Meet Piyush Jain
Executive Director, Consulting, Deloitte Singapore
Faces of Deloitte TMT is a series of articles exploring the personal histories of our people, sharing the key experiences that defined their values and exploring why they do what they do. In this story, Piyush Jain talks about overcoming self-doubt and building confidence.
The simplest explanation for what Piyush Jain does is that he helps companies solve problems. “The greatest satisfaction comes when we help put a company back on the right track,” says Piyush.
Piyush was born and raised in Jodhpur, a city of about two million people in northern India. Although he grew up in modest circumstances, he knew he wanted to achieve more and was inspired by the idea of education as a great social leveller. Although in high school he wasn’t the best student, he was curious, diligent and focussed. And though he knew pursuing a degree in business at university would bring him opportunities, he never imagined he could eventually work for a leading global consultancy like Deloitte.
Based on his experience, he now understands how a good team and strong mentors are essential to getting over that confidence hump. “I’ve been fortunate to work with many smart and capable people,” he says. They helped him navigate a string of positive engagements and with that, his self-doubts disappeared.
Piyush first worked at a multinational packaged foods company and then took a job at a local bank performing financial research and analysis. But then he was approached by a recruiter from Deloitte—which was expanding its presence in India. “I happened to be in the right place at the right time,” says Piyush.
While he saw working at Deloitte as an exciting and life-changing opportunity, Piyush did have some doubts about his own preparedness for the position. “I didn’t know if I was really ready to make the leap from a local investment bank to a large, global consulting firm,” he says. “When I think back on those first years, I realise how important confidence is to one’s success."
One of Piyush’s favorite activities is to get out of the city and explore the countryside. “Being close to nature is my way of unwinding” he says. He hopes someday to visit such far-flung locales as Mount Everest—and even Antarctica. “With the average summer temperature in Jodhpur over 40 degrees Celsius [104 degrees Fahrenheit], I can’t imagine a place on earth more different
It’s especially gratifying to me when I realise that, because of our work, thousands of people—people like the ones I grew up with—will get to keep their jobs.
Why TMT?
Piyush has mostly focused on the TMT industry in his career. He enjoys working in this fast-moving industry, where companies emerge seemingly out of nowhere to become industry dominators. “It’s very satisfying to participate in a client’s growth story,” he says. And in an industry as disruptive as TMT, he also finds it gratifying to help those companies not be positioned for change succeed.
