Zoho’s CEO Mr Sridhar Vembu, in an astonishing statement on his Twitter said - "I refuse to list my P.hD. among my qualifications, it is useless." Now, this is a man who attained his PhD in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University.
PhDs are extremely difficult to obtain after an investment of much money, time, and effort. While PhD remains an overqualification for many, its importance in the specificity of learning can not be denied.
Looking within the network of the global sphere that his company operates in, this is a highly unexpected statement to make. The netizens remain divided with some praising his honesty and humility and some mocking that Ph.D. might be the least of his qualifications when he’s made so many achievements and been in the field for so many years.
To understand the implications of his tweet resulting from his personality and thought process, delving into the growth of his company becomes the groundwork. An organically grown company revolving around tech with a literal 0% of external investment seems to be the foundation of believing in their abilities and plan. While the start-ups in the current age walk a thousand steps at a time or take the big leap of faith, the 90s startup Zoho seems to have masterminds behind its progress. A well-thought-out chessboard is what they have laid down with extensive thought for the future of national development.
Moving their chess pieces one at a time with no external backing in the capital-intensive tech industry is a fresh concept from the 90s. To ensure that these chess pieces are not kicked off by their competitors and the failure of profits, they extensively funded the R&D department with trust in the capability of better products.
ZOHO listed in Forbes
“My liberation came when I decided to leave that academic prestige path and go build real engineering systems for a living.” posted Sridhar Vembu. He explains that he considers PhD studies to be highly impractical in a real-world scenario, with professors completely obsessed with their models, it is unfathomable that one could achieve worthy real-life knowledge. The Paradox remains to be the confinement of PhD students to the academic sanctum. A defining path of creativity and innovation is provided to students but with the boundaries of the academic pool that lay as obstacles to tumble the students in their pursuit of liberatory creation.
The people who stand on the opposite side of Mr Vembu may have different opinions but his expertise in the field and personal growth paralleled with the efforts he has thrust into national growth are undeniable.
A man who believes in completely scrapping the “lay-off” scheme had potentially planned much ahead of time by not being dependent on the investment pool. Sridhar’s philosophy lies in not being fixated on exits or liquidation which a majority of investment-oriented start-ups tend to believe in currently. He speaks of his fundamental disbelief in VCs at a time when startups are cutting costs to survive in the era of slowed-down funding.
In a thatched hut, he operates his model with much-applauded inclusivity while training and bringing to the fore the underprivileged and rural human resources. The CEO also actively states that the brain drain of our country shall soon be addressed, thus his ambitions remain to bring back the talent of Indian roots from the United States. The Digital renaissance of India has been fuelled by this man- with his company lighting up in the global CRM circuit and empowering the underdeveloped areas of the country. India's expansion on the global IT Map is, in part, credited to him. Technology does not seem to be his only field of achievement as his company continues building the social metaverse of education.
Sridhar Vembu at his workplace (News18.com)
Thus, as dumbfounded as one would feel seeing his tweet on the matter of PhDs and their importance, it is undeniable that he holds much merit in the spectrum of education and development and his tweet holds much gravity. The tweet remains a well-considered public statement to respect the domain of practical applications. He remains grounded and connected with intellectual and meaningful engagement on platforms like Twitter.
What remains in question further is- When a man born in the 60s complains of a useless PhD and the generation from the 21st century places their stamp of approval and agreement, has there been any development in the curriculum of education? Food for thought, there!
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