Invest in employees to build up firms

Employees have to be given an industry’s best financial compensation, actual authority and due respect to build a successful business organisation, a top entrepreneur said yesterday.

Latifur Rahman, chairman and chief executive of Transcom Group, one of the largest conglomerates in Bangladesh, said companies give employees designations but how much authority people get really has to be seen.

“As employers, we must pay our colleagues a financial compensation that is the best in the industry; otherwise, they will not stay. We will have to give them meaningful empowerment and show them the highest level of respect.”

The noted entrepreneur made the remarks while delivering a lecture on ‘entrepreneurship towards creativity’ at Daffodil International University (DIU) in Dhaka.

The lecture was part of the DIU industry academia lecture series on entrepreneurship development, launched by the Innovation and Incubation Centre at the university.  

Rahman’s Transcom started off with tea plantations in 1885. It is now one of the country's largest conglomerates, with operations in the areas of manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, electronics, beverages, media, consumer, food and insurance.

The group has an annual turnover of more than $600 million, employing over 14,000 people. Its pharmaceutical products are exported to 27 countries.  

Rahman, who won the prestigious 2012 Oslo Business for Peace Award for maintaining commitment to social responsibility and ethical values, recalled his beginning.

Born in 1945, he has had a comfortable life. In 1966, he started his career as a trainee in the family-owned jute mills, W Rahman Jute Mills, in Chandpur, which was the first jute mill owned by a Bangalee in the erstwhile Pakistan. He worked as an executive in the jute mills right up to 1971.

But when the government nationalised industries in 1972, Rahman found himself in a very difficult situation.

The family owned some tea estates in north-eastern Bangladesh. But after the independence of Bangladesh, the price of the produce was less than the production cost, as Pakistan was not importing the brew.

“It was a question of survival for me. But I did not give up hope.”

In the same year, the entrepreneur came across a Swiss company and started a trading business. There was no looking back since then.

As his business activities branched out into different sectors, he established Transcom Group in 1981.

The seven-time president of the Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Dhaka urged the young students not to be disheartened in times of difficulties as adversity is a part of natural progression.

“You should continue fighting. You should live up to your values, courage and character.”

Rahman said there are huge opportunities for entrepreneurs in Bangladesh. “There are ideas all around us. So, young entrepreneurs will have to keep their eyes open and work on them to become successful.”  

Rahman, 72, rejected popular perception that there are no qualified people in Bangladesh. “We are as good as any professional in the world. We have quality people. It is a question of providing them the right opportunities, atmosphere and guidance.”

He said there are no shortcuts to success. “You may see some people become successful by cutting corners, but the success will not sustain in the long run.”

The youth has the potential to grow and they have to be given the opportunity to tap into it, he added. 

Rahman drew an example from the apparel sector. “Twenty years back, no one thought that our garments sector would have such tremendous growth. Now we are the second largest supplier of readymade garments to the world and our exporters are taking the sector to the next stage.”

According to the industrialist, workers’ rights can not be ignored as they are integral part of any company. He added that the labour rights situation is improving gradually.   

Everybody in an organisation is already an entrepreneur as they take decisions as part of their day-to-day work, he said.

“Employers also have responsibilities to promote entrepreneurship by way of delegating more authority and freedom to employees.”

He termed his employees as colleagues. “They are running the companies. I have never heard that anybody from our companies has siphoned off any money in the last 40 years.”

A member of the International Chamber of Commerce, Rahman said in a globalised world, business practices and standards would have to be the same across the country. “One can’t compromise on standards.”

DIU Chairman Md Sabur Khan said businesspeople like Rahman have been taking the country forward through hard work and industrial revolution.

“I respect him particularly because of his ethical business practices and his emphasis on transparency and leadership development.”

Prof Yousuf Mahbubul Islam, vice-chancellor of the university, said the most important thing about the Transcom chief is that he has built up successors.  

During the programme, the DIU authorities announced that it would establish two scholarships in the name of Latifur Rahman and his grandson Faraaz Ayaaz Hossain, who was one of the 22 victims killed in the Holey Artisan Bakery terrorist attack in July last year.

Rahman also asked students of the university to stay aware of terrorists as their activities are anti-Islam and anti-values. 

Arshad Waliur Rahman, a director of Transcom Group, and Zaraif Ayaat Hossain, elder brother of Faraaz, were also present.