Shobha Ramswamy

Music makes the world go round for Percy Siganporia, the deputy managing director of Tata Tea, and it helps him stay young

Percy Siganporia is a thorough music aficionado. He uses music to unwind after a hard day at work, just as he reaches out to the nearest stereo system in the middle of a busy workday to inspire fresh thought. The subtle resonance of diverse sounds first fired his mind when he was a teenager. Today it helps him hark back to his boyhood and keeps his youthful spirit burning.

Mr Siganporia, the deputy managing director of Tata Tea, enjoys a disparate taste in music. He slips into the primordial days of rock and roll and heavy metal with Pink Floyd and Iron Maiden as easily as he explores a quiet moment listening to the Japanese group Yamashita’s plucking on the classical guitar. Others who clamour for his attention are Mercyful Fate, Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, Metallica, Deep Purple, Puddle of Mudd, Creed, Armoured Saint, Tool and In Ruins.

Mr Siganporia resists loud vocals, heavy guitar sounds, jarring melody and outrageous lyrics that normally pass off as rock music for the uninitiated. Instead, he lends his ear to sharp orchestration and technical wizardry. Naturally, he has little patience with remixes. Pearl Jam and Bon Jovi are out of his canon.

While hard rock translates into blast and fury for many soulful music lovers, it helps prod Mr Siganporia’s thought processes. He says, "Some of the best ideas emerge when I try to think with music playing loudly nearby. As a single note reaches its crescendo, the music itself recedes into the background, and thoughts emerge crystal clear. It’s a wonderful feeling."

At other times, it helps him keep in touch with the youth within him. He believes that people should attempt to remain young and childlike, as these are the qualities that inspire spontaneity and robust ideas. "Music helps me relive my youth, and in a way I am constantly in touch with myself through this. When I am listening to my kind of music, I am more aware of myself than at other times."

Mood music
He lets his mood decide the music he wishes to pick. And his mood swings could lead him to a powerful guitar rendition by Cream or a composition like Four Seasons of Grey by In Ruins, a modern heavy-metal group. His all-time favourite, however, is Pink Floyd’s cult classic Wish You Were Here. Fond memories rush back with that song, as it was to the rhythm of this song that he wooed his wife in their youthful days. Today he keeps track of upcoming rock musicians through late-night MTV.

A passionate involvement with music may be a lonesome activity, but it makes way for some of the most intense experiences in life, believes Mr Siganporia. This revelation came to him when he was in college in the 1970s. Those were the heady days of rock and roll. And he was a willing student. "You did not need anyone around you if you had music for company. An impressionable college student on his own, I couldn’t have asked for a better non-academic preoccupation."

Mr Siganporia was a core member of the due-diligence team that engineered the Tata Tea-Tetley merger. It was a learning period for him. His forte lies in marketing and brand valuation, and he spent most of his time on the merger studying Tetley's multinational operations, marketing strategies and global best practices. He used this knowledge to streamline processes in Tata Tea and raise its standards to meet global values.

Mr Siganporia, an alumnus of XLRI, believes that change takes a 36-month cycle. He explains, "When you start a successful project, the first-mover advantage allows you to accrue fantastic returns within the first six to 12 months. Following this, your competitors and new players in the business will emulate and improve upon your strategy, and in less than a year will begin to impact your volumes and, thereby, your returns. Subsequently, you spend the next year modifying and tweaking your strategy to give you a lifecycle for another year. But thereafter you are actually living on borrowed time."

Chasing the challenge
Challenges motivate Mr Siganporia. He thrives on plunging into a project headlong and emerging a winner. Which was why he, as a TAS officer, chose Tata Finlay over Lakme and Tata Oil Mills. With its share capital wiped out, Finlay was headed for a closure, yet it appealed to him.

"A clear strategic plan to fight the multinationals was already in place and it was now a challenge to initiate the process of implementation," he says. However having built a company, Mr Siganporia prefers to let go. "One of the secrets of enjoying corporate activity is to realise the distance you need for direct, detailed involvement. You need to keep away from it so that operations can run smoothly."

Tea has invaded his private space as well. Mr Siganporia’s average day has many intervals for a refreshing cuppa. But he likes to brew his first cup every morning, according to his own taste. He nursed a secret guilt over the addiction for a long time, when it was commonly believed that too much tea was injurious for health. Eventually, the many advantages of tea became known, and Siganporia did not have to hide the habit anymore. "My guilt has given way to indulgence," he says.

Mr Siganporia has yet another diversion. He likes to spend quiet moments observing fishy friends in his aquarium. After the morning’s stimulating brew, his collection of 35 fishes claims his attention completely. He diligently cleans the tank, changes the plants and feeds his friends and talks to them. It is a private and therapeutic activity for him.

Clearly, a mixed bag of leisure activities is the secret of Mr Siganporia’s animated mind. It helps him plunge back into work with renewed vigour and enthusiasm.