Thursday, 12 February 2015

I have never thought of changing my job during the last 12 years



Vidhya’s story is a perfect tale of ‘rising through the ranks’. Her commitment towards work and zeal to accomplish her tasks, has earned her accolades at IDS Next. This week, meet Vidhya Srinivasan, a native of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, she holds a BSc degree in Biochemistry and is the Associate Manager in the Credit Control team.  

From a Receptionist to Associate Manager:

Vidhya’s journey with IDS Next started in 2003 when she joined the company as a receptionist. Her educational qualification, prior work experience, communication skills, commitment and spark drew the attention of the then head of credit control.

“At that point of time, credit control was a two person team. It has been 12 years that I am part of this team, and as an associate manager, I now oversee a team of eight people. My work at IDS Next leaves me fulfilled and the thought of working anywhere else never came to mind in all my time here,” Vidhya says.

In her current capacity, Vidhya and her team along with customer engagement group (CEG) are responsible for driving the collection process of all receivables from clients spread across India. “The challenge in our job is to be persuasive and collect the receivables from our clients on time,” Vidhya explains.

Mastering the Tradecraft:

According to Vidhya, her team’s success depends on how well it puts up a finely coordinated effort. We deal will all kinds of clients, small and big hotels, city hotels and leisure resorts, chain hotels and restaurants, all of them have varied expectations from our software and we connect with them with this nuanced sensitivity. We need to be patient and persistent, helping the customer harness maximum value from the software and connecting them with internal teams when necessary” she says.

When asked what she has learned from IDS Next so far, she says, “This company and team has taught me the importance of teamwork, how to coordinate among both internal and external stakeholders and how to stay calm, even when responding to an irate customer. We never take the customer personally, and look at how we can address their concerns quickly,” Vidhya maintains.

Professional versus Personal Life:

Besides a hectic work schedule, Vidhya is also an able manager at home. “I start my day at 5 am and by 7 am, I am done with preparing breakfast plus other household chores. After my husband leaves for office and my son for school, I take care of the need of my aged in-laws. Weekends are with my family and when free, I enjoy (more) cookingJ. I especially like trying my hand at North Indian style food. I also love reading,” Vidhya says with a smile and signs off.