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Vinay Kamath

Chennai, April 26 Last month, when Mr Satish Kumar, 55, stepped down after a long tenure as FMCG maker Henkel India’s Managing Director, the board didn’t appoint a company veteran to succeed him. Instead, it roped in Mr Jayant Singh, 39, earlier the chief of GlaxoSmithKline in Sri Lanka, to take over as MD.

Or, take Tata Chemicals. Last November, when its MD, Mr Homi Khusrokhan, retired, it was 42-year-old Mr R. Mukundan who succeeded him as MD.

It isn’t just these two companies; more and more non-family owned firms in corporate India are roping in younger chief executive officers (CEOs) to steer their ships.

Last year, Mr Nitin Paranjpe, 45, was appointed the youngest-ever CEO & MD of FMCG behemoth Hindustan Unilever, while Ms Chanda Kochhar, 47, is all set to step into Mr K.V. Kamath’s shoes as ICICI Bank’s CEO & MD.

More examples abound among IT firms.

So, what is it about a younger CEO? Why are organisations looking at relatively younger people to take over at the helm; does it have to do with the times we live in? Don’t grey hair and experience count any longer?

Put these questions to one of the young CEOs and this is what he has to say: “Increasingly, younger people are getting responsibilities in organisations from the very beginning and are building the necessary expertise at an early stage. Organisations are not necessarily changing their briefs but could be merely finding people who fit the brief at a younger age given the new world we live in.”

He’s not sure if this is a choice between youthful energy and experience. Organisations, he says, want both. “The one thing that most consumer-oriented organisations clearly want is visible leadership. The younger people may also bring better connectedness with today’s ways of doing business and leading people. They may be better able to understand the aspirations of the young stars in their organisations.”

Mr Harish Devarajan, former Human Resources head, Hindustan Unilever, now CEO of People Unlimited, a leadership consulting firm, says that in today’s context, what is required is the capability and willingness to understand the changing circumstances and learn/adapt to newer approaches. This is more often found in the younger managers than among the veterans.

“Experience can never be out of fashion. But the evolving view is that it is not necessary that you have to experience everything that matters – you can leverage on the relevant experience of those with whom you closely work,” he says.

As Mr Harish explains, youngsters often are not shackled by the burden of past experiences, and in today’s fast changing environment past experiences are not necessarily valid all the time.

Younger leaders who get appointed to the big jobs have a success track record and the ability to inspire and lead.

Mr B. Santhanam, MD, Saint-Gobain Glass, says contrary to the view that if one changes jobs fast he rises quickly, most young CEOs would have spent many years in the organisation understanding the business and cultural context.

“Definitely, the age bar has come down for CEO positions from the early fifties to early forties,” says Mr Santhanam, who himself was 39 when he was appointed the founding MD of the company in 1996. Most CEOs featured in the chart here have been at the helm for a few years already.

Mr Harish Bhat, Chief Operating Officer (Watches), Titan Industries, himself in his mid-40s, says the country may have lost out on a generation of leaders who migrated to the Silicon Valley in the ’70s and ’80s while the generation after is sticking around in the country and finding the right opportunities.

“Well,” he adds, “if the world’s largest ‘organisation’ has a young CEO in Obama at 47, why not our companies!”

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