Life is exciting at Cigniti for me and many of my colleagues, as almost every day,  we get an opporutinty to meet, host and/or interact with clients and prospects from various geographies (which includes about 5 continents, and about dozen countries). It is like meeting almost microcosm of entire world at Cigniti.  This week we hosted 3 customers at our Hyderabad Delivery Centre, and one of them is a strategic client from EU region.   This client is all set to introduce a product which is likely to disrupt status quo in their market space.  It is thrilling and satisfying for all of us at Cigniti to contribute to successful release of their product into a competitive market space

It is also always an interesting experience to note what our guests observe and enjoy when they visit Hyderabad.  Even though our agenda to entertain and engage clients has few similarities, we do customise the itinerary extensively based on what we know about our visitors preferences and interests. This week we took our client to Puri Jagannath temple, because of its unique design and proximity to location of our office.   If we have time, we ideally prefer to go to Birla Mandir.  Our colleague from UK often calls this temple as white temple.

Our client noticed a couple doing Vahana Pooja (vehicle Pooja) of their brand new Honda city at the temple.  It was a fascinating experience for them to witness 15-minute ritual which ends with moving the car forward direction on 4 lemons (one each placed underneath 4 tires).  After in-depth interview of nuances of Hindu religion during the temple visit (though it’s initially confusing for them the concept of so many forms of worships that we have, one for courage, wealth, education, etc and more), and most of them conclude, “hey, we all seem to have so much in common, paths are little different, but destination is the same”

Almost all of our clients enjoy the rich Indian cuisine.  Though they are familiar with Indian cuisines, they enjoy the enhanced flavours and spices that is seamlessly integrated into all the dishes served here, when compared to same dishes outside India.   Some of the places that I prefer to take my clients include Taj Falaknuma and Minar (for the grandeur factor), Chutneys (as it’s next door, and to give them a flavour southern cuisine, and get them to experience 70mm Dosa), much hyped Paradise, etc.,

This week, we went to Sahib Sindh Sultan (which was a favourite adda for us, until 6 years ago) because of its unique train themed ambience and rich food experience.  We stopped at Firangi Pani (English Pub next door, which they were pleasantly surprised to experience right next door), before the dinner, to get them a drink.  We also took them to Ohri Guffa which has a cave theme and has unique ambience.  Though we had planned for Titanic Ice Cream at Havmor, we couldn’t make it.

Highlight of the trip for them to was experiencing IPL game at our Uppal Stadium (see photos below).  We had an opportunity to host them in a private box with unlimited food and drinks, and great view of the game.

I also notice them being fascinated about traffic with diverse vehicles with almost no distance between each vehicle, and yet they see a pattern in the chaos.   They often notice rocky terrain and huge boulders on some of the roads in hi-tech city and inquire about it. I did not pay attention to it, until my client commented about it 10 years ago.  To get an immersive experience of riding amidst this traffic, me and my colleagues encouraged our client to take a bike ride with us, followed by a traditional tuk tuk / auto rick shaw ride.

This time, I have captured immersive footage on GoPro from an external vehicle to get a 360-degree view of what they have experienced during the ride, and gave them the video footage as souvenir to them.  Be sure to notice the rocky terrain and boulders, which are fast diminishing to make way for ever expanding HiTech city. To ensure safety of our colleagues and clients, we drove only few blocks around our office.  Here are the pics from this week’s activities.  I have included very limited to ensure that clients logos are not visible anywhere in this blog

Check out the video @ https://vimeo.com/166156822