Let's see, for me was more of a move for me to first of all explore the depth of my leadership style. The second reason was also being in one company for a fairly long time, I also wanted to kind of have a network with the industrial leaders. I thought that ILPSE actually provided a lot of opportunities in terms of diversity in terms of meeting people from various backgrounds, whether it's from media or let's say, sales or marketing, which was fairly new for me. The third reason probably I would say is also how I can learn the best practices and INSEAD  is a leading organization, so why not learn from the best in the industry and take my career to the next level.

In terms of impact of the INSEAD Leadership Programme , we started with a few general subjects in terms of accounting, finance, and so forth. I think at this stage in my career, working in the executive level, what really mattered was how I was getting insight, which helped me to do my job. I'll give you a very simple example, when we are doing accounting, what really mattered in my role is whether I'm able to get the insights to make a business decision. The time in between the two modules allowed us to go into more detail, subject matter expertise. In the classroom I think what really helped me was how to read those financial statements, what really is the next level of business decision I can make based on that data. I think the insights were really helpful to me in order to do my day to day job, make the right decisions for the organization, and for my team per se, and for me also as an individual.

The other thing is also in terms of the impact of ILPSE, I would want to kind of highlight that it's up to one person. The takeaways are very different for different participants. For me personally, it was my interpersonal skills and leadership style. We were also given a lot of questionnaires, surveys, which kind of drill down in terms of what is my inherent style of leadership, how do I perform under pressure, whether I'm an intro or an extrovert. We keep on doing that in big corporations, but I think the holistic diagnosis, which really was conducted and helped me to grow as a leader. I kind of understood what are my strengths and probably the areas where I can be can be more conscious and try to improve them.

The faculty was tremendous. Some of the professors, when I went into their classes, it was a really great moment to understand from the industry academic folks. In terms of whether the subjects were marketing, accounting, even if I did not have the hands on experience in these areas, being from a technology background, I do work with the customers. These professors really helped us irrespective of our background, education, our career experiences, how we can apply these learnings and research material in our day to day life. Professionally, they also guided us in terms of it based on their own experiences of how we can tackle a particular situation.

I would say the best part of this program is peer to peer learning. This cohort of 60 people, they came from such a diverse background that it was just amazing to have those conversations. How they handled the way this career transitioned, how they handle the people's situation, how they shape their career. What are the challenges of a particular industry, which is probably where a lot of wisdom is being shared, a lot of time being spent. There was a lot of friendship and bond which had been created, I would call it my professional support system, which I have built over the past few months, which will obviously help me that I can pick up on their brains in order to solve the problem or share my knowledge with them from my domain expertise. I think the peer to peer learning, the faculty, I think that's the biggest takeaway because you have so many brilliant minds in the class whom you can share your questions or your feedback. It was a tremendous experience.

One of the key transformations that I felt during my ILPSE journey was the pillar based on self. I think a lot of time working day-to-day in the corporate world you tend to forget why you are making certain decisions, why you preface certain things, and so forth. While ILPSE's focused on three pillars, leading yourself, leading the team, and leading the business, I think this journey for me started when I started unfolding why I make certain decisions in the way I tend to do and whether those are right or not. I think that was the most transformational part for me in this journey because once I started knowing myself better, how I conduct myself and make decisions, I think definitely the role became a lot clearer for me. Then I also kind of could relate why I manage my team in a particular way or how I'm running the business day to day

In short, in case you are looking for taking your career to the next level, whether it's a lateral or a vertical move, or you're thinking about starting your own business, I would strongly recommend you to consider a program like ILPSE because it provides you a holistic idea about what you need to achieve your ambitious goals. Because being in the career for a long time, sometimes we do not understand what it takes to reach that level. We need the help of the best professors or people who are doing the research, and also a good network of people who have gone through that journey. It provides you all in terms of your overall exposure to your industry or even beyond. That's why I would say, if that is on your mind, please think about taking your career to the next level with ILPSE.

Preeti Jain