Satan’s Angels

By Sandeep Das

The cohort of 2011, recruited by one of the world's best management consulting concerns, hand-picked from the best business schools, is keen on succeeding at The Concern. The members of the cohort are showered with the best of opportunities, the best of luxury and unbelievable money.

However, behind the good life, lies an ugly truth. A secret organization operates within The Concern that helps proprietor-driven family-owned firms succeed in a post liberalized India. When one member of the cohort is hand-picked to join this club, he is elated. Having been identified as the chosen one, there is little that can go wrong for him now.

What he doesn't realize is that nearly a dozen consultants who have been hand-picked before have paid with their life working for them. Will he survive the game in which every mistake is fatal or will he be on his way to become a partner?

Across 3 continents, 6 industries and over dozens of characters; the angels of Satan bring you a journey of greed, brilliance, sleaze, murder, debt, progress from the greatest profession of them all - management consulting!

• Language: English
• Publisher: One Point Six Technologies Pvt Ltd
• Release date: Oct 17, 2018
• ISBN: 9789352011186

Sandeep Das

The author, Sandeep Das, has done his MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore (IIMB) and schooling from Bishop Cotton Boys’ School and St. Joseph’s Boys’ School, Bangalore.His debut book titled “Yours Sarcastically” was inspired by an actual job assignment to interview 60 size zero South Bombay women. “Yours Sarcastically” got rave reviews and was featured on leading newspapers and magazines like the Times of India, Business World, Hindu, Asian Age and CNN IBN. It was nominated for the Crossword Economist Book Award.He has been a columnist with Business World for over 4 years. He is a keen debater and has won laurels nationally and internationally. He represented his college at the Asian Debate in Malaysia where he finished as a quarter finalist and was awarded the “Best Rookie”.In his free time, he likes to host various business festivals and has featured as guest speaker on numerous occasions. He hosted the Bangalore Business Literary Festival in 2018.“Satan’s Angels” is his second book which deals with the world of consulting - its glamour, glitz and abysmal filth.

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Episode 0

THE EXECUTIVE

SUMMARY

The most important skill you will learn in management consulting is to construct the ‘executive summary’ – the ability to summarise everything in 2 lines

- Iyer, Lead Partner, India, Jackson & Company

There was acid being poured on my face. Everything and everywhere over my body seemed to burn. I could feel my skin getting charred. I could feel the acidic air enter my nostrils -dusty, dirty, stinking air. I could barely breathe.

A sharp bout of electricity seemed to gallop from my neck to my head. I could barely move my head to that side of the neck. It was sore. It hurt badly. I was sure there was a fracture. A major one.

Another bottle of acid was being poured on me. It burnt with the same ferocity. The air was stinking. I couldn’t move my body.

I tried to open my eyes. The place was a wreckage. A dilapidated wreckage.

However, it looked familiar. There were stacks of cartons towards the north west corner of the room. I had seen some of those cartons earlier. I had definitely been here before.

And then, in an instant, I realized that water was being poured on me. Not acid. Thank God!

I couldn’t move my hands. They were sore. They were tied behind me. I wanted to drink the water. I couldn’t.

I was starving. I was thirsty. I needed water. I needed food. I needed clean air. I needed some light.

I looked around. There were people everywhere. There were tyres and ropes everywhere. The last time I was there, the place looked so different.

I wondered what time of the day it was. Or what time of the night. Or how many days I had been here for. I had no recollection.

How are you feeling, Mr. Political Guy?

His tone didn’t seem different. There was the same tinge of warmth and encouragement. He even wore the same formal outfit the last time I saw him in. He sat on a wooden table ahead of me. Flanking him were his key associates most of whom I had trusted at some point in time.

My phone started ringing. I didn’t realise that it was in his hand. He looked at the number and smiled. He held it up for me.

He, walked up a few paces and brought the phone to me. I saw the number. It was a pre-paid unknown number. I recognised it immediately.

He took the call and put the phone on speaker. I wanted to scream. But couldn’t. My mouth was stuffed with something. I couldn’t even groan.

The sun is setting.

There was no reaction from my side. I was being asked to run to safety. He was instructing me to run to any place other than where I was. I knew the sun had set long while ago.

He started calling my name out. Not once. But again and again.

There was no reaction.

He started to scream, Are you okay? Just get away. They have found out about you.

I tried to groan one final time before that. I couldn’t. I didn’t have any energy. I was losing the will to. I hoped he would locate me somehow.

The call was disconnected. He took out the SIM card and broke it. A woman emerged from the cabin behind him. She was carrying a set of files for him. Eleven files to be precise.

She looked at me from a distance. I knew her. She thought I would be surprised to see her. I wasn’t.

