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 R.Seshasayee,
Managing Director, Ashok Leyland Ltd, has carved a
space for himself in the history of the automobile industry
in South India. Seshasayee took over as Managing Director
in 1998, when the industry was in the throes of a
recession. He achieved a dramatic turnaround and set a new
direction for the company; the secret for the turnaround
being foreknowledge and anticipatory measures. Refusing to
succumb to the gloom, Ashok Leyland concentrated on the
much needed revamping of its functioning in the areas of
customer focus, customer satisfaction, teamwork and unity
of purpose. His strategy included shedding excess flab,
better inventory management, improved productivity and
judicious use of finances.
 A
Chartered Accountant by qualification, he joined Ashok
Leyland in 1976. He rose to the position of Executive
Director (Finance) in 1983 and was made the Deputy Managing
Director in 1993. A great believer in teamwork, he achieved
synergy by forming cross-functional teams. He accorded top
priority to quality of products produced, as well as
quality of administration.
His achievements include, a past Chairmanship of the
Confederation of Indian Industry - Southern Region, a
membership of the National Council of the Confederation of
Indian Industry for over a decade. He is currently the
Chairman of the National Committee on Export and
International Trade. He is also the Vice-President of the
Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM). He is
the Director of several Public Limited Companies including
ICICI and a member of the Southern Regional Advisory
Committee of the Industrial Development Bank of India. He
is also associated with with many professional and Academic
bodies such as Accounting Standards Board, Institute of
Chartered Accountants of India, Institute for Financial
Management and Research and the Academy for Management
Excellence. He has been an active member of the group which
made recommendations for framing policies in approaching
WTO issues.
His other interests include music, which he learnt formally
from masters such as Valliyur Gurumoorthi,
M.L.Vasanthakumari and Maharajapuram Santhanam. A good
speaker in both Tamil and English, he has written short
stories in Tamil under the pseudonym Vasumathi Ramaswamy,
which happens to be his mother's name. He is deeply
religious and a firm believer in universal peace and
harmony.
The Rotary Club of Madras bestowed the For The Sake of
Honour Award on Seshasayee, the highest honour that the
Rotary Club bestows on any individual. In his acceptance
speech, at this awards ceremony, he said that he was indeed
fortunate to receive the award, but could think of
countless other individuals who deserve the award. "No
individual can claim his achievements as his own, no
individual can stand alone". He also said that if the
poetry of his life were to be written, then you would have
to credit many other individuals who have shaped his life,
the first on the list being his parents.
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