The discussion now obviously veers towards the automotive segment. Dr Goenka uses that as an example to explain how the Group is now evolving into being a customer centric organisation, a journey that started about 10 years ago. "Around 2003, we were at the bottom of JD Power CSI (Customer Service Index) and SSI (Sales Satisfaction Index). That was almost like a jolt to us. Since then we have worked very hard to change it."

While product quality is a very big contributor to it, Dr Goenka points out that the Group is equally focussed on how the customers are treated in terms of the whole experience of buying and getting serviced. "Now we rank amongst the top three but we are nowhere near done."

AFS is now working on an initiative called Crusade. "It is primarily driven by creating delightful customer experience. We do believe that there is room to differentiate ourselves in the auto segment. There is an unfortunate perception that Indian companies do not care for customers. That hurts me because it is not true. Yes, we do have a legacy that we have to get over with. But today we try as hard as anyone else; may be even harder. We have to get to a point where nobody ever says that Indian companies do not care for customers."

Crusade has two parts to it; one is on the product side and the second is on the experience side. On the product side, the aim is to get the product first time right and also getting it every time right. "Once we have launched the product, we should not get into any kind of issues," Dr Goenka explains. A lot of effort is also going in to the R&D side.

"This involves the way we design, develop and validate our products. At the plant level, it is about the way we are putting the focus on quality in terms of sourcing as well as the overall operations. We involve our suppliers in this initiative. In fact, we just came back from a supplier conference where this was the main topic of our conversations. The emphasis is on how consistent quality comes from suppliers because 70 percent of what we put in the vehicle is coming from them."

All shopfloor employees are working towards making Crusade a big success. "Even before Crusade which we launched last year, the sensitivity to quality at the shopfloor level has been very high right from 2003. You will see displays at the shopfloor reflecting how we are performing against the competitor and how it is very important to us even as a customer. As a customer what you will expect from a product is what we need to deliver as a provider of that product to our customers."