Debi Guha PGP ’93 & Jaideep Lakshminarayanan PGP ’92

“We have been each other’s biggest cheerleaders, encouraging other to take risks knowing their back is covered”

How do you balance long work hours and a chaos free household?

Embrace the chaos! Actually, juggling the two is not as difficult as is made out to be. Some tips:

– Divide responsibilities, especially with the kids;

– Be organised about household matters, just like at work;

– Set out a clear schedule for everyone (including the dog!);

– Over-communicate (especially on trivial things like shopping lists, to dos and social commitments – technology really helps here);

– Rely on support from family and domestic help;

– Don’t sweat the small stuff – when things go wrong, find a solution instead of looking for someone to blame;

– Early on, observe how other working couples handle things and learn from those mentors (we were lucky with this)

– Last, but not least, keep your sense of humour and your sense of perspective intact.

How do you make sure that you spend time with your partner? 

Whenever we are both in town, we take a long walk in the evening, together. That’s our time.

Irrespective of where we are, we talk on the phone at least three to four times during the day. Short calls, but they help. Apart from that we take regular holidays with our kids, and during those, make it a point to spend some time just by ourselves.

What are a couple of things that you appreciate about your relationship and why do these things seem significant?

The most important thing we appreciate is the trust that whatever either of us does, it is with the objective of achieving the best possible outcome for both of us, given the circumstances.

The second is that we have been each other’s biggest cheerleaders, encouraging the other to take risks knowing their back is covered, able to pick the other up after a bad day and to provide a sympathetic shoulder when needed.

In addition, it is respect for each other’s views, values & decisions and the acceptance that we don’t need to agree on everything. For example, between the two of us, one is an atheist and the other religious, one prefers to be vegan and the other eats everything, we even like completely different types of movies – but these are relatively unimportant differences.

Instead, the focus has been on the things we really enjoy doing together, whether it’s travel, wildlife safaris, music concerts, reading, spending time with our family and friends, working out or just going out to a quiet cafe for a coffee together.

How did you go about career growth and career planning “together”? 

We don’t. Since we are both working in financial services, in areas that require us to maintain confidentiality, we have never known the intricacies of what the other was doing or what was going on in their office. There has been a significant reliance on serendipity!

Have you lived/living in different cities? If yes, how do you cope with family commitments/manage trying travel schedules?

We’ve lived in different cities a couple of times, due to work considerations. The first time, before we had kids, was easier. The second time when Jaideep moved alone to a different city was brutal – he was exhausted flying back every weekend to try and spend some time with us, while I had to be much more strategic with my travels, and much more available for our kids. We were lucky that during those years we had amazing house help. Would not recommend it, but even with the benefit of hindsight, I don’t think there was a viable alternative for us. Actually, recognising that we had no real alternative at the time helped in creating a mindset where we were finding ways to make it work rather than moaning about how tough it was.

Do work conflicts come home? How do you keep rivalry at bay?

We do not discuss each other’s work. If either of us has to take a call, they go to the study and talk behind a closed door. That ensures some sanity at home!

Once you think of yourself as a unit, there is no rivalry.

Please share any instance of compromises in career growth for the family. (One by husband & one by wife)

We don’t see it as a compromise – it’s an evaluation of what works best for the two of us and our family and then following that path. For instance, when Debi decided to set up her own firm, we relocated and Jaideep then retired to become a stay at home dad. Similarly, when Jaideep had a great work opportunity early in his career, he moved immediately, and Debi only moved after finding a good role in the same city. While others may think of these as compromises, given the process we followed, neither of us felt so.

It is just a question of figuring out the alternatives, being clear about our own preferences and then having an honest discussion about what works best for both of us. We’ve both maintained a number of interests outside of work, and embrace change, so these discussions are not uni-dimensional.

How does it help being in the same boat?

The biggest benefits of being from IIMA and working in the same industry have been that we have stayed very close to many of our batchmates (since they are mutual friends) and that we have a lot of empathy for the other person keeping late hours or travelling at short notice. We have never had to feel we were letting the other person down at home, by committing time to work.