The exclusive team of Women Entrepreneur Magazine indulges in a conversation with a passionate & enthusiastic leader, Rinku Agarwal, Head - Finance, Legal & HR, Interview Kickstart, who is known for her optimism, enthusiasm, cheerfulness, and her ability to see the best even in difficult situations.

Her colleagues have also given Rinku the title of Chief Happiness Officer. She is known for radiating positivity just by walking into a room with her charisma – it changes the world and people around her (even in the virtual world). But this optimism toward her work & profession did not come easy.

Her father started his life as a factory worker and soon became a business tycoon of Jodhpur but lost everything in a fire and was left with huge debt when she was 11 years old. She along with her siblings started supporting her family and became financially self independent within a couple of months.

Amidst difficulties, she completed her Chartered Accountant degree with ICAI & Company Secretary degree from ICSI in the first attempt. She has also completed all three levels of CFA Institute USA and is an IIM-A alumni after completing one year of the Senior Management Program at IIM Ahmedabad along with her full time job. She has been a university rank holder in post-graduation. For being an academic overachiever and securing a maximum number of degrees in Finance, recently she was recognized & awarded by the India Book of Records.

Rinku has a strong & rich experience of 15+ years working in diverse verticals across multiple startups as well as distinguished organizations. She is a maestro in managing the entire spectrum of financial activities, including fundraising, structuring, investor relationship management, accounts, finance, taxation, audit, treasury, compliance, FP&A, risk management, and automation in industries like Tech, AI & ML, SaaS, IT, Private Equity, Banking, and Real Estate. Her passion for building businesses from scratch has given her multiple opportunities to work with startups, where she has been prosperous in raising significant funds and making the companies financially and operationally scalable.

Currently, she is working diligently to escalate the business of Interview Kickstart by leveraging her financial skills and improving its business strategies. As the Head of HR of Interview Kickstart, she is inclusive of team members, works toward strengthening different personalities, and fosters innovation through collaboration.

She is known as the Jack of all trades, excelling in every aspect of the business. A true multitasker, she has sailed multiple boats simultaneously and created great things from nothing.

Rinku is a strong woman who gracefully accepts the war she went through and is ennobled by her scars. Let's lend an ear to the inspirational leader as she talks about her journey and more.

What are the various roles and responsibilities that you shoulder as the Head - Finance, Legal & HR at Interview Kickstart? What are your primary focus areas?

When you jump on a ship that has just started sailing, you have to often build your crew from the ground up. That was one of the first challenges I had to solve, not just for my present role but all the companies I have worked for.

Today, we're a lean startup that has achieved growth equivalent to companies with a multi fold number of employees because we've managed to create a culture in the organisation that celebrates people and rewards great performance.

I helped empower this ship with policies and processes conducive to employees, which has helped us hire only the best talent in the country. I am proud to have built a people-centric employer brand for IK that our team raves about, and recruiters use as a pitch to bring in new talent.

In addition to ensuring that every employee feels valued, I work on the "not-so-glamorous" yet crucial pieces of a business – the financial strategy, financial modelling, and long-term business planning. In short, I have to ensure we invest in the right things, build the right relationships, and always have working capital in the bank.

As the Head of Finance & Legal at IK, my core responsibility is to make strong, data-backed strategic recommendations to the Founders on a proactive (and not reactive) basis. I think being agile is the most crucial part of my job, especially in a fast-paced environment like the one we live in today. You snooze, you lose!

Within Finance, things I thoroughly enjoy and specialize in are IT transformation to make companies future-ready and automation of Financial Planning and Analysis. These help us move fast. One of my key achievements in my role at IK was empowering the employee participation plan to ensure that every single employee in the organisation participates in the growth of the company. Other aspects of my role include maintaining effective ROI on company assets.

What are some of the most pressing challenges that you encounter in your current role? How do you successfully mitigate these challenges?

In a 100% remote company, building a team of 300+ people from 28 states while ensuring that they share the same values and believe in our company mission, is already a huge challenge in itself. But I cannot boast of having built a people-centric organisation until I can confidently say that each employee is empowered to deliver their best work. And this is the most pressing challenge I fight every day because it needs constant attention and effort.

I believe that if we don't give people ownership, we cannot empower them. I worked to concretize our core value of "being an owner" into our OKRs. During performance reviews, each employee is rated on their ability to "act like an owner" by their peers, manager, and even themselves.

