Growth Transformation with NeoStrategy

ARAVIND KONDA
CO-FOUNDER & CEO OF PROWESS SOFTWARE

“Before YK helped us, we could see only clouds.

I see more clearly when I look up at the sky now. It is up to me and Ajay to explore our new horizons. But, it is because of YK that we have this clarity and have recognized our true potential.”

AJAY KUMAR KONDA
CO-FOUNDER & CTO OF PROWESS SOFTWARE

“Entrepreneurs face new challenges and unknowns every day. YK has helped us navigate them with confidence.

Before YK helped us, we didn’t understand our DNA. We now recognize the difference between the critical and trivial. We are able to gather powerful insights from the information we collect. We know when to act and what to avoid. We are a thriving organization experiencing exponential growth. This would not have been possible without YK.”

THE CHALLENGE

Making the transition from an Early Stage to a Growth Stage company
Low results from previous consulting engagements with other firms due to values mismatch
Founders’ strengths not harnessed and key personnel missing
No clear roadmap for growth
Company operations not optimized Inefficient sales and marketing strategy

THE STRATEGY

Harnessed founders’ strengths and their exceptional relational capital to achieve scale.
Coached the A1 team on strengths and smarter decision-making.
Hired a COO who complemented the A1 team to perfection.
Laid out clearly the mission and vision, and crafted taglines to guide company culture based on values.
Built a results-based road map based on the values and strengths of the company. Devised an empathy-oriented sales and marketing strategy.

THE RESULTS

Boosted revenue from 6 Cr to 24 Cr. Built a robust A1 team that can meet any future challenges.
Hired key next-gen leaders and put a scientific recruitment strategy in place.
Optimised operations for business excellence.
Fostered organization-wide clarity.

RAMA KRISHNA REDDY
Founder & CEO Spoors

YK has a knack for pulling the rat out of the hole. Sometimes you don’t even realize there’s a rat.
He has a step by step procedure that will find the underlying cause and point your actions in the right direction!

There are two major areas of transformation that we got through YK
As leadership we did not focus on being futuristic or strategy, we were not organized. We wanted to get a process in place and start monitoring progress, right. And that’s where The NBA framework really helped us to look at all dimensions of an organization whether it comes to people processes or sales or marketing.

The tools YK used has helped us realize the strengths of the team members and their weaknesses. This helped us identify who is doing something that they are not strong at. Then we began filling these gaps with the team that we have.
This had also led us to realize that one of the reasons why people weren’t happy was because a large portion of their job included them doing something that they weren’t good at. So, the gap identification is one of the biggest wins which we wouldn’t have found if we had not engaged YK.

Now, we are happy. People are doing the jobs that they like. The second one is, we have streamlined ourselves. The next tier of management after the top tier have stepped up

One thing I like about YK is that he is not transactional. Even after the engagement, he shows a lot of interest in the progress and business. Sometimes, he makes it a point to intervene and make us realize what went right and what went wrong And he still keeps us updated with new learnings and insights. YK is someone who is genuinely interested in success.

VIJAY CHIKKULAPALLY
Founder & COO Spoors

Consulting YK has brought down a few major conflicts, this was mostly because we identified that we were unhappy due to our focus on bettering our weaknesses and not utilizing our strengths. The 1 on 1 session has helped by making us understand our strengths and how to utilize them better.

YK is not the guy who would leave once the engagement is done. He always asked us about the status what we are where we are going, what is the status and checks if any further help is required either from the coaching perspective or either from any other aspects also at any other level and he is always available!

THE CHALLENGE

Unhappy and dissatisfied work environment
Lack of workflow & friction between teams and People
No sense of accomplishment even after hitting milestones
Beating up on improving areas of weakness
The hampered potential of existing talent Lack of direction as people didn’t know what they are working towards

THE STRATEGY

Forming A1 TEAM with effective team leaders via Internal and external recruitment process. Coaching Ram and the other A1 team members to become effective leaders.
RESTRUCTURING ORGANISATION Getting people to work towards their strengths and reorganizing to a flat structure.
NBA Framework for better performance tracking and TURNAROUND GROWTH.
Removing AVAILABILITY BIAS in recruiting

THE RESULTS

HAPPIER WORKPLACE
Talent GAP is filled by recruiting people with
the RIGHT STRENGTHS.
CXO coaching for founding members made the STRATEGICALLY EFFECTIVE LEADERS.
STREAMLINED work and improved performance from 2nd tier management

UMA MAHESWAR REDDY
Chairman & MD HEMA BEVERAGES

“YK helped us build the A1 team for HEMA Beverages. Earlier all of us were trying to do everything, but YK has made the team realize their areas of excellence. We started seeing results as the team started working on their strengths.

