Skills and Personality of Sundar Pichai

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Introduction
Personal effectiveness is a set of principles that helps an individual to be a successful leader in
future. There is a saying that leaders are born and not made, however, Mr.Pichai has changed
this notion through his hard work and perseverance. Mr.Pichai has never been very aggressive
towards his attitude and he never indulges himself into the political conflicts and still, he is well
received by everyone. This all has become possible because of his dedication towards his job
and his disciplined life. It is true that he has enough skills to be a leader but still he has to polish
these and sharpen these skills every day by sheer hard work. He was a good student that
helped him to get a good job but leadership skills that he acquired over the years have made
him a great corporate leader. This report will shed light on some of the key skills of Mr Sundar
Pichai and will also discuss the ways to apply the personal effectiveness for one's development
in professional life.

Case Study Review

Skills and Behavioural theory

Sundar Pichai is one of the busiest men in the world as he is the current C.E.O. of world's 2nd
largest company named Google. It is obvious that he has enough skills and a right sort of
attitude to carry such a big burden on the shoulder. He is currently the leader of Google and it
has all become possible for the leadership skills that he possess. To discuss and represent
correctly his capabilities, Skills Theory is discussed here in detail. On another side of the
spectrum from trait theory is the leadership theory known as skill theory. Skills theory is
developed by Robert Katz in 1955. The skills theory as discussed grew from the flaws inside the
trait theory. Trait theory is not suitable to develop new leaders. Skill theory is used here to
describe and assess the skills that made Sundar Pichai a global leader. This is what skill theory
does. Skills theory is a leader centric and emphasises on the characteristics that are must to
have on a leader. Katz's three skill model implies that effective leadership requires three key
skills and those three skills are respectively, technical, human and conceptual skills.

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According to Kartz, a leader should possess all these 3skills to be an effective and successful
leader (Reeves and Hansen, 2020). Sundar Pichai undoubtedly also has all these skills and this is
the reason why he has been so successful in his professional life over the years. He has played
the role Senior Vice President for Google from 2008-2014 and from 2015 he has been holding
the chair of C.E.O. of Google and so far he has been very successful in both the roles. Here in
this part the skills of Sundar Pichai, that made him ' the Sundar Pichai' has been discussed
below in relation to the Skills theory.

Positive Elements of sundar Pichai’s Skills and Behaviour

Technical Skills
Excellent Numerical Skills
Sundar Pichai is very very strong in Numerical calculations and has an extraordinary numerical
recall power (Chen and Rybak, 2017). Sundar Pichai has had this skill since his childhood when
he used to memorize the telephone numbers. Later he realized his knack for numbers and he
has developed his skill over the years to be more productive.
Coding and Product Design skills
Sundar Pichai has mastery in coding and product designing. Being the product manager for
Google for 2008-2014 has helped him a lot to gain the relevant experiences needed apart from
the skill that he already had (Sousa and Rocha, 2019). He has himself led many products
management and innovations for software products starting from Google Chrome, Google
Drive, Chrome OS, Google Maps and Gmail.
Human Skills
Communication skills
Sundar Pichai has charismatic public speaking skill. Speaking gently with his south-Indian
accent, he parried questions being calm and composed. He has a mastery of each and every
detail in the Google Vision and he can explain the toughest of things with complete simplicity,
depth and clarity. He communicates with his team and other subordinates regularly and always
extend his support to his colleagues which has made him such a great leader for such a long
time (Iordanoglou, 2018). His esoteric speech at Google I/O in 2014 has mesmerized people and
his acumen for technology was evident from his speech.
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Humanity
Sundar Pichai is a very dewy thoughtful and caring person who always thinks about the issues
and the ways to eliminate them. Since his recruitment, he has tried his best to make Google
People first company. He has always emphasized to put people before profits.
Deal Making
Pichai has proved to be very successful in making and finalising the deals. He helped to get
products of Google preinstalled on millions of computers. These deals were worth to billions of
dollars to Google and brought a larger portion of the customers who had moved to Bing.
Collaborative
It is true that someone who values relationships can only tend to have a collaborative working
style. Sundar Pichai knows very well how to run a team and how to be empathetic, supportive
and thereby navigating political minefields (Thompson and Miller, 2018). collaborators like
Sundar Pichai know how to collaborate a team and work unitedly. He is very self-deprecating
and very supportive of his colleagues. What stands out for him is that he believes in proper
communication and cooperation rather than confrontation. He waits out conflicts rather than
arguing with the opponents. He maintains a great relationship with everyone in the company as
he knows everyone is equally important for the company and this is why he values everyone.
He is very straightforward and not a polarizing figure like others.
Solution Finding
Sundar Pichai is one of the very few people in the world who has a solution to every problem.
He is a very intelligent figure and instead of being impatient and intervening throughout the
meeting, he possesses a very calm and composed attitude (Farrell, 2017). When everyone
discusses the problems, he strategically involves himself to find the solutions as he believes that
every lock has a key. Once everyone finishes their say, Sundar comes up with an idea that is
completely flexible
Political navigator
One of the main reasons for Sundar Pichai to be so successful is due to his skills to remain
neutral to politics. He never indulges himself into the political arena as he knows very well that
it may malign his and company's reputation.

