My Life in Full: Work, Family and Our Future

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Are you diverse? On what metrics are you diverse? Do you have ethnic diversity? Gender diversity? Racial diversity? All that stuff. But inclusiveness is a state of mind. It’s an emotion. Are you going to make When a successful person writes an auto-b, are they obliged to present their life experiences as advice or lessons for others? Maybe, I don’t know. The book seems to be average on that front as well. The later chapters about her post retirement phase are filled with her thoughts & recos on issues like support for women at work, elderly care, saving the environment etc. Which again is nothing new. I also had no regrets about leaving my job and was sure I wouldn’t miss my role as PepsiCo’s chair either, when I stepped down in a few months.” Writing this book has been a new experience for me—a journey, a labor of love, a different kind of hard work. I didn’t intend to write my own story in such detail when I started out. I thought that I would write a few articles filled with facts and figures on how we must support women, young family builders, and our collective well-being, and talent? What does the retention number look like? How many [diverse employees] are getting developed and promoted? Let me see the organization’s health scores. Do diverse people feel included? Does everybody feel included, but particularly the diverse people? Are they underrepresented in the country?”

I would sit up reading mail and reviewing documents until 1 or 2 a.m. I was almost never around for dinner. I didn't exercise. I barely slept. I left home for the airport at 4:30 a.m. on Mondays and lived in a Marriott hotel room until Thursday night. (Alok - lots of examples of EXTREME sacrifices :)That’s why I use the term work juggle. Work–life juggling. Are you constantly trading off priorities? It’s when you’ve constantly got multiple balls in the air and you hope nothing drops. It’s not easy for a stay-at-home mom who’s juggling so many home priorities. It’s not easy for a working woman without a family who’s also juggling other priorities—it could be an aging parent or a relative she’s looking after or a work environment that’s hostile. Everybody’s juggling all the time.

I chose Indra Nooyi's recent book, My Life in Full: Work, Family, and Our Future, to read this January. She is one of a few immigrant women of color who ran a Fortune 50 company. I enjoyed her book very much as she wrote about her struggles with Kids, parents, married life, and her demanding career. Her memoir is quite honest and down to earth as she spoke frankly about her privileges and limitations.Being brought up in Chennai myself, the author's initial tales of upbringing in Chennai was relatable and nostalgic. It was great and inspiring to read a story about the author's success, hard work ethic while grappling with traumatic incidents, family and support systems in the early stages of her career. Her strong beliefs in diversity and inclusion principles, support systems as well as putting in the work to drive actual change in this area was inspiring to see from a strong top leader. The notion that a company is just a profit centre is very recent. Throughout history, companies have prided themselves on their roots in society and the legacy they leave to it. No business can ever truly succeed in a society that fails. What’s good for commerce and what’s good for society have to go together.” Many men-- CEOs and others-- perpetually linger on the sidelines of the work-family debate, in part because they are reluctant to break routines that are, ultimately, easy, comfortable, and lucrative for them. I have noticed that younger men--including husbands and dads who are just as stressed as their partners-- also refrain from this discussion, perhaps fearful of hurting their own chances to move ahead."