Exclusive | Incredible Ravi Subramanian of 'The Incredible Banker'

An alumnus of the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore, Ravi Subramanian is president and chief executive officer, Shriram Group (non-chit), Mumbai. He has worked with various multinational banks, including Citibank, ANZ Grindlays Bank and HSBC, in a career span of more than 18 years.

 

He shot to fame with his maiden fiction venture, ‘If God Was A Banker’ in 2007, which went on to become a bestseller, selling 200,000 copies.

 

Initially it was just an attempt to put together his experiences in the banking sector. But he actually fell in love with what he was doing. Eventually writing became a much serious activity for him which demands much more of his time now.

 

Ravi Subramanian’s third book, The Incredible Banker was the last in his trilogy of banking chronicles—after If God was a Banker (2007) and Devil in Pinstripes (2009)—The Incredible Banker is set in a foreign bank and tells the story of two employees who get embroiled in “dirty” corporate politics and become scapegoats.

 

The motivation behind his writing he considers to be purely his heart’s desire. He wanted to leave a legacy behind. According to Subramanian people tend to forget CEOs, but they always remember what has been written. Hence the first step towards writing. The success of his first book further motivated him and the responses he got mattered a lot to him. His experience of 18 years in the banking industry helped him to write on it. All his books deal with the banking industry, particularly in the foreign banking space.

 

He believes in the saying that the truth can only be told through fiction. He is of the opinion that one can relate to the story better in a fiction and characters in it are better remembered. Also according to him ,lessons learnt from fiction stay with the reader.

 

Ravi Subramanian, the only Indian author who writes in the genre of Corporate Fiction is all set to launch his 5th book which is the first of its kind, international corporate thriller, which evolves in the backdrop of a Multinational Bank and its Indian operations.  Ravi Subramanian goes the Digital way to unveil his upcoming book chapter by chapter through graphic illustration.

 

Ravi Subramanian took out time to talk to Adgully about his love for writing, the banking industry today and his new book ‘The Bankster’ which is ready to be launched soon. This is what he had to say:

 

Ravi Subramanian has come up with a unique idea to launch his next book ‘The Bankster’. He intends using the first ever digital format to promote the book. Commenting further on this he said, “More and more youngsters are reading books today. My books, which are in the genre of Corporate fiction, are targeted at this segment of the population. Tracking reality very closely, they do sensitise the readers to what life in a corporate looks like. This generation is very tech savvy, always online, either on social networking or for something else. If one has to connect with them and strike a chord with them, online promotion is the key.”  According to him the larger story also relates to the fact that the fabric of the internet has metamorphosed.  It is now a place to connect, to talk about shared interests, share information and collaborate and if one needs to be seen by this generation, a presence where they interact is a must.

 

Interaction has to be in a very interesting, different and unique manner whereby people who find this promotion interesting will come back to buy your book he said. He is also of the opinion that it is an inexpensive and targeted method and nowadays one need not be really rich to run heavy duty marketing campaigns. This is the first time any book is being launched in this format.  

 

He further said, “Through this campaign, we propose to introduce the characters of the book to the audience who have read my earlier books and are connected to me over social networking. This will generate a certain degree of curiosity in the audience, and raise the buzz around the book. The interesting aspect is that over the next 8 weeks, we will be releasing the pictorial Manga comics style depiction of the chapters of the book in the format of a daily soap. Customers will be able to follow, through regular updates on facebook, upto 40-50% of the book, leading into the launch of the book.”

 

Being the first time that any book has been launched in this format he is enthusiastic about the launch  and also expects to generate a certain amount of intrigue, without revealing the entire story.  

Mr.Subramanian has written four books prior to “The Bankster” .  When asked if his earlier books too were in the  genre of corporate fiction he went on to elaborate and said, “  Prior to “The Bankster”, all my earlier books – If God was a Banker, Devil in Pinstripes and The Incredible Banker, have been set in the world of Multinational banks. I believe that for any story to engage the reader, it needs to have all the elements of a pot boiler –fraud, deceit, organizational politics, money, relationships and sleaze – all of which can be found in modern day world of multinational banks. Hence I have woven all my stories around life in a foreign bank. That said, my stories are industry agnostic and the storyline would have been all the same, had it been set in any other industry, probably the specifics would have been marginally different.”  