She smiled at me the same way. The same charming, enthusiastic, caring and warm smile. No change. She even asked me how I was feeling. She offered me a glass of water.

I couldn’t drink it. I wanted to but I couldn’t with the cloth stuffed in my mouth.

I looked closely at one of his men standing at the extreme right corner. He had a hammer in his left hand. Maybe the same hammer was used to hit me.

Your stupid bitch was going to the cops. Had she kept quiet, I too would have kept quiet. Had you kept quiet, I too would have kept quiet.

A Scottish trainer had once told me that everything in management consulting was in lots of three. Three key points. Three key slides. Three key stakeholders. Three key findings. Three main colours. Three main fonts. Three key skills. Three main industries.

There were three women who had played a pivotal role in my life over the last few years.

Two Indian, one Thai.

One loyal, one a traitor and I am not sure of the third one till date.

One who helped me rise, one who resurrected me and one who proved fatal for me.

Two who loved me, most likely.

Two who used me.

The three angels of Satan had shown me three different faces. It looked like I would be punished at least three times that night.

Episode 1

ENTER THE

DRAGON

Executive Summary:

A Jackie always supports another Jackie. Always!

- Foundation value, The Concern

He handed me a sheet of paper with Mickey Mouse sketched on it. I looked at the two partners in front of me not knowing how to react. Surely, they were not joking with me at this point. All of us were sober, educated adults.

Outside our little room on the second floor of the Management Development Centre popularly called the MDC, over 300 students were running around all of four floors to land a job of their choice. The prospect of a record placement year at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Bangalore was slowly becoming a distant reality given the bleak economic scenario. The student-led placement committee gave us strict instructions not to reject any offer that came our way. They adopted their oft patented socialistic approach of ‘maximum good for maximum people’.

I had finished four rounds of interviews at the Deutsche Bank and three rounds at Goldman Sachs. I was not sure about the final offer at Goldman Sachs but I thought I stood a fair chance at Deutsche Bank. They had, however, not called me for the final round with the managing director. I was now interviewing with Jackson & Company.

Is Deutsche Bank going to hire you?

Shouldn’t you just step out for a minute and check?

₹ 1.3 crores a year!

That is a lot of money!

You can buy a BMW in two years’ time.

But if you step out now, you will definitely lose this offer.

So Mr. Rajdeep, how do you evaluate a painting like this?

Ask him if you can step out for a couple of minutes!

I mentally ran through all the consulting frameworks I had memorised over the last few weeks: 3Cs, 4Ps, 5Ps, 7Ss and Porter’s five forces.

All consulting interview cases could be neatly classified into revenue growth cases, cost management cases or a profitability improvement case.

In all my coaching, there was never the slightest mention about evaluating a painting, more so of a cartoon character.

I took out the Pierre Cardin pen I had bought especially for this interview. Management consulting concerns attached a lot of importance to an individual’s taste and grooming.

I hesitantly replied, If there are similar paintings of cartoon characters, I will use their value as a benchmark and evaluate this relative to those.

There was an immediate reaction from the other side.

Is that all you can come up with? the bald partner almost killed me with the piercing look in his eyes.

The second partner tried to make me feel at ease, That is one way to analyse; what else can you come up with?

So, they are playing good cop and bad cop with me!

I tried to appear calm and wrote down a few random sentences on a blank sheet of paper ahead of me.

Try and buy time!

I can try multiple things; look at the past paintings of this artist and use those prices as a benchmark, put this painting up at an online auction site or get an insurance to guarantee a certain minimum amount.

Interesting! said the good cop as the bad cop kept shaking his head grudgingly.

We are a unique concern. Unlike other management consulting concerns, our India growth story has not centred around helping foreign concerns enter India but by working with Indian family houses and making them world class. We genuinely believe in the India growth story.

You have made it!

Now it is your turn to convince me to join you.

I had successfully managed to put a price on a Mickey Mouse sketch!

On stepping out of the room, my placement coordinator told me that I had been rejected by the Deutsche Bank interview panel. My only choice was to accept the offer from Jackson & Company. I was told that if I didn’t sign the offer of acceptance within the next five minutes, my offer would be revoked. It was, after all, a gamble!

Outside my room, the bald guy patted me on my back and looked human for the first time, I assure you of a fabulous career with us. You will remember your experience with The Concern for a lifetime.

It was a prophecy that wouldn’t go wrong.

He continued, noticing my apparent lack of acknowledgement.

We are a very choosy and a private concern. We don’t advertise much; you will not hear us blowing our trumpet.

