{"id":3043,"date":"2026-10-17T05:15:22","date_gmt":"2026-10-17T05:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/?post_type=blogs_updates&p=3043"},"modified":"2026-10-17T05:15:22","modified_gmt":"2026-10-17T05:15:22","slug":"what-it-takes-to-build-a-business-without-losing-your-principles","status":"publish","type":"blogs_updates","link":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/?blogs_updates=what-it-takes-to-build-a-business-without-losing-your-principles","title":{"rendered":"What It Takes to Build a Business Without Losing Your Principles"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

My conversation with Madhur Daga, Managing Director of Orient Bell<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my conversation with Madhur Daga, Managing Director of Orient Bell, I wanted to understand the decisions behind the company’s growth in India’s manufacturing sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do you build a business in a highly competitive industry without compromising on quality? How do you modernise a company your father spent decades building? What happens when the people who helped build the business are no longer the right people to take it forward? And, perhaps most importantly, how much are you willing to compromise to make the numbers look better?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our conversation moved from family expectations and entrepreneurship to acquisitions, leadership, ethics, addiction and meditation. What connected these seemingly different subjects was one recurring idea: building a business is important, but deciding what kind of business you want to build is even more important.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Family Expectations to Building Something of His Own<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

When I asked Madhur why he joined the family business, his answer was immediate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy dad.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a familiar answer for anyone who has grown up around an Indian family business. You study, you work hard, your family builds something substantial, and eventually you are expected to carry it forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur joined the business in 1994, after completing his undergraduate degree at the University of Southern California. But within a year or so, he realised that he wasn’t enjoying it. He wanted to pursue technology instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What followed was not the conventional next-generation journey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He pursued further education and founded a company working on wireless software at a time when mobile phones were still relatively basic. He ran the business for around four to five years before selling it to a system integrator with operations in the Middle East and Malaysia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That experience mattered. Madhur had built something outside the family business, found customers, developed a team and experienced entrepreneurship on his own terms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When he returned to Orient Bell around 2004\u201305, it was a different decision from the one he had made a decade earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was no longer returning simply because his father had asked him to. He was ready to take responsibility for building something within the family business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For me, that distinction is important. In a family enterprise, the next generation may inherit a responsibility, but commitment has to develop in its own time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Hardest Leadership Decision Was About People<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

One of the most revealing parts of our conversation was Madhur’s account of changing the company’s leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He believed that if he was going to make a meaningful difference, certain senior people and their teams would have to leave. Some had been associated with the business for more than a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Imagine being in that position. You are relatively new, you are questioning decisions made by people who know the business far better than you do, and you have to convince your father that the existing structure needs to change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur’s father did not simply dismiss his concerns. But he gave him an important warning: making a decision is easy; living with it is harder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once the decision was made, Madhur would have to take responsibility for the consequences. He could not return later and ask his father to reverse the decision because things had become difficult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That lesson stayed with me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leadership is not just the ability to identify what needs to change. It is the willingness to own the consequences of changing it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur also made an important distinction: someone does not have to be a bad person to be the wrong person for a particular stage of a business. Personal relationships and professional alignment are not always the same thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For family businesses, where loyalty and long-standing relationships carry enormous weight, that is a particularly difficult lesson to put into practice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turning Bell Around: Why Acquisitions Need Patience<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In 2012, Orient acquired Bell, which Madhur described as a loss-making business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I asked how long it took to turn the company profitable, I expected an answer involving several years of restructuring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His answer was: one year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The speed of the turnaround was striking, but what interested me more was his explanation of what it required.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He spoke about the importance of assembling the right team, improving SKU management, controlling costs, reviewing raw-material procurement and supply contracts, and understanding the business before making decisions that affected people’s livelihoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was particularly conscious of the uncertainty employees face when a loss-making business is acquired. People naturally worry about whether their jobs will survive the transition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur explained that he wanted layoffs to be the last line of defence, not the first response to a financial problem. The team worked through other opportunities to improve the economics of the business, and he communicated that employees’ jobs were not automatically at risk, while making it clear that expectations would change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another challenge was cultural. Bell had a strong presence in South India, a market where Orient Bell had comparatively little presence. Madhur recognised that the company’s existing understanding of the market was not enough. He had to spend time there, listen and understand how the business operated locally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is a lesson in acquisition strategy that extends far beyond tiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Buying a business is one thing. Understanding its people, relationships, customers and regional context is another. A successful acquisition requires more than financial modelling; it requires patience and the ability to learn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Question of Growth Without Compromise<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