Being an innovative launch, we asked him what success he foresees for his book. He said, “ I expect this innovative launch to spur the readers to talk about this book, generate a certain intrigue and whet their appetite for reading the book. I expect them to reach a level of curiosity wherein they go out and buy the book the moment it is released. The Incredible Banker which was my last book, sold over a 100000 copies within the first year of launch… I expect the buzz generated as a result of this success, to reach out to more people in the target audience and make them eager to read the book. I will be happy if this book replicates the success of The Incredible Banker, but within six months of launch.” 

  Elaborating on the plot of the story and what he intends to convey to the readers through the plot, Mr. Subramanian said, “The Bankster is a corporate thriller. When I wrote this book, my intent was clearly to entertain the reader, to make it enjoyable and transport him to a completely different world – the world of MNC banking. I have not tried to be preachy or give a message to the reader through this book. It’s an out and out entertainer. 

 

Mr. Ravi Subramanian has planned to unveil his upcoming book chapter by chapter through graphic illustrations. We were keen to know if this process would reveal the plot of the story and cause a setback to the mystery element in the book. Sharing his views regarding this he said, “This is exactly the challenge I had in front of me when I thought of going down this path. How does one keep the suspense element intact while making sure that one reveals just enough to generate an intrigue and a desire to know more in the customer? I wanted to make sure that the critical parts are not revealed and at the same time letting the customer know that there is more to the story than what he is seeing in the digital soap – and for that he has to buy the book and read. It was difficult, but manageable.” He promises readers  that the fun element in the book will not be lost once they have read the book after seeing the Digital soap.  

 

Of late a new trend has been observed. In the present day scenario global banks are crashing to unimaginable depths. Commenting on what he would attribute this trend to he said, “In the olden days, banks used to be plain simple retail banks, where people used to go for keeping their money and cutting cheques. Isn’t that what banks were supposed to be doing in the first place. Today banks have evolved to gigantic monsters doing complex transactions, which even many bankers don’t understand, leave lone the regulators. The money involved has grown manifold. This has led to the emergence of a banker driven by greed, lust for power and the willingness to make compromises. The culture of conscience is being fast replaced by the culture of tick marks, where people are willing to push the lever on what’s acceptable from a compliance perspective. Short-term profitability pressures are replacing long-term objectives.” This he said contributed to the banker turning into “The Bankster”! 

 

Mr.Subramanian has been in the profession of banking since the past 18 years. When asked to elaborate on how and when during the span of his career did his passion for writing start, he said, “I had always wanted to write. It’s a bit strange, but my need to write was inspired by a very strong feeling on my part to leave behind a legacy. I wanted to be remembered long after I am gone from this planet. And writing was the best means to do so. Long after one is gone from this planet, a book in some library in some corner of the country will remind people that someone called Ravi Subramanian once wrote a book (a few books).  

 

He went on to say that his eighteen years in banking made sure that the books were set in the global banking industry. After close to two decades, one has seen and experienced enough to write quite a few stories. He is surprised that no one else has chosen to write in this field, thereby leaving the field wide open for him to play around and experience in.  

 

On an end note he said, “When I started writing If God was a Banker, my first book, it was purely by chance. My wife was away for a month on a training program. My daughter, who was six at that time, would go to sleep at 9.00PM. TV can get really boring if forced upon you. And that’s when I decided to put pen to paper. I wrote the first few pages. I didn’t have any inkling of the direction the book would take. I showed the first few chapters to a few friends of mine, who liked what they read. From thereon the desire to see the book through, kept me going”.  

 

Hence readers can eagerly look forward to an intriguing journey where greed, ambition and  lust for money and power rule.  This  is portrayed through the racy build up to unraveling of the ‘who-done-it’ plot, where  stranger than fiction characters emerge, faith gets shattered and ivory towers come crashing down in the Digital Thriller Soap  called ‘The Bankster’.