I completely lost interest as he kept talking about how The Concern’s people and processes were the company’s assets. The only thing I took away were the details of my salary; a fixed salary of ₹24 lakhs in the first year and a maximum variable pay of ₹10 lakhs. It was a good package but not a great package by IIM standards. It was nearly one fifth the amount that was being offered by Deutsche Bank.

In the evening, a senior of mine from Deutsche bank admonished me as the tea in my plastic cup started leaking from the bottom, Why didn’t you come back to interview with us? We were very keen on picking you. But the Placement Committee told us that you were not interested in working with us.

The Placement Committee of an institute that churned out capitalist MBA graduates had followed its core socialistic principle of maximum gain for maximum students. Again!

Episode 2

DO YOU REALLY

KNOW YOUR

STRENGTHS?

Executive Summary:

The Concern is always watching you; at the client site, in office, at the parking lot and even in the rest room. You are all intellectual slaves to The Concern.

A pompous Audi A8 stood outside the Oberoi Hotel ready to take me to my first day of work. What was different was not that we were staying at a five star deluxe hotel on the Queen’s Necklace in Mumbai but that there were twenty six Audi A8s that had been called in for us – the fresh recruits.

Twenty six Audi A8s for twenty six new hires!

Have these guys gone crazy?

One dedicated Audi A8 for each new hire?

Is this how new hires are treated?

They must be insane.

This is a ridiculous waste of money.

Twenty six Audis crawled past Churchgate station for the ten minute ride to the plush office of Jackson & Company. Jackson & Company was the second office I knew, the first being Goldman Sachs in London, that didn’t have its name etched at the building’s entrance. Floor number five was designated for Jackson & Company. You just had to know it!

Few people could resist the urge to stare at her translucent shirt and her distinct black bra underneath.

She is seriously sexy.

Doesn’t she realise everyone is staring at her?

Jessica, aka Jaspindar Handa, was from the Indian Institute of Management, Ranchi, one of the newer IIMs.

Do you know the first thing she told her Mom when she cleared IIM Ranchi? her batch mate and a new joiner seemed over enthusiastic to spill the beans, that she would marry someone only from an Ivy League business school such as Harvard Business School, Stanford School of Business and if the boy’s family was really really good, she might consider the Wharton School of Business.

Huh?

This is typical guy gossip.

If you realise a woman is above your league, guys start spreading such crap.

A woman in her mid-30s and a thoroughly professional looking man entered our massive conference room and held out a placard that read ‘Cohort of 2011’. The lights went off and a video started playing on the massive projector screen.

I wanted to join management consulting because of the CXO interaction that the profession offers.

I wanted to join management consulting because I wanted to be at the forefront of intellectual value creation.

I wanted to join management consulting because of the various sectors I can get exposure to.

Oh my god!

Did they just show you on the giant screen speaking about management consulting?

The video being played showed recorded snapshots of comments given by us on why we wanted to join management consulting.

I looked down at the file ahead of me and the heap of books that were being distributed by an office associate. The pile of books comprised of In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman, The War for Talent by Ed Michaels, Helen Handfield and Beth Axelrod and the most important book Strengthsfinder 2.0 by Tom Rath.

Welcome everyone. It is my honour to introduce you, as part of the Cohort of 2011, to The Concern.

This guy has a seriously good accent.

He must have had a stint in London.

Let me introduce yourselves to you. Your cohort of 26 analysts has been hand-picked from the best business schools in India. All of you have one thing in common – a superb career ahead.

There was a round of applause.

Stop staring at Jessica’s thighs.

This is your first day at work.

Over the last few years, we have made a conscious attempt to bring about gender diversity. We have tried to positively re-enforce a healthy gender ratio. We are very proud to have the largest number of women in this cohort.

There were 12 women amongst the 26 of us.

Out of these four were decent looking, three were better than decent and one was super sexy.

You pervert!

He continued, Why is the number eight special?

It is the number of years of an average economic cycle...from boom to bust to boom, Jessica’s fake accent didn’t match up to the natural British accent of the partner.

Did Jessica just say bust?

According to Chinese history, the number eight has immense implications on society and its formations.

That is a smart answer!

This guy from IIM Ahmedabad will be tough competition!

Don’t say anything; you don’t want to make a fool of yourself on day one.

I must admire your quality of answers. However, the number eight has a unique significance in management consulting. It takes eight years for an analyst to become a partner.

Most of us in the room knew this.

I am sure all of you know this. You are considered successful in management consulting primarily when you are made partner. You are respected by your peers and you rake in massive moolah only when you become one.

There was a brief pause before he continued, You will move from an analyst to a consultant to a manager to a principal and finally to a partner. At each level, you will be working for two years before you prove to The Concern that you are ready to perform at the next level and are promoted.