Uganda is a mass market, where you have to be on the streets to make the product successful. YK has worked closely with us to establish new ways of performance tracking which helped us to observe and act on improving their performance.
While all the operational areas were fixed, marketing was still a challenge. We needed a much deeper analysis of what was working and what wasn’t
During covid, all of us were facing problems, YK shared his learnings from all his clients with each other, so there was an indirect way of cross-collaboration which helped the business sustain and grow.

YK’s dedication and hardworking nature have helped us get that as once he takes up a project he multiplies the output of the team. this quality of his is very rare.

KIGULA ROBERT
HEAD OF SALES & MARKETING, HEMA BEVERAGES

“With YK’s guidance, we built a solid roadmap to achieve our goals, started planning better, improving teamwork by tracking progress and fixing the production issues. This has resulted in an increase in sales.

HEMA used to be the industry leader locally but the competition had increased in addition to Covid-19, which hit our sales very hard. YK started with redefining our mission, vision & strategy for business.

YK has put me on a challenging path and has helped me throughout. I did not know my strengths until YK made me realize them, he had a systematic approach and helped me apply those strengths for the growth of HEMA. Our sessions with YK gave me clear insights and I have gained a structured way of thinking and made me work in an organized way with an action plan
The NeoPlanner helped me track my productivity down to the minute. It has enabled me to plan your day around my strengths and track progress, record all my actions, plan & execute the follow-up actions as well.
Consulting YK has helped me unleash my potential and helped us work towards getting back our market share.”

THE CHALLENGE

• Losing Market share & impact from COVID-19
• Unable to use talents of the core team
• Misalignment of Vision between the company and the employees
• Lack of deeper insights on the business challenges

THE STRATEGY

• Roadmap with a SOLID MARKETING STRATEGY
• Built VISION & VALUES to bring overall alignment in the company and clear direction.
• Built strength-based A1 team
• New tools and procedures to improve PERFORMANCE TRACKING
• CROSS COLLABORATION via shared learnings from all clients during the COVID- 19 pandemic

THE RESULTS

• Increased seasonal sales by 150% and overall sales by 80%
• Change in CEO’s employee management style towards strategic and efficient way
• The holding company gained equal attention and was better provided
• The team started to excel at their areas of strengths

THE CHALLENGE

Dynamic and creative entrepreneurs running a high-revenue business were nonetheless unable to turn a profit

THE STRATEGY

The strengths of the primary executives were found to be misaligned with their roles. Redistributing key responsibilities substantially improved productivity and reduced friction due to misunderstandings. Some functions were outsourced and operations were structured through the right combination of processes to improve efficiency. A long-term strategy for growth was introduced. Employees were oriented on renewed objectives so that there was improved clarity on what was expected.

THE RESULTS

80% increase in sales, 12% increase in profits in 6 weeks

MOHANA VAMSI INDUKURI.
CEO, RENEE SYSTEMS INDIA

“YK has a rare combination of skill set required to help with growth of any small and mid-sized company. With his deep understanding in innovation, sales and grip on people & business psychology we can easily see 10X growth. He uses his PBI (People-Business-Innovation) proprietary approach very effectively. He has the fine knack of figuring out issues by diving deep into the root rather than peripheral temporary solutions. With his genuine empathy and problem solving skills, he builds personal rapport with his clients to give visible improvement within few strategy sessions.

In our business engagement, his strategies helped streamline multiple things ranging from sales, team building, team productivity, awareness of focus areas and more. He pursued to great extents in order to help analyse and enhance the team strengths. YK raised the awareness of market analysis and competitor analysis which helped redirecting the focus on new and cutting edge technologies to be future ready. I wish him all the very best to continue providing great value to more and more businesses. I strongly recommend Neo Strategy’s coaching for anyone looking for rapid growth in business”

PRAKASH DANTULURI
Award-winning CEO & Founder, Bulbul Apps

“By most measures, 2018 was a bad year for me. I was struggling on many fronts and was headed nowhere. Thankfully, a good friend introduced me to YK and we decided to meet. At first, I couldn’t fathom anything positive coming from the meeting. After all, I am a well-read, well-traveled, seasoned entrepreneur. How could YK offer me anything new?

Luckily for me, we had a wonderful conversation. I couldn’t help noticing the fire and passion in him. This led to another conversation. And then another! I even remember spending a full day with him discussing entrepreneurship, innovation, and cognitive biases. I saw how even the best of entrepreneurs couldn’t always correctly identify their problems.
Soon, I was doing a lot less talking and a lot more listening to him. I noticed how his instincts were always spot-on and realized that the time he had taken to know me and my patterns was yielding rich dividends. His advice was based on a solid, scientific foundation. Yet, it put me, rather than my challenges at the center. This human-centric, holistic approach makes him highly effective. And although he eventually becomes a friend to his clients, he remains an absolute professional who is very consistent in his follow-ups. I was delivered way more than I paid for during our small business engagement.
I just needed something to anchor everything I learned from YK to a system for action. So, it’s a good thing he designed NeoPlanner! The genius of it is planning your workday based on your strengths, not the number of tasks or their urgency. In the months I diligently use the planner, I get a tremendous amount of work done against all odds. I stay aware of the tasks that are not in my areas of strength and act cautiously. Whenever I miss using the planner, it clearly shows. My phone starts ringing more and my execution becomes more of fire-fighting. I hope to keep using it every day for the foreseeable future.
Over these 3 short years, I have watched with amazement at how well YK has executed on all fronts- building his team, his brand, and tons of tools and content, all while delivering consistent client results. His learning and growth, and the community he has built are just amazing. I would have him back as my coach any day and wish him all the best!”

