The Strength Behind Success

Before she took up a leadership role in the organization, Girija had to handle multiple roles to ensure progress, as is the case with all enterprises in their initial stage. This involved all kinds of jobs varying from handling the reception desk to working on the core of its existence, which in this case, was Auditing. But she admits that this helped her interact with the staff closely as a team member and make them feel associated with the firm as a partner. In fact Girija strongly believes in creating a collaborative decision making climate at her enterprise. She understands that this doesn’t happen overnight and all the team members need time to become familiar with each other and develop shared perspectives. She also considers trust and respect to be two very important factors for encouraging this constructive collaboration and works on instilling these diligently. She believes in leading by example and recognizes the importance of gaining respect along with deep trust from each member of the team to ensure unparalleled success of the organization. Girija also recalls that acceptance by the team members was a real challenge when took up the leadership role in the organization. In those times, a woman was considered to be weak and fragile, one who cannot handle big assignments and who succumbs to the pressure of balancing between work, family and home life. She could easily sense the resistance from her team, but chose to approach them with an open heart and soon won their hearts with her sense of humor as well as support and respect as a leader. “Dream big, believe yourself and never give up trying to reach your dreams and ambitions.” says Girija, whose own story is an ideal example of dreaming big and working hard to achieve it. An average student from a middle class family achieved a professional degree, had a successful career growth and built an enterprise that made its mark globally.

Girija was born in Mahe, A Union Territory in India, to Mr. Vellora Madathil Kammara Poduval and Late Mrs. Savithri Amma. She has two sisters who are working and settled in Kerala. Her first sister Sreelatha is employed with the Federal Bank and second sister Geetha is working with IPIX BPO Pvt. Ltd. Girija is married to Raju Menon, Managing Director of Kreston Menon Group and the couple have three sons Aravind, Madhav and Govind. Aravind has recently completed Grade 12 and is gearing up to write the CA exams, while Madhav and Govind are studying in The Millennium School, Dubai in Grade 10 and 8 respectively. Before becoming a Certified Internal Auditor from the Institute of Internal Auditors, USA and a Professional Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, she took her Bachelor’s Degree in Commerce from P.S.M.O College, Tirurangadi (Kerala) and did her Pre-Degree at Farook College, Feroke (Kerala). Her first steps into a career started with her articleship training of three years at Varier & Associates, Chartered Accountants, Kerala. This was a mandatory party of the Chartered Accountant curriculum in India. Girija then joined a trading company in JAFZA (UAE) as an Accountant. This stint gave her a strong under-standing of the basics and exposed her to extensive facets of accounting work varying from data entry to preparing manual accounts, before she headed out to debut as an Auditor. A major turning point in her life was her marriage to Raju Menon, who was then working as a Chartered Accountant with another firm in Dubai. This was also the reason behind Girija shifting base to Dubai. She recalls her early days in Dubai as the ones spend in awe of the infinite opportunity that she was suddenly exposed to. She found everything about Dubai immensely inspiring, be it the visionary leaders, the rapid growth of the city, favorable atmosphere for business or the world class infrastructure. It was all immensely inspiring for her. In Dubai, she handled part time accounting jobs for 6 months till she completed her CA Finals. Since her husband Raju Menon was working for another audit firm those days, her choice of selection of audit firms were restricted due to the confidentiality clauses. It was only later when she qualified as a Chartered Accountant that she joined her husband Raju Menon to start an audit firm.

Soon Girija found herself fighting between career hassles and management at the home front. The initial days of establishment of the enterprise demanded a lot of her time and she found herself feeling guilt-ridden at many instances about not being able to give much time to her children and family. Her business required her to travel late nights to meet clients, report deadlines and updating status of jobs to them. Having faced such challenges, she completed understood the implication of being a businesswoman and the criticality of finding the right balance in life and this she considers to the biggest challenge that every woman faces at some point of their lives. During her growing years, Girija was mentored by her father who ran a small scale transformer manufacturing unit in Kerala. He was a man of principles who maintained a disciplined life. He taught her the significance of punctuality, hard work and honestly. He was not the kind of pamper his children but instead wanted to ensure that his three daughters were on their own and well settled. Today, on becoming an accomplished successful businesswoman and content mother, she admires him for instilling these qualities in her and moulding her as a better human being. She doesn’t forget to credit her husband Raju for having played a huge role in her success. The insights she gained from interactions with him were beyond measure and she respects him for always valuing her efforts and giving her due credit in the growth of their enterprise. Girija and Raju vowed to keep work related issues detached from their family time and always aided each other in maintaining a healthy balanced life. They also ensured that they gave each other the much needed space to operate well in their domains. In terms of motivation by example, just like every one of us has that one incident or person that induces within us the strength to go on in times of stress and breakdowns, Girija too has one such example from her early years in Chennai while she was preparing for her CA exams. One of her classmates Murali was physically challenged with polio and used a motor fixed wheel chair to travel on plain terrain and his arms to climb the staircase up to the 3rd floor open terrace tuition class without seeking any help from his friends. One could always find him smiling and spirited and he passed CA final exams before anyone in the batch and that too with high marks. Girija would always think of him and drawer inspiration from his positive attitude towards life and that would always help her get back on track. When she’s not playing with numbers, Girija loves to read and try her hands on cooking various oriental cuisines. She also practices yoga on a regular basis to keep health and other ailments in check.

“Dream big, believe yourself and never give up trying to reach your dreams and ambitions.” says Girija, whose own story is an ideal example of dreaming big and working hard to achieve it. An average student from a middle class family achieved a professional degree, had a successful career growth and built an enterprise that made its mark globally. All this was possible only because she dared to dream big since her early years and never allowed any failure to stop her from relentlessly climbing the ladder of success."