“Creative Thinking Inspires Ideas And Ideas Inspire Change”- Barbara Januszkiewicz

By Pravash Dey | July 20, 2019

Namrata Sachdev, an Entrepreneur, a retail design consultant, and a visual merchandising strategist has close to two decades of work experience in storifying spaces through visual – experiential narratives. After a long corporate run in the creative space, she recognized the need for a creative kick and specialized and kick-started her consultancy ‘NVISAGE’ in 2016. Our keenness in her journey has been thorough, which came out in an interview with her.

“Creative thinking inspires Ideas and Ideas inspire change”-Barbara Januszkiewicz, and this is what Namrata Sachdev has proved us.

Namrata Sachdev, an Entrepreneur, a retail design consultant, and a visual merchandising strategist has close to two decades of work experience in storifying spaces through visual – experiential narratives. After a long corporate run in the creative space, she recognized the need for a creative kick and specialized and kick-started her consultancy ‘NVISAGE’ in 2016.

Our keenness in her journey has been thorough, which came out in an interview with her.

How did your entrepreneurial journey start?

I witnessed the best of both the worlds, as my entrepreneurial journey started after my corporate journey ended. The seed of my own consultancy was planted early in my career when I interacted with a couple of established consultants. However, it was between jobs and up-skilling herself that I realized my next move would be to start on my own. I chose to term it ‘NVISAGE’ for the boundless possibilities that open up when a situation is viewed through a creative lens. My consultancy and work combine my passion and profession – offering meaningful and experiential concepts that help achieve business objectives to my clients.

Everything looks gloomy from outside, but definitely not inside. We want to know how you decided that you need to put an end to your corporate journey and kick-start your entrepreneurial one. What were the challenges you faced as a woman entrepreneur?

I analyzed the pros and cons, first gave a listening ear to my friends and family. At the end of the day, I took a rational decision that resonated with me. My main objective was to remain true to my craft and create content-rich work that added value to the industry. Though the security a job offers was tempting, nevertheless, I finally chose entrepreneurship.

We are always in the middle of two energies, the bad one which pulls us down, and the second, the inspiration that helps us holding up. We wanted to know who has inspired you so far.

Being inspired by multiple incidences, everything kept me on my toes and going throughout. Nevertheless, one significant influence was: coming across Sujata Keshavan’s work, (who had then rebranded the logo for Shoppers Stop). In the same year, she was also a speaker at a design conference, both—her words and works inspired me. Other than this, a book named “White banners” by Lloyd C. Douglas made her believe in herself even more. The book talks about how a woman turns around the tide and influences change in the life of a family by encouraging reinvention and pushing past limitations.

How did you raise the necessary capital to jumpstart your own company?

I learned to manage my finances since the day I started working. This helped me to keep a thorough record of all my expenses and savings.

It turned out to be a blessing for my start-up. I also happened to be at a juncture with no financial liabilities, so I could easily dig in my savings to get the basics for a start-up.

Being a safe risk-taker, I always kept an eye on my finances, with a budget to sustain on, no matter what! Profitability remains at the core of any enterprise, even a creative one.

A firm believer in having a pragmatic approach, I believe one must evaluate situations and then decide on a course of action.

What were the exciting moments in your entrepreneurial journey so far?

I believe that for an entrepreneur, every day is a new day. Loving what one does, and being a go-getter is one of the inestimable emotion that an entrepreneur experiences.

Running my consultancy has taught me a lot. With every passing day, I look forward to acquiring new skills, exploring new avenues. Nevertheless, I have also had my downtimes where things didn’t go my way, then again, ‘never say die’ is not a cliché but an attitude.

Your approach towards clients? Did you face any failures in any associations?

I’ve always thought and treated my clients as my partners, not customers. So my approach is value-centric. As my services revolve around, bringing quality to the table, it fetches me business. Hence there’s never been a need to market my work aggressively.

When it comes to failures, one must know the entrepreneurial journey is full of uncertainty; nonetheless, with the right planning, I always could meet my deadlines. Focus on timely delivery and quality that have been promised to my clients.

Where do you see yourself 10 years down the line?

One of the biggest challenges that every newbie company faces in a dynamic environment is sustainability. However, I wish to continue my consultancy firm and grow with it.

Currently, my company is offering creative, and quality solutions with subprime focus on the retail industry. Being content and quality-driven firm that my company already is, I wish to raise my bar and move across different industries and sectors in the coming years.

I strive to deliver eco-friendly solutions in every project that will be coming ahead of me, and I feel everyone should try to do the same. Sustainable solutions must be drawn, as I want to comprise eco-value and leave less carbon footprint in every aspect of my company.

Do you want to transform into a product company?

NVISAGE is a service-oriented design consultancy that creates memorable identities and interactive spaces for all the stakeholders – the business owners & the audience. Our takeaway is intangible yet retentive, and we would like to remain service-centric.

Swing is a thrilling situation, where maintaining work-life balance is of utmost importance for every entrepreneur. We wanted to know how you have managed so well to hit this equilibrium.

As the entrepreneurial journey is quite a peril where uncertainty is at the peak; likewise, I too had to face long working hours, midnight projects, and tiresome days.

But sooner or later, I realized that I needed to balance my work life. So I applied valuable corporate lessons from my first innings with corporates— discipline, time management, and deadlines. Exceptions were made for emergencies. This helped me optimize my productivity during working hours then, and I never needed to stay back.

Start-up being a new culture altogether for India must have been quite challenging for a woman entrepreneur. Please enlighten us with your views about how other factors like governance has been supportive of women entrepreneurs?

While I’ve never experienced direct discrimination, I have witnessed it being meted out to many, and yes, it is disheartening.

Often, women are not given a fair and equal platform to display their abilities; perhaps overlooked and deprived of opportunities due to deep and almost invisible biases many people have.

I feel that offering equal opportunities and ground is the need of the hour. It is crucial for both, the government and corporates to undertake it as a chief objective for there is a latent talent pool out there.

Financial up-downs that women entrepreneurs face.

One cannot deny that women entrepreneurs face many troubles while they are out there seeking funds. This may be because the majority of the investors are men. Moreover, as said, biases can be sensed. An entrepreneur should be judged solely on merit.

This can definitely boost women entrepreneurs and help in the modification of our economy.

What are the changes with respect to the ecosystem you look forward to in the coming times?

Policies must be redesigned to promote equality. An ecosystem which works on the principles of equality will never fail to reach its zenith.

Do you have any message for the millennials?

Everyone who is planning to start their start-up must know the real purpose behind it. If an individual knows what exactly their motivational drive is and has drawn a pathway for their start-up, only then they are ready for this journey.

As entrepreneurship has many pitfalls attached to it, one must evaluate the situation well before deciding on a course of action. I recommend a rational yet bold approach.

The Future of Start-ups has been intertwined with India being one of the fastest-growing economies, how beneficial it is for new entrepreneurs?

Even though today there are many new doors which are opened for the first-generation entrepreneurs, it still takes immense efforts to tap these opportunities and convert them into profits.

I feel that an entrepreneur should be a master of their sphere, yet one must be patient and not give up making their entrepreneurial journey worthwhile.