VIJAYA LAKSHMI BM
GM. UNITED – HEMA BEVERAGES

“In a volatile business environment, we tend to accidentally miss identifying the core issues. The solution-based approach was something that I picked up from my sessions from YK, which meant, first identifying the root cause of the issues and then arriving at solutions for them.
I came from corporate but the work culture at United, being a family-owned business, was not very organized. So we had a bias, thinking we cannot apply all our corporate & MBA principles and learnings in this kind of environment. but that was wrong.
YK proved otherwise by helping us apply those approaches even in this chaotic environment and get solutions out of them. This was possible because of the professionalism brought in by YK.
Personally, the Solution-based approach is my core takeaway from YK and also being a better manager of resources. Amidst the highly unpredictable business is the environment, using the NeoPlannerTM has helped in managing my time effectively.
United was an entity that constantly experimented with new products. Lean innovation is something we worked on and we had absorbed and implemented in a few relevant and applicable areas. We are into manufacturing. So, for us, production and sales are very critical. YK and I exhaustively worked on how we can enhance these two and bring out the best efficiency. We introduced new tools and innovative models for performance tracking, reviewing them weekly or daily. This gave me a better picture of what was happening and what needed to be worked on.
Another thing is the identification of strengths. It helped me understand my strengths and also my team strengths. I started assigning the right tasks to the right people and I could get more out of them instead of pushing them towards something that’s not their strength.
In the Business aspect, United grew past being viewed as a smaller entity thanks to the innovation & strategy by YK.”

SHARATH
CEO, CLOVE TECHNOLOGIES PVT. LTD.

“Being an entrepreneur of two companies is a demanding role. Both have very diverse cultures and aspirations as one is a midsized services-based company (250+ Employees) and the other is a product-based startup (20 Employees), managing them both at once with the same passion is challenging.
I have been using the NeoPlanner for the 5 Months, I fixed a schedule for myself, and it has been working brilliantly to manage my time and focus deeply on the issues and make better decisions.
I have allocated specific days for each company, and I use this with specific day-wise “THEMES” like operations, sales & marketing, delivery, product innovation etc., and “ZONES” like strategic zone, operational zone & routine zone, within those themes which are about 2-hour slots for each theme.
Previously I had an open-door policy where any team can approach me with a short notice that resulted in me switching between different mindsets required in both my companies, which might lead to less focus and might affect the ability to make the right decisions.
I guess a lot of entrepreneurs like myself try and attend to all problems immediately with the fear that they might snowball if we leave it for later. After I started the practice of “THEMES” & “ZONES” the teams started approaching me only during those times except for emergencies of course.
This has helped me stop trying to put out small fires as they arise and enabled me to go deeper into the theme that I am working on. This is also pushing the teams to come prepared with a few solutions on their end as well.
I believe that the NeoPlanner  is a good first step and I strongly recommend this for entrepreneurs and executives who are trying to scale their business with a strategic approach and focus.”

ASHOK TANKALA
Chief Technology Officer KC Overseas

“I have always wanted to become a CTO, but for the past 2-3 years I was playing it safe by not taking any risks.
I have been thinking of getting a coach for a long time and while researching about it I realized that I need a coach. If I was on level 5, I needed someone who is on level 10, who would help me get there instead of me figuring out all the levels in between by myself.
In my sessions with YK, I take myself seriously. I’m able to debug and think about myself in all 360°. Consulting YK helped me change my thought process. I realized there is no perfect time to start. I became a CTO within a month after I have started consulting YK.
With the help of “PITSTOP”, I was able to track my progress, ascertain where I am, and it also acted as a reminder about what’s next.
Everyone tries to work and get better at their weaknesses, which can be a painful and long process. YK helped me realize this and helped me leverage my strengths for growth. In addition to this, I have also realized that I must find people complementing my weaknesses. This was eye-opening learning for me.
The NeoCommunity has helped me a lot in terms of networking. I was able to make good connections and I was lucky to meet a few senior and established executives & entrepreneurs.
Consulting YK helped me get a vision, a plan and a solid roadmap for my future!”

SANJAY RAGHAVARAJU
Founder & CEO, 33 HOLDINGS

“When we got YK to Atlanta, a different region with a different culture, I was a little skeptical.

We had to leave our biases behind for a more quantifiable, scientific approach. We are energized to achieve our BIG goals, powered by YK of course!”