“A change which I never thought would happen”

Meet Sunil Sethi, National coordinator at BYST, a Not For Profit founded by Lt JRD Tata that believes in turning Job seekers into job creators. Interestingly, this wasn’t Sunil’s introduction when he joined Delhi whiteboard in July 2011, till Jan 2014 he was CEO, VH Fashions a For Profit set up with no significant connect with the development sector.

Here’s his narration of this story of migration…..

My first job was at Oriental Carbon Ltd-Duncan Brothers. Shifting duty, a great place to learn how to work hard-too much of dirt at work place. Got motivated by the white shirt wearing sales person and started looking for a sales career and moved to  Graphics India-the sellers of XEROX in the country. Learned my selling skills from the best trainers in the world. .Modi Xerox was yet to be born. Did well and moved to Network Ltd-part of HCL group to start their Chandigarh office, moved to HQ at Noida.

 After spending more than a decade and rising to head a profit centre, the journey at Network was historical-be it working at grass roots or at the top.At HCL a merger of companies started happening-started looking for a change and then Maxima happened.Maxima was a dream run and bought up Maxima like my own child. The salute we got from the industry was the birth of Sonata from Titan.

Then came the era of .com and entertainment. The offer was too good from Stracon -Sega and it gave me a opportunity in the International arena. The greatest learning at Sega was to be able to deal beyond the national borders.Then one fine day Sega decided to get out of the hardware business, the .com bubble was any way bursting.

Moved to GBC- Spice-net. Solidified my international exposure and learned the operations part in depth. The opportunity and exposure was not getting expanded because of the type of business we were in so moved to Dixon-Weston.Got a chance to revive a dead brand and enjoyed successfully getting it back on the block.Till one day there was issue of ownership of the brand Weston so decided to move on to VH Fashions.New business line, small organization settled it.

During my VH Fashion days came across Whiteboard on LinkedIn. Went to attend a meeting at Delhi and was there for a short while. The mix of people and the causes they were working for showed me a side of life which was unknown to me. I was moved and joined Whiteboard as a volunteer. Be it drug addicts, abandoned parents or children or the other professionals who volunteered for whiteboard, these people helped me to understand and relate to this new world.

This close association with the non-profit sector, working voluntary with Whiteboard sealed my decision to work for this sector. The volunteer experience at Whiteboard was my actual feel of this sector.

I am thankful to Whiteboard for giving me a great platform to volunteer.  The calling was there but Whiteboard paved the path and directed me. Each and every NGO which I was associated with at Whiteboard gave me a new learning. I do not have the words to thank Whiteboard.

Today working as a national coordinator at BYST from A CEO in the corporate world is a change which I never thought, but yes it happened because of Whiteboard.

Working for a non-profit organization I feel gives you a feel good, tests you of your capabilities with limited resources. Seeing those smiles on faces of the people whose cause you are working for is ultimate. Although it’s early but I find it equally enjoyable to work for the development sector as the corporate.

Having undergone this change myself, I wish  you all the very best for this new phase of your professional life, and hope to see many more Sunil’s moving into this wonderful world of passion!!