These women entrepreneurs are helping individuals and organisations by nurturing them to reach their full potential
Kritika V Singh and Lakshmi Ramaswamy are founders of Bengaluru-based Being You! Consulting that offers a host of training sessions like coaching, NLP, and other life-changing techniques to help individuals and organisations reach their goals.
Life coach Kritika V Singh says that when people multi-task, they compromise on their true selves. Being oneself may seem like the easiest thing to do, but it is difficult for a lot of people.
It is also the problem that Kritika and Lakshmi Ramaswamy are seeking to address through their Bengaluru-based startup Being You! Consulting.
Currently operating on B2B and B2C models, the startup offers a multi-pronged approach ranging from Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) to regression method, and inner child healing, among others, to serve individuals as well as corporate entities in areas of coaching, facilitating, nurturing, and healing.
In a corporate setup where they follow a group coaching format, it begins with getting to know the participants before their programme. Additionally, if they see any changes required at an individual or organisational level, the startup facilitates and nurtures leaders or individuals who need to adapt to the changes around them.
On an individual basis, they help clients navigate the way to achieving their goals. The duo makes it clear that it is not same as a psychiatrist, which involves advice-giving and prescribing medicines.
Lakshmi says, “We believe everybody knows intrinsically what is good for them. So, we help them explore options to reach their goals, inform them about the benefits, and the challenges. In short, we play the devil's advocate to empower them to be confidently make the right choices.”
For social good
For Kritika and Lakshmi, it is purely a passion project, where money is not top priority. Kritika shares that they have had several people approach them for guidance after quitting jobs and paid what they owed after a year.
“ reached out for training session for their leaders. We told them that a day’s workshop would not make a big difference. We then worked with them at three levels of training new managers, senior leaders, and women leaders as well,” Kritika says.
Following this, they secured a social impact partnership with NextWealth, a social enterprise that is setting up a BPO in Tier-II cities like Chittoor, Vellore, Salem, Mysore, Hubli and Bhillai.
Shaping lives
Lakshmi had gone through diverse career changes before she decided to start up with Kritika. She started her career at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) as engineer, and then took on HR and consultant role at Bharti Airtel . A management graduate from the Goa Institute of Management, her last stint was with Airtel as a consultant before she became an entrepreneur.
In all these jobs, Lakshmi says people appreciated her for being an empathetic listener and would often approach her for advice. It was then she realised that she was capable of helping people look at options beyond the obvious and went on to learn more, accumulating over 20 years of experience in the learning and development space.
Lakshmi met Kritika when they signed up for the same life coaching certificate class online in 2013.
Kritika is a graduate in English Literature from St. Stephens college in Delhi and has a Master’s from Leicester University, UK. Later, she ran a consulting firm in Bengaluru. Kritika reveals she used to be extra-empathetic and often took on other people's worries.
“It would bog me down so much and I could not dissociate with these matters. I understood it was not productive and was not able to help,” she adds.
That is when she turned to taking several courses on life coaching, and on Neuro Linguistic Programme (NLP), among other techniques. “When Lakshmi moved to Bengaluru in 2016, I was pleasantly surprised to meet again as neighbours. We started working together on projects since then and started the consulting firm to Being You! in late 2016,” she recalls.
The duo says their common aim was to move away from technical methods of training to implement a more individualistic approach.
Coaching past the challenges
The road to entrepreneurship is not without challenges. There were occasions when people questioned how women coaches can coach male members of the organisation. However, the entrepreneurs feel that people are more open to them as women and coaches and there is no judgement at all.
Kritika shares an experience at one of the top management institutes in the country. “We met a training director and he was taken aback. He asked us why women needed to work when their husbands were earning. Later, when he understood the work we were doing, he got too invested in it and started drawing out business plans for us.”
Lakshmi concludes saying that while there were companies and individuals who were conservative who were not open to seeing women entrepreneurs in the beginning, many have come around, sooner or later.
“What matters is to let passion and integrity speak for the work we are doing,” says Kritika.
Edited by Rekha Balakrishnan
