From Mannarakoil To CEO Of Global Scholar: Kal Raman’s Journey (Part 3)

Sramana: What did you do after you had led Drugstore.com back to a $9 stock position?

Kal Raman: That was sometime around 2003. I had begun having conversations with my board about what our next steps should be. I gave them three choices. First, being a micro-cap public company is not an easy thing, especially after 9/11, so I recommended a sale to allow new management to make the right investments to build a long-term company. The second choice was to just ignore Wall Street and focus on building investor value for the next five years with the understanding that the upcoming quarters would be very dismal. The third choice was that if they did not agree with either of the first two choices then they should go find another CEO. It took us nine months of back and forth, and that board with a ‘who’s who’ of the best with people like Melinda Gates, a top investment gentleman for Paul Allen, Howard Schultz, and several others. That is an intimidating board, but I think I pulled it off OK. The board decided they did not want to sell and they did not want to take any actions that would impact short-term profitability, so I made the decision to leave.

Sramana: When did you leave?

Kal Raman: I left in 2004. I had two kids who by that time had basically grown up in the Seattle area. I also did not want to be a CEO again for a while; I think I was promoted way too fast. I would not have agreed with that statement when I became the CEO, but hindsight is 20/20. I went through the ranks too fast. It was hard to undo the bad habits I had developed as a leader.

I decided I would not be a CEO for at least three years, and that I wanted to go back into the ranks to see what it takes to be a contributor and to learn leadership. I did not want to relocate from Seattle, so that limited my choices of what I could do. I had the choice of working for Microsoft or Amazon.com. Jeff was a fantastic friend and respected me, and he asked me to come and work at Amazon.com. I promised him that I would give him two years for sure, but no more than three. I joined Amazon.com in August and ran technology and marketing as well as half of the nonmedia businesses. During that time profitability improved 100%. I did not do all of it, but I had a great team.

While I was doing that I was also asking myself why someone like me, who comes from an underprivileged society and had obtained financial independence compared to 98% of my classmates from high school. I felt that it was my mother and God’s grace that made it happen. The only controllable input I had in my life was education. I decided that when it was possible for me to do something in the education space for the society whose tax dollars paid for my education in India. It has now been eight years since then, and I have since supported all the orphanages in my village, I have built five schools, and have helped at least 100 kids every year with their higher educational needs. I have done that without forming a trust or claiming tax credit. I want to help underprivileged kids with education, and I help take care of 3,000 kids right now.

This segment is part 3 in the series : From Mannarakoil To CEO Of Global Scholar: Kal Raman's Journey
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