Gone are the days, when leaderships across the globe were mostly dominated by men unafraid of taking risks. Businesses, over the last three decades, have been experiencing massive evolution, with organizations today increasingly focused on adding more women for key leadership roles. An accomplished leader with around 16 years of extensive experience in the B2B industrial business sector, Priyanka Mishra started her career at BASF and over the years, has worked in various senior and leadership roles across many esteemed organizations. Currently, as the Executive Director, Country General Manager, & Member on Board at Umicore India, she is efficiently spearheading the firm’s India operation.

In an exclusive interview with Women Entrepreneur, Priyanka sheds light on her educational and professional first steps in her career at BASF, her current roles and responsibilities at Umicore, and much more.

Take us through your early education and professional background. What motivated you to venture into the field of sales and marketing?

I have been a science student throughout my school and college and decided to go for Microbiology and Biotechnology during my graduation. I did my BSc in Microbiology from St. Xavier's College, Mumbai, which was considered an extremely coveted course at that time with very limited seats. Later, I did my MBA in Media & Communication from Symbiosis International University. By the time we passed out in 2008, the market was reeling through a global crash, resulting in a pretty tough placement season. Fortunately, through the help of an alumni, I got a chance to appear for an interview to join BASF in the corporate communication domain. Rest is history.

I had a fantastic experience at BASF in terms of learning and growth. I owe a lot to my first manager, Sunita Sule, who honed me well in terms of discipline and professionalism. After a year and a half with the team, I moved to sales and product management within BASF and fell in love with the B2B industrial sales domain. Later, keeping up with organizational changes and requirements, I moved into Business Analysis and got introduced to the wonderful world of numbers and data.

We had an extremely grueling curriculum at Symbiosis. The crazy schedule even resulted in many dropouts in the first month itself. Symbiosis was extremely strict in terms of discipline and timelines. Even a two-minute delay to the class used to result in losing attendance. But those who survived those grueling schedules learned a lot about some of the most critical life skills, especially time and people management. My university days helped me become more efficient at handling pressure as well as understanding finance management. Even talking to a diverse set of people at the university honed my personality development.

Introduce us to Umicore. What are the various roles and responsibilities you shoulder as the General Manager?

Umicore is a multinational company rooted in Belgium with extensive expertise in material science, chemistry, and metallurgy. In other words, Umicore transforms non-ferrous metals such as lithium, platinum, nickel, cobalt, manganese, gold, silver, and platinum, into advanced technological and applied solutions that are used across numerous applications. Apart from that, our expertise also lies in recycling these valuable and critical metals. Long before recyclability was even a trend, Umicore has been recycling these metals for almost 140 years at its plant in Belgium, showing the world how a 'closed loop' model works successfully.

Coming to my role, I head Umicore’s Marketing Services in India (UMS), which specializes in sales, marketing, operations, logistics, and small processing units for multiple business units of Umicore. I, along with my highly talented team, help each of these businesses grow in India, quite like an incubation center. One of my major responsibilities includes being part of the conversation with government bodies in India, think tanks and various industrial platforms to be part of the future of India. Apart from that, I am also involved in the development of a growth-oriented team by way of suitable hiring, training, and guidance.

What are some of the most critical challenges you encounter in your current role and how do you mitigate them?

I would not call it a challenge, but rather a major requirement for anyone in senior management roles, which is an evolving level of communication and situational leadership. I work with both local and international teams spread over different time zones. In my current team here, I have the responsibility for nine business units, all based out of Europe, each with its own priority and strategy. This requires me to be extremely communicative but in a more customized way. Another challenge, always, is change management. Accepting changes and evolving strategy requires exceptional leadership, patience, and top-down management commitment. 

In my experience, these are simpler if the leader walks the talk. One needs to work equally hard with the team, sometimes more. It is important to accept setbacks as well as successes and focus on improving the process and optimizing efficiency. If the intent is towards overall and inclusive growth, and the team can see the vision - they will begin to believe and then the magic happens!  

Priyanka Mishra, Executive Director, Country General Manager & Member On Board, Umicore India

An accomplished industry leader with around 16 years of extensive experience in the B2B industrial sales domain, Priyanka Mishra started her career with BASF and over the years, has worked in many senior and leadership roles in various esteemed organizations. Currently, she is working as the Executive Director, Country General Manager, & Member on Board at Umicore India. An inspiring leader with a walk-the[1]talk attitude, Priyanka has done her BSc in Microbiology from St. Xavier's College, Mumbai, and her Masters in Business Administration in Media & Communication from Symbiosis International University.