Making the Elephant Dance: The Turnaround Story of SAIL

Arvind Pande has worked as the chairman and CEO of SAIL from January 1997 to September 2002. During this period as chairman, he led the company in a major transformation and turnaround, facing challenges after decontrol of the steel industry and entry of new private players and supplies from overseas players. He joined the Board of SAIL as a full time functional director in August 1986, in different areas such as corporate planning, personnel, finance, Rourkela Steel Plant, and special steel plants. He worked as a vice chairman from 1992 to 1997. After superannuation, he was an independent director in several private and public sector companies such as HDFC Bank, Coal India Ltd, Sandhar Technologies Ltd and Visa Steel. He chaired the Board of Bengal Aerotropolis Projects Ltd which, along with Changi Airport of Singapore, have built the first private greenfield airport at Durgapur in West Bengal. He advised POSCO (South Korean steel company) for several years and chaired J-PAL South Asia (2009-2012). He was the member of Government of India Board for Reconstruction of Public Sector Enterprises (2004-2014) and member of conciliation board for ONGC, NTPC, NBCC. Arvind Pande had joined the Indian Administrative Service in 1965 and has had varied experience in different districts.

Sanjay Kumar superannuated from Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) in September 2019, as Chief General Manager, after serving it for more than 30 years, in various capacities. After joining SAIL in 1988 as an economist in the Business Planning Directorate, at its Corporate Office, he rose to head the business planning function of the company. In his tenure at SAIL, he was actively involved in tasks pertaining to strategic planning, joint ventures and business development. He was also a part of the investors relations team that regularly interacted with the investors, merchant bankers and equity analysts on the performance and prospects of the company and the steel sector. Some of the key assignments he handled included formulating long-term strategy for the company―SAIL Vision 2030, Corporate Plan 2012 and Corporate Plan 2005. He developed the demand module for India Vision 2020 for the World Steel Association. He was also a part of the team that prepared the 'Investor Relations Guidelines' for the central PSUs in 2011. Mr Kumar was a key member of the team that formulated and implemented SAIL's Turnaround Strategy in the years 1997-2003. Subsequently, in the chairman's secretariat, he dealt with the issues related to the company's special steels business, cost reduction strategies, business environment analysis and contemporary issues concerning the industry. He holds a master's degree in economics and business administration from the University of Delhi. An avid sports fan, Sanjay Kumar has diverse interests encompassing music, reading and watching movies.