The Accountant who Became a Marketeer: Manish Godha

Manish Godha, founder and CEO, Advaiya Solutions is passionate about technology and his enterprise is a true reflection of his passion

Manoj is sensitive yet very rational. He has built his enterprise with a lot of passion. Passionate about how things work, how technologies help, and how technologies can be applied in contexts of business, profession or an individual. This streak help him enjoy, appreciate and celebrate human creativity and complex maneuvers of intellect-whether in business, or in art, sciences, economics, music or architecture. A very dynamic persona, Manoj is not only a successful entrepreneur but a great human being too.

Armed with professional degrees like Chartered Accountancy, MBA, Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), and Certified in Governance of Enterprise IT (CGEIT), Manoj has gained considerable experience having worked for around 15 years in technology and consulting, spanning the areas of software development, marketing, assurance, risk management, security, and IT governance. He specializes in enabling individualized solution sales and have developed analysis based frameworks for allowing effective profiling and solution discovery.
His diverse experience also includes engineering industries, large banks, and start-ups, contributing on various areas including marketing, business analysis, solution development, and enterprise sales. Manoj has also been involved in technology and marketing initiatives for companies like Microsoft and Google.

THE ENTREPRENEURAL SPIRIT
However, there was a burning desire to do something on his own. For him, it was exciting to be instrumental and influential in helping technology make a transformational impact on businesses, society and individuals. Being on his own allowed him to live his ideas and fortunately quickly build an audience as well. Risk of course was there but then an entrepreneurial dive can rarely be justified on rational grounds.

With a passion to make a difference on his own, Manoj established Advaiya Solutions which is a technology services and marketing company enabling and delivering business outcomes through identifying, building, communicating and realizing the value of technology. It services the clients through their seemingly disparate goals-c consumer experiences, marketing effectiveness, enterprise productivity, and innovation seamlessly.

Manoj's focus is on ensuring a positive impact of technology on businesses, large and small. The company provides strategic consulting, technical and marketing content, training, pre-sales support, software development, IT services, technology advisory, staffing and creative expertise to many of the top companies like Microsoft, Google, VMWare and some of the most innovative start-ups.
In about 8 successful years, Advaiya has grown into a company with around 80+pro¬fessionals worldwide working with 50+ valued customers. Their Technology-Marketing-as-a-Service (TMaaS) is a technology enabled service providing a combination of connected skills (technology/ business domain/ creative/ marketing), with accountability.

TACKLING SETBACKS
However, all good things also pass through bad times. The venture went through difficult times when the business environment had worsened, getting new clients was tough and existing engagements were being renegotiated. These coincided with increasing costs and changes in the organization which made operations tough. It took some analysis and introspection. The business model was re-invented -the markets, the offerings, and delivery processes were re-positioned. The biggest strategy was to persist, ralling support of the team and work through newer positioning, operating models, and weather the difficulties. Manoj is very grateful to his capable and loyal team members who took on challenges and delivered well.

Apart from his team, his family has been enormously supportive. His wife, Ruchika, has partnered, by taking a major share of responsibilities at home and work. His younger brother, Dharmesh, also part Advaiya, has been a source of strength. His parents have always supported and sustained an entrepreneurial spirit in the family. And, of course, both the kids have been continual source of joy.
The Godhas live as an extended family with close ties with uncles, cousins and so on-many of whom have been successful with their own ventures. With a strong entrepreneurial leaning, at home, the professional and the personal intermingle seamlessly. Conference calls intersperse family conversation, morning chats include discussion on business plans and ideas!

ADVICE TO BUDDING ENTREPRENEURS
That everyone is different, and not everyone would fit in the standard slots, is the genesis of entrepreneurship, according to Manoj. "My path and learnings would probably have little bearing on someone else who is looking to challenge the status-quo and trying to do things differently. So if I have to advise, my advice would be that an entrepreneur must understand that few advices make sense!" says Manoj.

THE FUTURE PLANS
Passionate about building Advaiya into a universally respected and admired as a highly trusted and capable company with rich intellectual assets is Manoj's vision. He plans to grow their services to include newer marketing, technology and application areas and more geographies, they are also investing in packaging our intellectual assets to deliver non-linear growth. The company plans to continue to work on innovation and growth by constantly working on people, intellectual property, partnerships, brand, customer portfolio and process maturity. At the same time he is also eager to bring some positive difference to the world around. Truly the world can be a better place with such hard-working spirit and passion running deep!