November 28, 2025 ( TGN ) : Addressing the morning session of Day 2 of Insight: The DNA of Success on Friday, Nitin Paranjpe, Non-Executive Chairman of Hindustan Unilever Ltd, recounted a powerful story from HUL’s journey to unlock its next phase of growth. Paranjpe explained that HUL needed to accelerate growth and chose to expand its already extensive distribution network instead of waiting for the next big product innovation. Paranjpe proposed adding 5 lakh stores– a number that initially sounded absurd. Yet the audacious goal triggered a surge of energy, new ideas, and a dramatic shift in what the company believed was possible.
“Nobody expected us to get to 5 lakh. If we had got 60, 70, or 80 thousand, we would all be heroes, superheroes.” But simply adopting that audacious target created a shift. “A few weeks later, I realized something had changed. There was a different energy, a different buzz. The nature of conversation was different. Someone came up with an idea — maybe not 5 lakh — but maybe we could get to 1 lakh if we executed it well.” As the months progressed, momentum surged. “By September, it became evident we might get quite close.” They ultimately hit the 5 lakh mark that year, “beyond anyone’s wildest imagination
Reflecting on the larger lesson, he said, “Fear of failure is a debilitating emotion. It does not create creativity or innovation. And that’s when the penny dropped for me. All of us want to be heroes. There’s no one who comes to work wanting to do a mediocre job. But none of us, or very few of us ever realize or get an opportunity to do something which is genuinely heroic. And the reason for that? You’re too afraid to fail. You start working on goals which are relatively modest, and therefore we could go through our whole life without even knowing how much depth of… potential that we actually have.”
Rohit Bansal, Co-founder of Titan Capital and AceVector, offered a diamond-rare view into what it means to build, back and believe in entrepreneurs. Though widely regarded as one of the poster boys of venture capital, he admitted that he still enjoys being an entrepreneur more than anything else, but investing has become for him another way to contribute to India’s future.
In his early entrepreneurial endeavours, Bansal learned not to be shaken by failure. “We got used to failing very early,” he laughed, grateful for the resilience it forced him to build. Perhaps guided by some early advice from his father, to stick it out for 4 years, come rain or shine, he learned to adapt, iterate and keep pushing.
Expanding on the success factors that define entrepreneurs, Bansal said, “We’ve seen so many entrepreneurs who are exceptionally talented, very smart, very diligent. The only thing that differentiates those who did not become successful from the ones who did become successful is that the latter ones pushed a little harder, lasted a little longer.”
Speaking about his partnership with his high school friend and Co-Founder of Titan Capital, Kunal Bahl, he reflected, “We decided that we would succeed or fail together — everything would happen as one. That removed any need for either of us to look like the winner. As a result, every discussion is about what’s right for the business, not scoring points over each other.”
He further added, “Whenever we take decisions, we may start with completely different points of view when we start, both of us will get into a room, discuss it for some period of time, and finally come to a conclusion. Once you come to a conclusion then it is both our decisions. After that moment, neither of us is ever going to bring up who had idea A and who had idea B. From that point on, the only idea that matters is the one we’ve jointly decided.”
Sadhguru Academy is currently hosting its annual business leadership intensive for business owners and C-suite executives from November 27–30, 2025, at Isha Yoga Center in Coimbatore. The program features more than 200 participants from over 20 nations, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, and Singapore, and delves into the science of scaling one’s business as well as one’s inner capabilities.
Over the next two days, ‘INSIGHT: The DNA of Success’ will feature an eminent lineup of key resource leaders and speakers, including Shashank Kumar (CEO & Co-Founder, DeHaat); Raj Sisodia, Co-founder & Chairman Emeritus, Conscious Capitalism Inc.; and Dr. Bala Subramaniam (Professor of Anaesthesia, Harvard Medical School and Director, Sadhguru Center for a Conscious Planet). Day 1 of INSIGHT featured sessions by Sadhguru; Lord Karan Bilimoria, Member of the House of Lords of the United Kingdom; and Madhabi Puri Buch, former Chairperson of SEBI.
About Sadhguru Academy
Established by Sadhguru, Yogi, mystic and visionary, Sadhguru Academy offers the highest quality of leadership education by integrating external skill sets with tools for wellbeing. Its aim is to create leaders whose human potential has found fullest expression, who are deeply rooted in their inner well-being and are able to operate from a sense of inclusiveness, resulting in more incisive actions and decisions.