"Whenever I face roadblocks, I do not feel those challenges are hard enough; I address them optimistically and never say no to any opportunity that comes my way"

I also firmly recognize and honor that I can truly empower an employee only when they own everything they do, through and through, including owning their careers. Why should this responsibility lie in the hands of their manager? To put this idea into practice, I missioned a Fair and Unbiased Promotion Engine, where an employee, and only the employee, can nominate themselves for a promotion. I think this has pumped our employee satisfaction quotient massively, evidenced by our Glassdoor rating of 4.8 stars.

In the financial aspects of business, IK being a bootstrapped business, the primary challenge is the effective utilization of resources and leading as a facilitator, not as a controller of Finance. However, I was able to create a balanced equilibrium between our inflows and outflows, especially during the pandemic, even through several ups and downs.

What are some of the most significant milestones that you have achieved throughout your professional journey?

I consider an achievement a milestone only when it has positively impacted one or more lives. During the Covid pandemic, the toughest times our generation has seen so far, businesses were in turmoil, and the employed workforce of the country was in bigger turmoil.

I had an opportunity to work with 2 companies during the pandemic times. While companies were looking for ways to cut down people's expenses, we never considered it an option. As a team we spent hours in meetings to strategize a plan B. We fought hard to achieve financial stability in our operations and motivated our teams to perform better than ever.

In both cases we had pulled through! Not just that, we gave hikes to every employee!!

Learnings from the first wave of the pandemic helped me keep costs in check early on at IK, which gave us the flexibility and agility to move to other revenue streams during the second wave.

Throughout my career, I have been a part of 2-10X growth journeys of startups. And, surprisingly, of those that have managed to do that in just 2-3 years. Along the way, I was part of two extremely high-value fundraising processes. At BrowserStack, I extensively contributed to their $50 Mn round. Following that was the $20 Mn round for Quantiphi, where I played an important role in raising money from Multiple Alternate Asset Management, a fund led by Renuka Ramnath, one of India's largest private equity fund leaders.

What has been the driving force behind your success?

I started working when I was 11 and still in school. I did not hesitate in doing any odd jobs right from making rakhis, to running hobby classes to tutoring kids. When I look back, I was very happy to work and study at the same time. What kept me going was the hope that by the end of this, I would be able to contribute towards my family and make my parents proud. Also I was always full of gratitude for having such a beautiful and healthy family where after 14 hours of hard work, we could sit together and laugh together without worrying about what's going to happen tomorrow.

I am not a fan of textbooks in practical life (even though I have so many degrees (hahaha!!) . I love learning by talking to my team members and clients and understanding the people around me. That's exactly how I stumbled upon great founders who had extremely complicated and challenging problems to solve. I thrive on such challenges because nothing excites me more than solving problems that others tell me are tough. Challenging the status quo is where I love to start.

"If I could inspire these families, I'm sure every time a young girl aggressively follows her passion and achieves success is, along the way, inspiring a village, and not just other women"

All the discomforting situations that I have seen as a child motivates me to keep moving toward my goal. So, whenever I face roadblocks, I do not look at them as challenges; I address them optimistically and never say no to any opportunity that comes my way.

The ideologies and values I carry are also my driving forces. I believe in open-mindedness and the power to perceive things through fresh eyes.

What would your advice be to young women who aspire to become business leaders in the future?

I would say, do not let others define your limits and your capabilities. Believe in your dreams, passion, and caliber. You may not want to become a business leader; you may want to be a great photographer or an Olympic hockey player. Your definition of success doesn't need to resonate with the people in your society or your family. Dream of your success and work for it. It's ok to give your 200% to things people say you will fail at. Don't let them define your boundaries because nobody knows you and your capabilities better than you.

I am the first girl child from the entire generation (most of them are in small towns & villages) to leave home, move to a big city like Mumbai, and work for a large corporate company. That inspired several families in my town & village to educate their girl children and not get them married young.

If I could inspire these families, I'm sure every time a young girl aggressively follows her passion and achieves success is, along the way, inspiring a village, and not just other women.

Rinku Agarwal, Head- Finance & HR, Interview Kickstart

Rinku is a distinguished leader in the finance industry with strong academic qualifications and 15+ years of diversifying professional experience. She is a happy-go-lucky professional who wants to travel the world twice. She is a startup enthusiast and often spends time sharing valuable insights with emerging founders.

Headquarters: Bangalore & Santa Clara, California

Awards & Recognition:

 Recognized & awarded by the India Book of Records for securing a maximum number of degrees in Finance

Make a difference award at IK for social impact outside office