One of the questions I wanted to put to Madhur was about something I had heard associated with Orient Bell: its zero-bribery reputation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In industries where institutional sales can involve pressure to compromise, refusing to participate can raise an uncomfortable question. What if sticking to your principles slows your growth?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our discussion moved beyond a simple yes-or-no answer and into the financial discipline behind the business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur spoke about how companies can chase top-line growth by extending credit too freely, allowing customers to delay payments for months while continuing to supply products. He said Orient Bell had not followed that approach and cited a working-capital cycle of around 20 days as something he was particularly proud of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then he shared a lesson from his father that brought the conversation into focus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His father had taught him that if a business decision left him unable to sleep at night, he had failed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur explained the trade-off in simple terms: he would be comfortable with a business generating \u20b9200\u2013300 crore where he could sleep peacefully over one generating \u20b93,000 crore at the cost of that peace of mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was not saying that growth was unimportant or that Orient Bell could not become much larger. He was saying that growth could not be the only measure of success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That, to me, was the heart of our conversation about business ethics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The point is not that doing business ethically is always easy, or that choosing principles guarantees the fastest growth. It is that a founder has to decide which lines are not for sale, even when crossing them might appear commercially attractive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why a Tile Company Needs to Think Like a Technology Company<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Madhur’s background in technology has also influenced how he thinks about Orient Bell’s future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During our conversation, he spoke about three patents: antibacterial tiles, cool tiles and anti-static tiles. He sees product innovation and research as important ways for the company to differentiate itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is an interesting shift in perspective for a traditional manufacturing business. Instead of competing entirely on price, a company can look for ways to solve customer problems through product development, technology and quality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We also discussed the challenge of competing in a market where manufacturers can operate at very different price points. Madhur’s response was not to obsess over every competitor or predict exactly how the market would behave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was to focus on what the business could control: pricing, efficiency, better contracts, stronger channel relationships and moving towards products that offer greater value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He also described why he brought professional management into Orient Bell, including the appointment of a professional CEO in 2018.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His view was straightforward: ownership and management do not always need to sit with the same person. A promoter should understand where they add value and allow professionals to lead the areas in which they are better equipped to perform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That requires confidence, but also a certain humility. Being the owner does not automatically make you the best person to do every job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Personal Transformation Behind the Business Leader<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The most personal part of our conversation came when we spoke about Vipassana.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madhur has practised it for around ten years and described it as something that has fundamentally changed him as a person. The experience involves periods of silence, isolation from ordinary distractions and a level of discipline that he openly described as difficult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He spoke candidly about his own health, his earlier habits and how stress can turn alcohol into an escape. He explained that Vipassana helped him become more self-aware and eventually led him to stop drinking. He was also careful to explain that he did not consider the label \u201calcoholic\u201d appropriate for his experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What interested me was not simply the practice itself, but what it had taught him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you spend time sitting with your own thoughts, without the usual distractions, it becomes harder to avoid uncomfortable questions about yourself. Madhur described Vipassana as a process that strips away the ego and helps you recognise patterns you might otherwise ignore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He connected that awareness to fitness, resilience and his wider outlook on life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At one point, our conversation turned to the difference between worrying about business performance and recognising the value of being alive. When you have faced serious health challenges, he suggested, a disappointing business outcome can begin to look very different in perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was a reminder that the person running the business cannot be separated entirely from the decisions being made within it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Personal discipline, self-awareness and emotional resilience may not appear on a company’s balance sheet, but they can influence how a leader responds to pressure, uncertainty and difficult choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Legacy Is Inherited. Leadership Is Built.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As our conversation came to an end, I found myself returning to the question that had run through the entire discussion: what does it mean to take a family business forward?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Madhur, the answer was not simply to preserve what his father had built, nor to discard the old ways in favour of a new identity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was to understand the business, make difficult decisions, improve its systems, embrace innovation, trust professional management and remain accountable for the values that guide it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The conversation also challenged the familiar assumption that a business must compromise its principles to survive in a competitive industry. Madhur’s approach was grounded in financial discipline, quality, long-term thinking and a willingness to accept that the right decision may not always be the fastest route to growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I came away with a simple thought: the test of leadership is not just how much a company grows, but how it grows and what it takes to get there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Legacy may give you a starting point. It may give you a name, a history, a team and an established market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it does not automatically make you a leader<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My conversation with Madhur Daga, Managing Director of Orient Bell In my conversation with Madhur Daga, Managing Director of Orient Bell, I wanted to understand the decisions behind the company’s growth in India’s manufacturing sector. How do you build a business in a highly competitive industry without compromising on quality? How do you modernise a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3044,"template":"","class_list":["post-3043","blogs_updates","type-blogs_updates","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/blogs_updates\/3043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/blogs_updates"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/blogs_updates"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextinlinewithmohitgoel.com\/blogs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}