#360: From a Small Town in India to Acquisition Entrepreneur & Academic Rockstar: How Sindhu Srivastava Defied Expectations and Broke Through Social Barriers

In today’s podcast, I interview Sindhu Srivastava and she shared her amazing journey as an entrepreneur, immigrant, and woman of color. She walks us through her upbringing in a mixed-faith family, the transformative power of education, and her relentless pursuit of excellence. The interview highlights Sindhu's academic success, her migration to the US to escape societal norms, her career path in data analytics and entrepreneurship, and the challenges she faced along the way. It also emphasizes the importance of resilience, adaptability, determination, and authenticity in navigating personal and professional challenges. Overall, Sindhu's story serves as an inspiration and offers insights into data analytics, acquisition entrepreneurship, and leadership.

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5 Key Takeaways

The transformative power of education: Sindhu Srivastava's journey emphasizes the importance of education in empowering individuals to overcome societal constraints and achieve success.
Embracing authenticity and vulnerability: Sindhu highlights the significance of being true to oneself, embracing vulnerability, and accepting imperfections as crucial elements of personal growth and success.
The challenges of societal norms and gender-based prejudices: Sindhu discusses the obstacles she faced as a woman of color in the corporate world and the need to navigate societal norms and biases to attain leadership positions.
The entrepreneurial journey: Sindhu's experiences as an acquisition entrepreneur demonstrate her ability to identify market gaps, leverage her skills, and create value through her ventures.
The evolving definition of success: Sindhu's perspective on success evolves throughout her journey, encompassing personal goals, making a positive impact, and continuously striving for growth and authenticity.

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Bio:

Sindhu Srivastava is the CEO of We Crush Events, a mid-market company that organizes world-class events. She is also the CEO of Meaningful Data, a strategic data and analytics services company that works with organizations that want to maximize ROIC and/or Free Cash Flow. We Crush Events' exponential growth will come from the data-driven business decisions Meaningful Data will provide.

She is also a Silicon Valley data executive with nearly two decades of analytics experience. She has led analytics teams at all of her startups, all of which went IPO, in addition to leading analytics teams at large tech companies. Sindhu also has an MBA from The Wharton School, an MS in Engineering from The Ohio State University, and a B.Tech from IIT Madras.

Interview Quotes:

13:14 - “I was a fighter. I just wasn’t there to give up.” - Sindhu Srivastava

20:21 - “I think, as a human race, we tend to prioritize being nice over being truthful and over being authentic.” - Sindhu Srivastava

20:45 - “And I find that a lot of people kind of wish them away... Without actually taking a deep look at themselves and saying, who are you truly?” - Sindhu Srivastava

21:17 - “It's very apparent to me that that's me. I have these racist and sexist tendencies that I have to overcorrect for with mindfulness. And even as a kid, because that's what I was learning at school, like, you know, the honesty bit was really, really apparent to me.” - Sindhu Srivastava

30:30 - “I'm a hustler... I thrive when you throw me into a bullshit situation because I'm going to fight my way out of it. That's when my superpowers start showing up left right and center.” - Sindhu Srivastava

36:15 - “What having kids does to you is, it opens up dimensions that you didn’t even know where there. So literally, I started leaning into my more emotional side. And for an Indian engineer to acknowledge that she has feelings is a utopian idea.” - Sindhu Srivastava

45:34 - “The first question she asked me in our one-on-one meeting is, ‘Sindhu, what is a lead? Is it a person or is it an account?’ This was the VP of Analytics.” - Sindhu Srivastava

51:36 - “Business is nothing but how much revenue are you making? How much are you spending to make that revenue? And is there something left over?” - Sindhu Srivastava

52:33 - “I understood pretty much because I'm an analyst and that's how I grew in my career. Like the way I grew to be a leader of analytics was to help my companies generate that profit. How much are you spending? How much are you generating? Is there a difference and how do you grow that?” - Sindhu Srivastava