"Don't let my smile fool you; I'm under tremendous pressure": Vineet Bajpai, CEO, TBWA India

Vineet Bajpai likens his life to a fairytale. At 22, he quit his year old job at GE India to set up Magnon, a digital agency. Then, 12 years later, he sold it to TBWA, giving birth to Magnon TBWA. Two years after that, he is named CEO of the TBWA India Group.

Now, we've heard of CEOs relinquishing their cushy jobs to go solo but never of an entrepreneur who gets the top job at the company that bought his startup. A fairytale, indeed.

Bajpai, who has taken over the reins from outgoing CEO Shiv Sethuraman, now reports to TBWA's global brass, Philip Bret and Keith Smith. An MBA (marketing and IT) from Lal Bahadur Shastri Institute of Management, he has authored two books, The Street to the Highway and Build From Scratch. We spoke to the man behind the magnate.

Edited Excerpts.

Edited Excerpts

Over the last 16 months, I've travelled to TBWA's global offices and have come very close to advertising. Magnon's international arm was working with TBWA's global offices. So I spent time in TBWA New York, Los Angeles... there you won't find obsolete mindsets such as 'this is digital', 'this is shopper marketing'... it was a huge learning process. It got me close to advertising and made me realise how powerful digital and advertising can be if they worked together.

I think it was the continued performance of Magnon TBWA under my leadership and the fact that I was totally sold to integration that made the worldwide management realise that I was the best guy for this role. Appointing me as CEO was a collective decision. We all got together and discussed how something needs to be done. That's when we decided that someone who is oriented towards growth, and has respect for integration, should be allowed to lead the agency.

Today, I'm in a great position, by God's grace. I continue to be a significant shareholder at Magnon TBWA, so that keeps my entrepreneurial drive alive. And being Group CEO of TBWA India gives me a parallel corporate mandate.

I am not here to lead the ad agency, the digital agency or the shopper marketing agency. I've told my team not to think I'm here to teach them something, because they already know it. I'm here to build an institution. All the verticals have their specialist leaders who are empowered to lead their businesses like they have been doing.

My role is to keep them together and to convert these superheroes into a combat force, into avengers. I may not participate in in-depth brand pitches but I can sell the TBWA Group as an institution. We will go to our clients as a unified force. As a one-stop shop - a holistic creative agency. And I will continue growing TBWA in India, financially, in terms of scale, size and profitability.

It's something I take pride in. We were great friends. He has done a lot for the agency in the past. What we needed now was somebody with a slightly more new-age view of business, advertising and digital. While there is a lot to learn from Shiv, what is important now is to understand the next leap for TBWA.

A lot of things, actually. Morning to night, night to morning, I am only trying to knit the whole team together. I know the management has taken a leap of faith and a lot of people have an issue with my age. There are lots of challenges. In the next 18-20 months, we need to show the management that they were right. We need to show the media and the market that whatever has been done has been done with a sense of purpose and a clear plan in mind.

I am indebted to the worldwide management for accepting me. But while there is a sense of gratitude, don't let my smile fool you. I am under tremendous pressure.

I agree we could have done better over the last few years. Having said that, I think everybody needs to understand the step that has been taken. I give kudos to the international management of TBWA, for not just talking about disruption as a tool but actually using it.

They have taken a path-breaking step; now if I am able to deliver, it will bring in a new trend for the advertising, digital and shopper marketing industries. People will realise digital is no longer the younger brother of advertising.

We started small, with Rs. 14,000 (that I saved from my previous job), a generator room of my father's acquaintance, two rented computers and two boys who, today, are the managing directors of Magnon International (Vivek Merani) and Magnon TBWA (Nitin Naresh).

Initially, we took up web design projects for Rs. 5,000-10,000. In 2003, we won the Daikin account and then won the Ministry of Finance Government of India business, beating some big boys. That gave us the confidence to go out and win. We did some exciting stuff like e-commerce solutions, search marketing, social media, mobile apps... and became a full-fledged digital agency. My plan was to take Magnon to where it was at the time of its acquisition.

We realised the industry was changing. The advertising industry had recognised the power of digital and all the big boys were on an acquisition spree. In 2010, the offers began coming in. While initially we resisted them, in 2012, we realised that if we wanted to scale up and start playing on the international canvas, then we needed to partner with somebody who had that kind of presence.

I don't want to discourage independent agencies and entrepreneurs but times have changed. The market is cluttered with service providers. It will take a very special independent agency to be able to survive and compete in this market because all the big boys are here and you cannot compete with them.

If TBWA comes in and brings its global relationships with Nissan and Adidas, and allows Magnon TBWA to work on them, how can an independent agency sitting in India ever hope to do that?