Qissewala by Siyahi features Harish Bhat in conversation with Tamanna Bhanot

Reading Time: 3 minutes

How many of us sit around the dining table after a meal just telling each other the stories of our day? Kuch kahaniyan, kuch qisse, some laughter, some ideas and with lots of emotions, Qissewale: A series of kahaani-filled conversations is Siyahi’s latest offering for Jaipur. The first tale from the Qissewale series was told on Sunday evening at the Hyatt Regency Jaipur Mansarovar with Harish Bhat and Tamanna Bhanot to a discerning audience.

Harish Bhat is the brand custodian at Tata Sons and has held many roles in the Tata Group over the past thirty-four years, including managing director of Tata Global Beverages, and Chief Operating Officer of the watches and jewellery businesses of the Titan Company Ltd.

“I live for writing, I live for my books,” Harish Bhat said, beginning a conversation that flowed seamlessly from board meetings to coffee plantations, acquisitions and brand building to books and writing.

Office Secrets

Harish has five published books to his credit. His latest book, Office Secrets, takes an unserious look at many interesting human aspects of office life and the learnings that these secrets hold for us. “After being in the corporate world for 36 years, I realized that we take ourselves too seriously at work. We should take our work seriously but we should be able pull ourselves away from a work situation. Simple things like a good filter coffee, kindness and thirty minutes of me-time are secrets that can help one be far more successful and happier at one’s workplace”, said Harish while talking about the book. The book discusses a range of subjects such as the best methods of fighting exhaustion, organizing your work desk, the power of listening, why kindness is so important and what you can learn from the cookies that your colleagues eat.

Reverse Mentoring

Harish was selected as one of the ‘Top Voices in India’ by LinkedIn. But how he learnt to use LinkedIn is a qissa worth sharing and learning from. When he first came across LinkedIn, he did not know what to do with it or how to use it. So he requested a younger colleague for help who then showed him the ropes. His colleague explained what the platform was about and helped him set up his profile – the right picture to use, how to write his bio, how to interact and connect with people on the platform. During the pandemic Harish turned to using LinkedIn to share stories from the Tata Group with the hashtag #TataStories. The series was eventually published as a book of the same name. These stories developed a wide and enthusiastic online readership. Harish believes that every manager over forty should be mentored by an extremely young colleague so they can acquire the new-age knowledge the young person is familiar with. He calls this Reverse Mentoring.

The Jubilee Diamond

Harish also narrated a fascinating tale of Dorabji Tata, the second Chairman of Tata Group and a diamond. While in London in the early 1900s, he found what was then the world’s largest diamond – The Jubilee Diamond. He said, “This is such a wonderful diamond, I must gift it to my wife as a token of my love.” The lady Meherbai Tata used to wear it on a very delicate chain. In 1924, Tata Steel found itself struggling with liquidity crunch. Dorabji Tata pledged the Jubilee diamond with the Imperial Bank of India (now State Bank of India), along with some other jewellery to secure a loan of Rs 1 crore. The money was used to pay off the debts and the rest is history, with Tata Steel eventually growing to be one of the country’s largest and most impactful companies. 27 August, when the event was held in Jaipur, was incidentally also the birth anniversary of Dorabji Tata.

Heirloom Recipes

As the tales with Harish Bhat drew to a close, the event transformed into a culinary odyssey, “Gharane ki Kahaniyan,” curated by the culinary artisans of Hyatt Regency Jaipur Mansarovar. This menu celebrated heirloom recipes from Rajasthani Gharanas. The chefs explained the ancient cooking processes while whipping up delicious plates for the guests to enjoy.