Amitabh Ray, senior vice-president, Ericsson India Global Services, follows the “Athena” management culture, as described in Professor Charles Handy’s book, Gods of Management. “The book outlines the different management styles one can adopt, based on the characteristics of various Greek gods. The Athena culture focuses on the continuous and successful resolution of problems. According to Handy, in this type of culture, ‘power lies at the interstices of the net’ and is a ‘network of loosely linked commando units, each unit being largely self-contained but having a specific responsibility within an overall strategy’. I would loosely consider my management style to be along these lines. I am essentially a great believer in a transparent style of management. My job is to integrate expertise to create business value that both helps the organisation as well as creates exciting opportunities for individual career growth,” he says.

In his current position, Ray is responsible for building the organisation’s capability in the field of information and communication technology, and managing the growth of delivery centres across various locations. “I am responsible for leading the company’s performance management process that measures and evaluates progress against its strategic goals,” he says.

Ray has over 20 years of experience in the fields of consulting and IT. Within these domains, he has worked in the areas of corporate strategy, management consulting, programme and engagement management, change management and systems integration. Prior to his current job in Ericsson, he was vice-president at IBM Global Delivery and before that he was a partner in PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Going forward, he believes that managing user experience will be at the top of every operator’s agenda. “With operators aiming to transform their services into commercial offers to generate revenue, their attention is shifting from managing the performance of technical equipment to managing the delivery of high quality services,” he observes. “To achieve this, they require systems that support service-centric and user-centric management. Managing user experience is, therefore, going to be a critical success factor for all operators and they have to achieve this despite being under tremendous competitive and cost optimisation pressures.”

Travelling helps Ray to unwind. He says that an annual vacation is a must for him. He enjoys visiting national parks in particular. Going on long drives and watching various sporting events, live and on television, are his other interests.