealth management sector. No one else was doing it. Even her peers and ex-colleagues were dismissive of her belief.

In this episode, Soumya, in her calm and reflective manner, tells me her story. There is a strong thread of vision that runs through our entire conversation – Soumya is driven by a sharp sense of curiosity and purpose in everything that Waterfield Advisors is doing. You’ll notice it in the way she breaks down her midlife crisis, her role as CEO, her beliefs about products and incentives, and even her work for empowering women as investors. We also talk about:

1. What the wealth management landscape of India looks like
2. Why Waterfield is like the lawyer or the doctor of financial wellbeing
3. How to survive in the short-term when you’re building to last
4. The one question she asks people before hiring them.

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This is Episode 32 of First Principles, with Soumya Rajan.—The Ken’s fortnightly leadership podcast.

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