Sujai Shriram
Project Manager
Sujai Shriram - Creating a Positive Experience
Sujai Shriram works as a project manager for CrossView, Inc., a full-service cross-channel eCommerce solutions provider. Sujai, along with his teamat CrossView, Inc., work to create a positive, easy experience for their clients’ customers across multiple channels. Shoppers are increasingly savvy with price comparisons, product reviews, and the timing of purchases to get the best deals.
They also expect retailers to provide a high level of customer service by tailoring to their needs. Sujai Shriram focuses on building great cross-channel solutions (web, mobile, call center, point of sale etc.) built on IBM WebSphere Commerce and SAP hybris platforms.
Sujai Shriram believes that all commerce transactions are intimate, one-on-one interactions between a shopper and a brand. Sujai’s work attempts to keep positive interaction between customer and brand, building trust and a strong relationship base between each customer and his clients’ brands. Sujai focuses on digital marketing and e-commerce, which have become extremely important to all retail companies in recent years.
Sujai Shriram - User Experience and Software
One of the dreams that Sujai Shriram has had throughout his professional career is to create an impactful product or strategy that changes the world in some way. One of his primary interests is user experience and software development. He currently works for CrossView, Inc., a full-service, global ecommerce solutions provider that lives and breathes omni-channel commerce. Omni-channel commerce focuses on the relationship between a company’s online presence and physical presence. Sujai’s goal with his clients as a project manager for CrossView is to create a positive shopping experience for all customers, no matter if they use his clients’ online stores, or their brick and mortar stores to buy their products.
Sujai Shriram hopes to one day create full-service software using his knowledge of user experience systems and the potential that software systems have to improve the experience of customers. Sujai wants to find better ways to market to customers beyond the typical strategies that marketing companies have been using for over fifty years. As technology continues to change the art of advertising, Sujai hopes to develop solutions that companies can use over all channels when they interact with customers. At CrossView, the goal is always to provide complete digital marketing services to all clients. Sujai Shriram has big goals for the future, including leading his own company one day with some of his new ideas.
Sujai Shriram - All Interaction Points
In today’s business climate, connectivity is the key to success. Connections between businesses, consumers, suppliers and others must be maintained by all parties involved in order to make money. The good news is that in this day and age, these connections are easier to make than ever because of the ubiquity of the Internet as a tool for expanding business. Sujai Shriram is one of the leading marketing professionals at CrossView, a full-service, global company that focuses on creating growth opportunities for businesses across all interaction points.
It is now easier than ever for customers to interact with businesses—whether they buy products, or services, or need their questions answered. Sujai Shriram and his team at CrossView provide e-commerce solutions for companies so they can interact with their customers across all channels of contact in positive ways. Customers need to have positive interactions through a variety of modes. When they call the customer service hotline they need positive interaction, when they shop online or in the store, they need an easy, enjoyable shopping experience.
With the rise of mobile technology, the sheer number of devices that customers can use to interact with businesses has increased dramatically over the past decade. Businesses now need to develop their marketing strategies with mobile first and responsive design techniques. Sujai Shriram and his team work with clients to create positive user experiences for all of their customers. Sujai works to create innovative marketing solutions across the commerce lifecycle and on the devices that create commerce today.
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game where two teams of 11 people each face each other on a field. The game is very popular in England, Australia, India, and South Africa, among other countries. An excerpt from http://topendsports.com:
“Cricket: A Gentlemen's Game!
Cricket was invented in the vast fields of England, supposedly by shepherds who herded their flock. Later on, this game was shown benevolence by aristocrats, and now has the stature of being England's national game. After a century now, cricket stands in the international arena, with a place of its own.
THE GAME
Cricket involves two teams with 11 players on each side. The captain who wins the toss decides whether his team bats or bowls first. If they bat first, their aim is to score a lot of runs and make sure the other team does not reach that score.
FORMATS OF THE GAME
Cricket is played in many formats, but the most popular are TEST CRICKET and ONE DAY cricket. In TEST, cricket game goes on for five days, with each team batting twice - if time permits.
ONE DAY is the most popular format, with each team getting 300 balls to score runs. And the other team tries to outscore them within the same number of balls.
