Girish Mathrubootham tells it all in “All in” — Book Review
Just a couple of days ago I picked up Girish Mathrubootham’s memoir “All In” (written with Pankaj Mishra) at a Crossword store, along with Bill Gates’ “Source Code”. As soon as I reached home, I started reading the book and completed 17 chapters in one sitting, finishing the last few the next morning. It was a breeze to read, written in lucid prose. It told a story that was raw and real, and without too much “gyan” (generic advice). Girish comes across as someone who is full of energy and ambition. Much like his idol Rajnikanth, his story is a fairy tale, rags-to-riches, and you end up with no doubt that Girish deserved his success.
Having been in the software products and software-as-a-service (SaaS) business for the last 17 years, I have seen the meteoric rise of Girish from the early days (~2011) to the IPO in 2021. Freshdesk (and later Freshworks) became the poster boy of the Indian SaaS industry, and Girish its rockstar founder. As a straggler to the ecosystem, I had met Girish once at a SaaSBoomi event (I was introduced by Avinash Raghava), but there was no space for a chat. Girish was already the centre of attraction, surrounded by fawning founders, something that continues to date. I had heard Girish’s story in bits-and-pieces from friends, so I was looking forward to reading this book ever since it was announced.
The book covers his difficult childhood in Trichy, to college, the early ups and downs of his career, then a long stint at AdventNet/Zoho and finally the fireworks at Freshworks. Thrice in his career he moved to the US from Chennai. The first time during the Y2k bubble, then while setting up Zoho’s office in Austin and finally for the thrust to IPO in San Francisco. His own transformation between these journeys has been nothing but astonishing. He is supported by a loyal and close knit cast of characters led by his wife and friends who became colleagues. I can imagine Girish to be an extremely charismatic leader inspiring belief and loyalty in everyone around him.
His stints in running his own business (as a trainer) were interesting, but the defining part of his career was working with AdventNet/Zoho for nearly a decade. These are also the best parts of the book. Zoho itself is a legendary company with Sridhar Vembu making a sharp “guest appearance” in the story. I hope there is a book on Zoho in the works as well, because that is another fascinating story that needs to be told. Girish’s own leadership style is defined by the Vembu brothers, particularly Kumar Vembu who also identified Girish’s early talent and backed him to take up leadership roles all through the years. I am sure Girish was hugely impacted by Zoho’s no-nonsense style of doing business and staying true to the ethics of building software products. Girish was able to leverage this tribal knowledge later in his stint at Freshworks to build multiple products.
The other defining part of his journey was that Girish was able to attract both talent and financial backers through his journey. From Shekhar Kirani of Accel, to Lee Fixel of Tiger Global (the constant character in the two largest Indian startup exits). After Flipkart, Freshworks was one of Fixel’s greatest hits (maybe something to do with the letter F?). Once entrusted with capital, Girish was able to infuse a deep sense of energy and purpose in his team and execute a multi-million dollar exit for the team and investors. More often than not, founders lack self-belief and give up too easily. Not Girish. He was able to push his team to do incredible work and grow in multiples for several years, setting the stage for his final act, the IPO.
While it is a self-assuring and inspiring book for founders, my biggest gripe with the book is that it is too rosy and optimistic. Sure Girish was immensely successful, but it felt that success came almost too easy. Too often founders and teams don’t realise the amount of stress and exertion that is required to make success happen. And even that may not be enough. You must be backed by the right investors as well, which is always a difficult thing as there are so many founders vying for funds. Freshworks in itself was not an innovator but a clone of other products (Girish may have made a virtue of the “rip-off” comment, but the point still stands). In its years of existence, Freshworks probably never made any money, even though several investors cashed out. And ultimately, while the story was written in India and stars an Indian, it was always an American company. It was registered in the US and had mostly US investors. The book also glosses over this fact.
In spite of these flaws, it is a wonderful book and a great inspiration to startup founders. Girish put in his heart and soul in the company and it clearly shows. Along with Sridhar Vembu, Girish showed us that Indian companies can build products and be successful. Now that the benchmark is set, I hope more Indian companies are able to build products that are truly ground-breaking and impactful globally. India has had such few genuine product successes through the years, and it makes perfect sense to celebrate each one of them.
