The Explorer

Meet Telenor’s new Group Chief Marketing Officer Vivek Sood. He explains his career journey as a mix of a lot of common sense combined with the courage to explore and learn from his mistakes. This is his story.

As a young man growing up in Delhi, Vivek Sood decided that accounting would be a sensible profession to pursue. His father, an Indian bureaucrat, had surrounded the family with public servants during Vivek’s childhood. And Vivek wanted to get away from that environment. “When I started studying accounting I found it quite difficult. But I had made my choice and instead of regretting it, I decided to finish and succeed. I knew opportunities would open up if I was successful.” Vivek was among the 2-3% that on average passes India’s rigorous accounting exams on the first attempt. With his degree in hand, he joined Unilever (in Mumbai) in 1993 in their accounting department. It was around this time, with his career now budding, that Vivek’s parents started some plotting of their own. He distinctly remembers the one weekend that changed his entire life. “I was going back home to Delhi for the weekend, mostly excited to sleep in my old bed and relax. My parents had other plans for me, however. By Sunday, I found myself engaged to a woman who I had only just met, but I felt like I had known her for years. That was an easy ‘yes’,” explains Vivek.

Challenges and opportunities

Vivek’s ability to say yes to both challenges and opportunities has been of great benefit to his career. He performed well as an accountant for Unilever, which led from one opportunity to another. From Unilever, Vivek also went to Hutchinson Telecom (now Vodafone India) and AIG insurance, where he worked in 2011, when he got a call from a headhunter recruiting for Uninor. Vivek agreed to a meeting regarding the possible opportunity in the fledgling telco. It was a time when Uninor (now Telenor India) was facing immense challenges, licenses were questioned and the future uncertain. In the interview, then Head of Region Asia Sigve Brekke told it to him straight. There were problems. He didn’t have a solution yet. But Telenor believes in being in India for the long-term. “He told it to me like it was, and I appreciated that. It’s not everyone who will tell you the truth so clearly. I liked his vision, this idea of creating a future in India, so of course, I accepted the challenge,” says Vivek.

Keeping up the fight in India

He came on board as CFO of Uninor in 2011, and set out on an adventure like no other. The licenses were lost early 2012, and the company fought to keep on going. Vivek says that he learned two major lessons from his two years in India. The first, “it’s not over until it’s over.” And secondly, “this is not our last chance .” It was those two lessons that he carried with him when he moved to Dhaka, to serve as the CEO of Grameenphone.

The Let’s Win era

“Sigve Brekke he told me that there were challenges in Grameenphone. Things needed to be fixed, and he asked if I would go there and help fix them. I accepted the challenge and moved to Dhaka,” says

Telenor Group is one of the world's major mobile operators. We keep our customers connected in our markets across Scandinavia and Asia. Our more than 30,000 employees are committed to responsible business conduct and being our customers' favourite partner in digital life. Connecting the world has been Telenor's domain for more than 160 years, and we are driven by a singular vision: to empower societies. Vivek. When asked why he thinks Sigve chose him to take the helm at a troubled time for Grameenphone, he says, “I think it starts with living the Telenor values. But it also has to do with the mindset we had in India. The mindset of a challenger. And for an incumbent like Grameenphone, they had to start thinking like a challenger again.” Vivek served as CEO during Grameenphone’s “Let’s Win” era, a time when Vivek once again had to get out of a problem by succeeding. In the “Let’s Win” period, Grameenphone changed the game. They surpassed 50 million subscribers, rolled out 3G and moved the employee engagement score up significantly.

India calling

Then Sigve Brekke called again, asking him to return to India to serve as the CEO. He didn’t know at the time that his tenure there would only be 11 months, but during these 11 months the company would reach fourth place in its circles, achieve EBITDA positive and change their name to Telenor India. His time in India came to an early end when Vivek was offered a new role in Telenor Group, as its first-ever Group Chief Marketing Officer. Vivek assumed the role on November 1, 2015, and he is now in the process of setting the new structure for his unit.

The only choice

The young accountant has done what he set out to do. He got out of his sensible accounting profession by succeeding, seizing each opportunity and learning while doing. The same is expected of his team in Telenor, and with Vivek in the lead the only choice is to accept the challenges ahead and succeed.