KEY PLAYERS
Three functions of the players are 1. BATSMEN, 2. BOWLING 3. FIELDING.
- Batsmen - one who scores runs of the balls bowled by the bowler.
- Bowler - One who bowls, and tries to get the batsmen "out" (dismissed from the ground).
- Fielder - Players (10) who assist the bowler in achieving his goal, and prevent the batsmen from scoring runs. One of them, is a wicket keeper who stands behind the “stumps” where the batsmen is batting.
Sujai Shriram, who grew up in India, is a huge fan of Cricket and enjoys watching and playing the sport.
Planning
Planning ahead in life is not always easy. Sometimes things end up completely wrong. Sometimes we dream too big, and it makes where we are right now seem like a waiting place, somewhere we are stuck. Any good life plan should have a goal, but no goal is worth any means. That is to say, instead of focusing on where one wishes to be at all times, a person could love and enjoy every moment of where they are right now.
Making smaller plans is the best way to make bigger plans come together. “I’m going to become a great ping pong player” versus planning out a comprehensive step-by-step of how one might become a great ping pong player are like night and day.
http://www.wikihow.com has a few great pieces of advice:
“Taking a break is necessary whether you have been living it up or just taking it easy. Take two or three days, if possible, and plan to do nothing. This is different from making time for friends and new experiences; it is planned time for you to be alone with your thoughts and ideas.
Think of all the experiences you've had in life, so far. Contemplate the decisions you've made and how things have worked out for you. If you've made some good decisions, recently, congratulate yourself. If you've made bad decisions in past, don't demoralize yourself, instead acknowledge what happened as a direct result of those decisions. If you don't like the outcomes, think about what would have happened had your decisions been different and whether or not it would be worth your time to try to make corrections. Cherish your good and bad decisions and accept that you've grown and changed for the experiences.”
Sujai Shriram understands these ideas perfectly and lives in every moment he is in. He sets smaller goals and milestones, but one day plans to achieve his bigger goals.
Why Digital Marketing Matters
The evolution of the world’s marketing has taken many different turns, and changes have been so drastic that there are now multiple different avenues for people to receive persuasive messages by companies wanting to grasp their market. Print catalog marketing has slowed down in the last decade, as the increase in internet and mobile use by the population has driven companies all over the world to begin integrating better ways to reach their target market. The birth of digital marketing bridges the gap between old-school marketers and their need to reach their customers.
The art of digital marketing itself has grown very quickly in the last five years. In accordance to the increase in popularity of apps on mobile devices, as well as the monopolization of search engines over the internet, these services revolve around getting to their customers passively, rather than aggressively.
The days of cold calling and billboard advertising are nearing a close in its existence, as new and improve methods of marketing are rising that require nothing more than flowing with the movement of the market. This powerful act of marketing has made companies accelerate their portion of the industry’s market share, allowing some companies to even be created entirely off of marketing methods, such as a network marketing company.
Sujai Shriram, a Digital E-Commerce Marketer for Crossview, Inc., works with Fortune 100 and Fortune 500 companies to create multi-channel and omni-channel commerce solutions, as well as providing excellent digital marketing services. His work in the industry has been fast and fruitful, a hint that the industry of digital marketing is becoming the future of online presence and profit.
Sujai Shriram - A Brief Background
Digital commerce professional Sujai Shriram was born in a small town called Kanchipuram, located in Southern India. Kanchipuram is known for fine silk sarees (sarees are the traditional attire of Indian women). The town is surrounded by ancient temples that attract tourists from all over the place.
Growing up, Sujai Shriram moved around often, and enjoyed the opportunity to study in eight different schools across the entire country. Notably, perhaps, were the times he spent in the coastal city of Madras (now Chennai), located in southern India, the capital city of India, Delhi, , and India’s commercial hub and financial capital, Bombay (now Mumbai). While most people may instantly think moving around this much would have been traumatic to a child, it comes with its own set of benefits. One of the biggest benefits is being able to adapt to multiple different cultures, make friends easily, and speak multiple languages. In India, every state speaks a distinct language. By virtue of his experiences in all these different states, Sujai Shriram can speak 4 languages fluently, including English, Tamil, Hindi, and Kannada.