He is obviously not going to talk about either going up or being pushed out.

If you fail to perform at the required level, you will be fired.

He has smartly hidden that aspect of the job.

I assure you that your career at The Concern will be an enriching and a very satisfying experience.

The new law of evolution in management consulting is about visibility. The point is that visibility for lack of a better word is good. Visibility is right, visibility works, visibility cuts through and shows your real ability to The Concern. Visibility in all its forms, be it visibility to showcase your work; visibility to get the partners to back you; visibility to get staffed on the plushest of cases; visibility to go on the fast track growth path are all good. The only advice I will give you in The Concern is to be visible.

He paused for a couple of seconds as the cohort gave him a near standing ovation. The senior partner lowered his intensity and mimicked a forced smile for the first time.

Did he just rip off Michal Douglas’ speech about greed being good from the movie Wall Street?

I am sure everyone has realised it.

Just keep clapping along!

Show it on your face that you are inspired!

You don’t want to look like a laggard!

Let me lighten the somber atmosphere here. He typed the phrase ‘random bullshit generator’ in Google and opened the first link.

"Most jokes about how management consultants are jargon prone are true. If you ever fall short on jargon, use this site. All you need to do is press the make bullshit button and you can get management consultant language from here."

Matrix customised partnerships

Generate cutting edge eye-balls

Enhance seamless e-markets

Cultivate distributed applications

Synergise front end mindshare

Facilitate real-time niches

Mesh 24/365 web services

Synthesise proactive bandwidth

Engineer ubiquitous synergies

Envisioneer enterprise channels

The good thing about this site is that it throws up seemingly intelligent business jargon which in essence means nothing.

He actually does have a sense of humour.

Thank God!

Ours is a people and a capability driven business. We see ourselves at the forefront of shareholder value creation. We believe in staffing the right people with the right strengths in the right cases. Hence, a key exercise that all of you will go through is to take the strength finder test.

I picked up the Strengths Finder 2.0 book by Tom Rath that was given to us in the morning session. I quickly flipped over to the back of the book.

Do you do what you do best every day?

Chances are, you don’t. From the cradle to the cubicle, we devote more time to fixing our shortcomings than to developing our strengths. To help people uncover their talents, Gallup introduced Strengths Finder in the 2001 management book ‘Now, Discover Your Strengths’. The book ignited a global conversation, while ‘Strengths Finder’ helped millions discover their top five strengths.

The online test indicated what your top five key strengths were and supposedly you were staffed on cases which needed similar strengths.

After the afternoon drama was over, I walked up to a senior of mine belonging to the cohort of 2010, who was sitting in the conference room to our left.

Did he give you that speech on visibility?

"He did. Hasn’t he ripped it off Michael Douglas’ speech from Wall Street?"

Yeah, he has. All the incoming cohorts see his acting prowess on their joining day. However, he is not pretending. The Concern does run on visibility. Success in The Concern is directly proportional to how visible you are and not necessarily how smart you are.

The entire passage next to the conference room was painted with the phrases, A Jackie always supports another Jackie! Always!, Thought leadership, Merit and performance amongst many other phrases. They were part of the nine foundation values that defined The Concern.

The Concern is always watching you…

The entire poolside at the Oberoi Hotel was booked for the cohort of 2011 along with the managing director of India operations. Rumours were abuzz that the managing director had recently bought a penthouse on Nepean Sea Road and had a collection of at least a dozen premium cars.

In your 20-year career, have you never thought of leaving Jackson & Company?

The IIM Ahmedabad guy quickly sipped his glass of wine after posing his question.

How could he say that?

This guy has made his first CLM; Career Limiting Move!

Doesn’t he realise what he has done?

"Let me tell you young man – there are some things you don’t do at The Concern. You never utter out loud the name of The Concern; not at your client site, not in your social circles and never at office. Never! It is rude to call The Concern by its name. I hope you understand that you are a tiny spectre in The Concern’s existence. You always will refer to our company as The Concern. The day you become bigger than The Concern, you will address it by its name. And no one will ever become bigger than The Concern. No one!"

I am surprised he didn’t read the blogs on The Concern.

It is a cardinal sin to address The Concern by its name.

It is everywhere on the internet.

The Concern is always watching you; at your client site, in office, at parking and even in the rest room. You are all intellectual slaves to The Concern.

The IIM Ahmedabad graduate tried to hide his face and vowed to never address The Concern as Jackson & Company. The Concern, however, had taken notice of it.

Everyone went through their first round of tequila shots. I am sure the IIM Ahmedabad graduate wanted to gulp a few more.

Did Rajeev give you his Michael Douglas speech on visibility?

Most