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Strategic Thinker
Sundar is a great strategic mind and he also has the talent to fulfil his ideas into reality. He has a
mind that has given birth to many strategic ideas which he fulfilled with the help of highly
qualified and trained technical specialists. His strategic thinking ability has helped Google
achieving new heights.
Fearless
Mr. Pichai is very calm and compose and a very easy to go figure in his leadership role despite
knowing the fact the Google was entering into the uncharted waters. Sundar displayed a
fearless and bold attitude by questioning the need of Google drive.
Team Man
The most important skill that is needed to be a good leader is to be a good team man first. A
leader should have the ability to unite the team and establish a clear set of communication to
ensure a healthy environment exists in the workplace. Sundar Pichai apart from instructing or
supervising the teams also communicated with them and listen to the suggestions and ideas
and opinions of everyone. He gives value to each and every employee, irrespective of post or
age or sex. He has built a reputation of being humbled and down to earth. The success hasn't
changed him and his roots are still very much grounded. He communicates with his teams and
subordinates, helps them in their project in whatever possible ways and shows full faith in
them. This helps the co-worker to work harder and better for the company which indirectly
benefits Mr.Pichai as well.
Conceptual skills
Conceptual skills refer to the visionary power of an individual. It implies the skills that allow a
leader to think through and work with ideas, concepts and hypothesis. A leader who has
extraordinary conceptual skills can easily work with abstract ideas and hypothetical situation.
Decision Making
Decision making is one of the key leadership skills for a leader to have.leaders are assigned with
the job to take some crunch decisions at the crucial situations. It is a very tough job for a leader
to do as a one-minute mistake can cause a lot of damage to the company (Leading In, 2018).
Sundar Pichai has a gifted and sound decision-making ability and so far all his decisions proved

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to be very beneficiary for the Google company. His decision to support to provide a voice to
dumb children with Autism has enhanced the stature of Google a lot on the international level.
Visionary Power
The most important trait or skill of a leader is his vision. The success of a leader depends on
how far can he visualise. Sundar Pichai has the vision to provide every people living in the world
rich or poor, young or old the power of Google's machine learnings at any time and anywhere
they need. He wants to create a product that can be effective for a billionaire and as well as can
be proved handy for a farmer at the same time (Steiber, 2018). His mind is not limited to the
United States or the countries of 1st world only, rather he wants to establish a world where a
rural farmer has the equal opportunity and equal rights and power like a billionaire. He
visualises of a world where both, the farmers and the billionaire are treated equally. This
visionary power of Sundar Pichai is what is needed in a leader.
Mr Pichai wants to make the technology so easy and product and services of Google are so
affordable so that even a common man living in the rural district in India or in a remote part in
Africa can have the opportunity to use premium Google products and services.
These are the important skills that Mr Sundar Pichai possess and it is noteworthy to mention
that where Mr Pichai is today is all because of these skills that he has worked hard to acquire
and has been still polishing to get better and better.

