Throughout time, pre-set trends have changed how people live, how societies function, and even the course of work life balance. These ideas have been brought to life by few individuals who considered things as they were, envisioned what could be, and committed to creating the changes that they believed in.

During my potential days, I was busy in most of the base building works with RMZ, Brigade, prestige group etc., always looking for an innovation in load optimization, energy conservation, power source and its alternate ways of using.

My boss, Mr. BRV Murthy used to glance once on any deliverables which are going out for the execution, and it is a routine practice in me to show him once and take his final nod before sending any drawings and document to project site. One day, about to enter his cabin with a scheme for the discussion, just about to knock is glass door, found him in the serious phone conversation with somebody. I never used to enter any one’s cabin, without taking formal permission, hence waiting outside the glass door and watching him in serious dialogue with somebody.

His conversation was going on for some time, he saw me waiting outside his cabin and signaled me to get inside. I sat there in front of his table, the conversation was still going on, looks to be tensed, could not understand much as he was just hearing the voice from other side. It might have taken another 15 minutes or so, then the phone call was disconnected. I never seen his face in such a condition ever before. He took a water glass kept besides, consumed with a soft but deeper breath, and turned towards me. I could not stop from asking him the mater of his concern. He told, Harish of JLL was online, expressed his total displeasure over our representations in the meeting. BRV sir told me that this is of Accenture project, coming up across three metro cities at a time, one each in Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad.

He asked me whether I can up this assignment, but I politely denied because of workload by then, but said yes if my other colleagues do not take it up. I could not discuss further with him as he was in tensed mood and he told me that he needs to revert to JLL in a quick time.

After an hour or so, he called me again and asked me whether I can take up this project. Since I knew the development happening in Accenture project from past few weeks, I told him that I can take this assignment immediately but can start attending the meetings only after two weeks. He has agreed and immediately called Mr. Harish of JLL and made him to agree as well. I could see his face was little relaxed now post tele conversation with him.

Late evening, I took relevant drawings which are prepared by our team and took it home for study. After the discussion with other department’s designers, coordinator etc., one thing I found missing was a confidence in our designer apart from not meeting few requirements of client. Tried to rectify as much of drawings and document possible in next few days and brought the deliverables to some shape.

After two weeks of my commitment, I’ve attended the meeting with client and other stake holders. Whole team welcomed me warmly and started discussing with me on the drawings without wasting much time. After few hours, I found them in ease and calm, particularly by PMC team lead by JLL.  I realized it that my preparation of weeks worked out well!

The power requirement for the offices in those days were almost 10 to 15 watts per sq.ft, which includes utility loads as well. It was new to client in developing such a big office space, that too executing three different offices in 3 different cities, at a time.  There was no such document which would specify the requirement as such. I think Accenture were the first to introduce the theme of “Day one design and Day final” design concept. This concept was a challenging for all the services, especially electrical and security system in terms of flexibility, layout segregation, controls etc., At this juncture, I would like to recall a dynamic young lady from JLL, Sudha, who was instrumental in receiving inputs from all the stake holders to find a solution to any new or change in requirement by client and integrate.

The whole paradigm of placement of work desk, its efficiency per floor plate area has changed a lot in those periods to bring an innovative office space in the country and I would state that Accenture is the first company to create this idea of most efficient workspaces.

We started re-visiting on building requirement document called Design Intent.  Here, our journey started with Accenture standardizing the various drawings and document like design intent, room data sheet, load matrix, layout template, due-diligence report etc., Started with three major projects, continued with several Accenture facilities, later on across the country for more than a decade, I’m sure, today the quality of drawings and document at Accenture would be on par with any reputed MNCs in the country. The credit should also go to Mr. Roshan Gowda, a person who was as aggressive and as involved as Sudha in the project group. Today, Accenture project team, hopefully have streamlined all their listings for the betterment of their IT community.

What inspires you and why?

The team spirit found during the design workshops, the enthuse, mutual respect found within the stake holders of project design team, continues zeal for the improvisation by every stake holder has stored in the library of my memory.

What is your guilty pleasure?

The initial days were passed, client while looking at optimizing the workspace counts, also started looking at tight time lines and then to a tight budget, and then spilled over to Design-build concept of working had closed the doors to many consultants like us, who were instrumental in building the successful project template for the Accenture company

My takeaway?

Thriving for the improvisation, aggressive approach in the innovation within the time limit and tight budget made many of the stake holder to think on the cost-effective solution in their projects.

Sincerely Ramesh G