Get comfortable being uncomfortable, says Stuttee Arora

We recently caught up with Stuttee Arora who is an alumni from School of Business Management, NMIMS Mumbai and has a rich experience in Sales, Marketing, Business Development and Product Management. She believes in the mantra “Become the person who would attract the results you seek.” and consistently works towards it. She loves to take risks and has led challenging projects to drive growth and market share in her various roles.

Q1. Tell us something about your journey so far?

A compulsive dreamer, poet and biotechnology enthusiast, I started my journey with B.Tech in biotechnology when people didn’t even consider it a mainstream engineering field. Today with viruses multiplying and mutating, there is greater awareness about this field of science.

Post this, I worked with Infosys for about two years and realised that a post graduate degree would help me accelerate my career. So I pursued MBA in sales and marketing from NMIMS Mumbai. These two years were truly transformational for my personal and professional growth. I learnt a lot from great teachers, mentors and peers. From the campus I got the opportunity to join General Electric’s Commercial Leadership Program which helped shape my professional journey as I worked across different P&L of their Healthcare division. From working as key account manager in GE, I moved to Intuitive Surgical as Regional sales manager. I am responsible for growth and adoption of robotic technology in surgeries. Given that there is huge scope of ‘creating market’ and increasing awareness, I am driven towards this challenge and it keeps me going every day.

Q2. Tell us something about your experience in NMIMS Mumbai. How has that experience helped in shaping you as a professional?

As I mentioned, two years in NMIMS were truly memorable. I found great mentors in teachers who brought out the best in me. Being part of clubs, participating in competitions, starting my own club – I tried to make the most of each day and learn from peers with different experiences and background.

As a professional, these experiences defined the formative years of my journey and I wanted to leave a legacy for upcoming students. I started Toastmasters Club in College and am still actively connected with upcoming batches and try to share my experiences and learnings through different sessions.

Going back to the campus brings in nostalgia and reminds me of the place that polished me enough to own my dreams.

Q3. Tell us something about your daily work routine. How do you manage your stress levels in workplace which every professional encounters these days?

I believe a lot in the magic of mind! I constantly endeavor to conquer my thoughts and substitute –ve with positive.

In current times, things are changing more rapidly than we can imagine but results may not follow as planned. I have coaches and mentors from whom I seek guidance. It is important to seek help from those who have been through this journey and they can affirm that ‘tough times don’t last but tough people do’.

Moreover, my family and friends are my biggest strength. Spending time with them instils self-belief and keeps me driven towards my goals.

Q4. What or who has been the biggest influence in your career so far? How do you balance your personal and professional career?

My father has been my biggest influence. He has been ambitious in his own career and has always motivated me to constantly chase my dreams. I always seek his advice in toughest of times and trust his guidance. He has inspired me to be comfortable with toughest of situation and find positivity in failures.

I am grateful to get the right support from family and friends who appreciate my career goals and fully support it.

Q5. You have a rich experience in Sales and Account Management. What do you think should be the 3 Mantras that any aspiring marketeer should focus on to close a deal?

3 mantras to help aspiring sales enthusiasts –

1. Get comfortable being uncomfortable – This is the biggest force that drives me. Closing the deal involves really going out of the comfort zone and making the customer believe in your solution so much that they bet their money on it. In this process, they will make you uncomfortable in order to test if they are putting the right bets or not. In order to pass the test, you have to be persistent despite the discomfort.
2. Confidence on your solution – It is extremely important to believe that your product or solution can really create an impact in the customer’s lives. Once there is strong belief, it will be reflected in your body language. More often than not, sales people try to defend their product against competitor and undermine the capabilities of their own product. This can be sensed through verbiage, or sales person’s body language. Thus it is imperative that you understand the solution to the core and translate that confidence while pitching to the customer.
3. People buy from people they like – Even if you have a rockstar product but don’t form good relationship with the customer, they will never trust you. Building trust takes time but in the end, you will realise it’s all worth the effort.

Q6. How has the lockdown impacted you as a professional? What do you feel are the opportunities in this scenario that any professional should focus on?

This lock down gave me time to reflect on my journey and work on upskilling myself.

Clearly B2B sales has seen a disruption like never before. Hard fact is that sales is dependent on building relationship with clients, spending time in demonstration, and experiencing the product. Professionally, it was hard to imagine that I could sell a very high end capital equipment over a virtual call! Evidently this process had to be modified basis the need of the situation.

Thankfully the customers are also adapting to this new form of interaction and decision making. But there is a lot of room for innovation in this space and opportunity to make greater impact with digital presence.

I am trying to upskill by taking relevant courses and constantly trying to adapt to this new format while staying true to the real sales person that I am. Given that the rules of the game are changing, it is imperative to continue to innovate and constantly learn.

Q7. You have worked across different sectors from IT to Healthcare to Robotics. What will be your advice to young professionals and MBA students?

I have always believed in pursuing career options that I enjoy rather than being driven by what the herd believes is the right one. In college, it is easy to get distracted by perceptions of others and fall prey to the race and competitiveness. I would advise young professionals to focus on areas that drives them and continue to pursue that stream or organisation. In the hindsight first job out of college does not define your entire journey.

It is important to enjoy the learning process and find mentors in the form of seniors, teachers, alumns or networks like Ideasmakemarket to guide you in the process.

Q8. How important is it to pursue your passion? How can our readers connect with you ?

It is important to enjoy your work. Your energy level can really bring a lot of difference to the outcomes of your projects. I have been lucky enough to get opportunities in healthcare space and I am driven towards making a difference by helping ‘create market’ for adoption of newer technologies.

Greater understanding of market forces that drive healthcare in India and increasing role played by medical device industry drives me towards this field. But it is not necessary that everything falls in place as planned. If you connect strongly with either the industry, domain or people/culture in the field, pursue it strongly till you find your niche.

I am active on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/stuttee-arora-75b30261/and can also be reached out at @stuttee-arora on this site.

Q9. Any suggestions for IdeasMakeMarket.com?

This is a great platform. Look forward to read more articles and share experiences. Adding online videos can also be great way to add content.

Tags: MBA NMIMS sales Stuttee Arora