Negative Element
Inability of Multitasking
Probably the only negative aspect of Mr. Sundar Pichai’s skill is that he cannot perform multiple
tasks at a time and he admits that very humbly.

Reflective Statement
We are moving towards an increasingly volatile and chaotic corporate world. The resulting
chaos means that it has never been that difficult to lead a team than now and it has never been
that much easier to put blame on other external forces for poor performance inside the
organisation. We all lead amidst the chaotic situation, where some succeed and some fail. The
first step in the path to increasing leadership effectiveness is greater personal effectiveness.
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Effectiveness unlike efficiency is measured without the cost reference and whereas efficiency
suggests doing the right thing, effectiveness suggests to do the right thing in the right way.
Personal effectiveness implies making the most use of all the available resources like talent,
strength, skills, time and energy, one has at his disposal to enable one to master his life and
achieve success in both personal and professional life (Sunaga et al., 2016). There are seven key
principles on the path to personal effectiveness captured by the acronym A-D-D-R-E-S-S. I have
decided to apply the principles of personal effectiveness in the following way. I have divided the
entire method into 10 small steps to be able to focus one at a time.

Self Assessed Development Needs

Clarity of Thought
One should have a clarity of thought in order to be sharp their effectiveness and to be
successful in future. Having a clear set of mind helps to realise what I want and what should be
my approach to get that. Without a proper and clear thought process, one simply cannot
concentrate on his or her aims that he is targeting to achieve. It is important to recognize the
inner strengths and weaknesses since on the basis of them one can build his personality (Bass,
2016). Realizing the strengths I can work on them make those skills more strong to ensure that
when I get the opportunity to deliver, no one can beat me in my zone. It is important to identify
where I am best in and then I should move forward to improve that skill. I believe that everyone
has these weaknesses but to be a great leader one will have to focus on his strengths only. One
should make his strengths so strong that when it comes to delivering he can rely on those
strengths and should have the belief that he's the best in what he is doing and there's none
who can beat him in this skill. One who aspires to be a leader should concentrate on a single
thing. For example, if one wants to be a political leader then he should be focusing on what his
happening worldwide and should start learning the diplomacies whereas one who aspires to be
a sportsperson should be focused to work hard on the field. Hence having that clarity in
thought us important as it will help to set the goals. I believe that clarity makes me self assured
and it is the conviction that roots to personal development.
Uniqueness

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Conviction is one of the most important factors if one wants to be effective in life. Conviction is
like the key to success. Generally, the tendency or the fear to face the failure pushes one to
follow the crowd. Everyone has its own dreams and goals and therefore it is important for an
individual to not to follow the conventional mark and set one's own path and try to move on
that path (Prasad, 2016). Today Mr.Pichai has become one of the most successful global leaders
and the main reason behind that is his uniqueness. He did not follow the conventional path and
made his own way. This is exactly what is needed. In the modern world of art race, where
everyone is pushing each other to be successful in the market, one needs to take another way
rather than going with the flow that will lead him to success. There are always two ways and
the one who chooses to follow the second becomes successful. Therefore it is important to be
unique and not to follow what others are doing since everyone is different.
Mental Fitness
To be successful in life in both personal and professional sector, one has to be mentally fit
enough. I believe that mental fitness is important to uplift the spirit and it helps one to feel
energetic. The more one focus to stay fit, it automatically helps one to stay positive in all the
pursuits (Vipinkumar et al., 2017). Mental strength is very important to enhance effectiveness
as it plays a very important role to construct inner and outer personality. Being mentally fit
helps one to stay focus on his goals and only then one can be successful in life.

