‘Ravindra, these ex-servicemen have dedicated their lives to the safety of our nation and now they need the nation’s support and care. I am hopeful that you will find a way to do something for them.’
A quiet transformation began in Patna in 1973, when a young journalist, Dr. R.K. Sinha, inspired by the heartfelt appeal of social reformer Jayaprakash Narayan to support ex-servicemen, made a bold decision to leave his ₹ 250-a-month job that led to the creation of Security and Intelligence Services (SIS), which today stands as a global powerhouse in security and facility services. Now led by his son, Rituraj Sinha, it has grown into a global, multi-billion-dollar enterprise built on purpose and values.
So how did an accidental entrepreneur, without any formal management education, create one of the largest global companies in its industry? And how does SIS keep its employee-centric culture intact despite rapid scaling? What’s the secret behind its high-risk acquisitions of global companies and turning them around successfully?
‘The SIS Story: From Accidental Entrepreneur to Global Conglomerate’ (HarperCollins India) is a powerful and inspiring account of this extraordinary 50-year journey of grit, vision, and purpose. The book comes with glowing endorsements from Uday Shankar (Vice Chairman, Jio Star), Rajdeep Sardesai (Author and Journalist), and Arundhati Bhattacharya (Chairperson and CEO, Salesforce), offering readers a powerful and inspiring chronicle of one of India’s most remarkable business transformations.
Co-authored by renowned journalist and biographer, Prince Mathews Thomas, The SIS Story traces the evolution of the SIS Group — from a small beginning in Patna to becoming a global powerhouse in security services, facility management, and cash logistics, employing over 3,00,000 people across India, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore.
Prince Mathews Thomas is a financial journalist with 21 years of experience. He has worked in leading business newsrooms including The Economic Times, Business Standard, Dow Jones Newswires and Forbes India. At present he is Managing Editor at The Morning Context. Through these years, he has written about leading business houses across industries, analysing their business models and management style.
In order to delve deeper into the SIS story and to know more about the evolution-journey of this global security conglomerate, Sonakshi Datta of GoaChronicle posed a few questions to Prince Mathews Thomas.
‘The SIS Story’ Author Prince Mathews Thomas
What purpose and values have gone into the building of the global powerhouse in security and facility services, that is SIS?
When Mr RK Sinha founded SIS in 1975, the intention was not to build a multinational. SIS was his response to a call to help ex-servicemen find jobs. As someone who wanted to do the job well and in the best way possible, Mr Sinha took multiple decisions through the years that led to the business growing and scaling, first beyond its home market Bihar, and then – after Mr Rituraj Sinha took over – it diversified into other verticals like facilities management and cash management.
All through the years, the purpose and the values have remained the same. The purpose is to provide employment to those at the bottom of the pyramid, training them and educating them. The values are to ensure employee satisfaction first, and then servicing the client’s needs. By ensuring these two, SIS created a sustainable business, grabbing the opportunity that a developing economy like India’s offered.
How would you define the 50-year journey of SIS? What challenges do you think Mr. RK Sinha and his team faced, and how were they grappled with?
Mr Sinha was a journalist who became an entrepreneur by accident. He was not a management student. He was not from a business family. And, in today’s startup speak, he did not have the luxury of a seed capital at his disposal. Thus, he learnt on the job, and at the same time went by his entrepreneurial instinct. SIS faced several challenges, some that even threatened its very existence. There were financial challenges, including times when the company did not have enough money to pay salaries.
At one point in time, it was losing clients to a multinational that had recently entered the market. In later years, some of its planned acquisitions failed to materialise, or some deals collapsed. These were serious setbacks. One of the biggest was during the pandemic. The business was disrupted; operations came to a near standstill and there was a fear that the company may run out of money to pay salaries.
Interestingly, as often happens in entrepreneurship, businessmen have the uncanny ability to sometimes make the best out of the worst times. And that is what happened through SIS history. Some of its weakest moments turned out to be the strongest. And that is down to entrepreneurship and keeping the interests of employees and clients as top priority.
And that is what is the essence of this 50-year journey-entrepreneurship that had social good at its heart.
What are the most important learnings that one could take from the journey of Mr RK Sinha of building SIS and its evolution?
Mr Sinha had a great connect with his people. He put them at the centre of his organisation. His people were his product. He was the first, not just in India but probably in the world, to start a training academy in a security company. Apart from that, there was no trade unionism in SIS, a rare achievement for a security company.
Second was his focus on client and servicing the client. In the book, there are many instances when SIS went the extra distance to ensure its clients’ requirements were met.
Technology. SIS was among the first in the country to start using computers. This was back in the 1980s. That focus on technology has become SIS’s strength today.
And lastly, the focus on systems and processes. Mr Sinha brought in the best of talent to implement this in SIS.
Of course, there is also how a family business can professionalise itself, and ultimately, SIS is also a great example of a hassle-free transition from first generation to the second.
In other words, a budding entrepreneur can learn a lot from The SIS Story.
How do you think the world of entrepreneurship has changed over these last 50 years, moving from the pre-liberalisation, post-liberalisation and globalisation, to the modern digitised times?
I would think that the basics of entrepreneurship do not change- spotting a market opportunity, creating a product, taking risks, having a vision and taking tough calls. What they have to do is to keep up with the changing times-be it technology, financial markets, policy changes and understanding customers’ needs that do not stop evolving. And that the challenge they have.
Many businesses/entrepreneurs have folded. Some of the big names of the license raj are not there today. Even in the post-liberalisation era, some entrepreneurs have withstood the competition, some have not been able to. That is the biggest challenge: tech-enabled pivots are happening very fast now. Entrepreneurs have to be on top of their game to remain in the reckoning.
What makes ‘The SIS Story: From Accidental Entrepreneur to Global Conglomerate’ a must-read for all, especially for people from business backgrounds and aspiring entrepreneurs?
The SIS Story holds invaluable lessons for entrepreneurs, second generation businessmen, for family businesses looking to professionalise, businesses looking to scale, how to handle generational changes within a business, how to make good of an acquisition, the importance of financing. The book holds a lot of important lessons.
There is also a lot for those who like business history and understanding the evolution of the Indian economy in the last 50 years.
Eventually, this is a book for anyone who likes a good story. And SIS’s story is an excellent one with a lot of colour, drama, characters and suspense.