Strategies for Personal Development

Self-organization
I believe that someone who is very punctual and disciplined in life will surely be successful in
life. This is very important for an aspiring character to be punctual and dedicated and
disciplined towards his work. Irrespective of impressing the boss or friends, self-organisation
also helps one to stay motivated and positive. Being punctual helps one to stay top at his work
and also creates a good impression over others (García-Martín and García-Sánchez, 2020). It is
very important for a leader to have the skill of being punctual as it will greatly affect his
leadership. When a leader shows the way then the entire team follow that trend. So it is
important for a leader to set a trademark for others that will inspire others to do so.
Fulfilling the Commitment
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Determination is very important to organise the work. Keeping the Commitment is a trait of the
leaders and the leaders should know how to keep the commitments. I believe that commitment
is the way through which a leader can inspire people. It shows that an individual has convictions
and that the individual believes in the cause (Srinivasan and Jomon, 2018). I believe that one
should be committed to himself first to develop himself as a better human being and to be the
best leader. Self-awareness is the first step towards becoming committed. One who wishes to
get to a position in life has to be committed to himself, to his goals and to his work. To be
successful in professional life, commitment is the last thing as it shows how much an individual
is devoted to the job. The success in professional life depends on how much an individual is
committed and passionate towards his professional life.
Continuous changes
It is said that change is the only constant and it is even more relevant in the corporate world.
The continuous change is important for an individual to stay competitive in the highly
competitive world. Suppose a plan devised by a leader to beat his competitors in 2016, is no
more valid now because of the changes in the attitudes of the competitors and also due to the
changes in the market. The business world in 2020 is a lot different than what it used to be in
2016 (Pambuena and Bernarte, 2018). Therefore to go parallel with the changes in the world,
one needs to change himself as well. Corporate companies like Google or Microsoft changes
their competitive strategies in every year as they know very well fail to do so will make them
stagnant and they wouldn't be able to achieve their goals and objectives. Therefore one needs
to make constant changes to develop personal effectiveness inside himself. Indulge in the work,
being active and living the passion are the ways through which one can initiate the change
process.
Relationship Building
To be a successful leader and to enhance the personal effectiveness skills one needs to build
relations with others. An individual should be able to build trustworthy relationships with
others. I believe that a leader should be patient enough and try to listen to what others say in a
team (Misra and Srivastava, 2018). Building relationships with others will eventually help the
leader to achieve the targets with ease. It also improves the inner environments of a workplace

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as well where everyone is valued. When a leader tries his best to build a relationship with
everyone in the team and tries to unite the team, it inspires others in the team to work harder
for their leader. This helps the leader in achieving targets more easily and also enhances his
team-building skills.
Responsibility
One needs to take responsibility right from the start as it will help an individual to prosper in his
career in the coming future. One may have hundreds of talents inside but unless or until one
takes the responsibility to complete a project, he won't be able to show his skills and
capabilities. Being responsible for professional life is very important for an individual to be
successful in life (Khurana, 2016). Responsibility is related to handling corporate pressure. The
more pressure one handles, the more responsible one becomes. Therefore, to be responsible
enough an individual needs to put more effort and try to complete the projects that have not
been done by anyone. Handling such projects alone will help an individual to be responsible for
his professional life.

Conclusion
One thing that can be ascertained after considering the report on Mr Sundar Pichai is that the
skills and behaviour of a leader plays a crucial role in developing a global leader. It can be
concluded from the report that coding is not the only criteria or skill that a leader has to know
to be successful in the modern world of technology. Similar to what Sundar Pichai believes that
there are numerous other skills that are equally important to be a successful leader and one
can still become a leader without having sound knowledge in coding. All that is needed to be a
successful leader like Mr.Sundar Pichai is the self-conviction, trust on the partners, and the
ability to work hard and be fearless. However, there is another thing that an aspiring individual
should learn from Mr. Pichai is honesty and his humanity. These two are equally important
since until or unless one is honest towards his job, he won't be able to end up as a successful
leader. Hence it is important for an emerging leader to be honest and original and not to
imitate others to be successful.in life.

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