Sujai Shriram went to college to study Engineering, and graduated with a degree in Mechanical Engineering from SASTRA (www.sastra.edu). Following graduation, his first job was at TATA Consultancy Services, where he worked in the area of Business Intelligence, Project Management, and Business Development. After a couple of years, he decided to go to business school, and ended up at graduate school at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. Sujai Shriram’s experiences moving around and his ability to adapt to different cultures undoubtedly helped him make the transition from India to the U.S.
Upon graduating from his Masters program, Sujai Shriram started working as a business analyst for an interactive marketing agency called Brulant, which is now known as Rosetta. From there, he moved to CrossView Inc., where his team continues to specialize in eCommerce and digital marketing services. Every day, Sujai Shriram and his colleagues serve large retail brands and develop the best eCommerce solutions.
An Education in Engineering Management
Engineering primarily focuses on creation. Designing, building and creating are the core tenets of a good engineering curriculum. As students of engineering, we seek to understand the underlying science that governs things. We learn what materials are composed of, how cells interact with each other, and how the universe can be better viewed and understood. In the old days, engineering was a broad subject area, and then specializations developed; including computer engineering, mechanical engineering, civil engineering, and electrical engineering to name a few. Today’s engineers not only have to understand how to create things, but they have to equally be conscious of how a particular product can be used, marketed, and priced. Most successful companies or brands that we know of had a combination of a brilliant engineering mind and a savvy business one. Every Steve Wozniak needs a Steve Jobs.
After working as engineers for a few years, young professionals often find their interests diversify and evolve into other areas within their organization. One of the pathways to these diverse career prospects is a degree in engineering management. Engineering management has become a much sought after program for those who are interested in management education tailored to engineers. Many highly ranked universities like Stanford, Duke, Dartmouth, and Case Western Reserve University offer a Masters in Engineering Management. These programs specifically look for engineers who want to expand their skillsets to financial accounting, new product development & management, commercialization strategy along with leadership education. Some of these programs have a special emphasis on technology entrepreneurship, like the one offered by Case Western Reserve University. Those who graduate from these programs emerge equipped to start their own technology company or join a major corporation to help with strategy, operations or product management.
Sujai Shriram has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from SASTRA, India and graduated with a Masters in Engineering Management from Case Western Reserve University. Currently, he works as a project manager and eCommerce professional at CrossView Inc.
A Brief Analysis of E-Commerce and Its Role in the Modern Economy
How we go about buying things has changed significantly in the past decade, due to the innovations of digital technology in retail. One of the most significant changes in technology for businesses has been the transition from purely in-store purchases to multiple easy-to-access avenues (or channels) among retailers, manufacturers, suppliers, financial companies & banks, and most importantly, consumers.
The speed of shopping has increased so substantially that consumers are driving a need for the reconfiguration of supply chain management to handle the demand of orders! E-Commerce, or now commonly referred to as digital commerce, has not only changed the way we shop, it has significantly changed the drivers of our economy. Twenty years ago, no one would have imagined shopping could be completed without setting foot in a store!
As much as technology has brought us convenience, access, security, and joy to the way we shop; it is not without its own set of challenges. One major issue continues to be how well each retailer understands their customers, their ability to predict or learn what their customers are looking for, and to close the sale. Additionally, servicing customers before, during, and after each sale has become a significant differentiator for retailers to gain customer satisfaction; and in turn, loyalty, in this era where the customer is spoilt for choice and increasingly hard to please. Sujai Shriram, a Digital Marketing consultant & Project Manager for Crossview, Inc., helps retailers and brand marketers strategize and execute the implementation of omni-channel solutions for their brands.
Sujai Shriram - Reasons to Visit India
Sujai Shriram is a Florida digital marketing professional who was born and raised in India. He spent his childhood traveling to different Indian states, learning new languages and making friends. Today, Sujai Shriram takes interest in the improvement of India as a whole, and he has travelled to the country with his wife on multiple occasions.
If you’re considering visiting India, but you haven’t decided if you will go through with it yet, there are plenty of reasons to see the country. In addition to the general benefits of travel, the country offers perks like those below to all who visit…
Varied Terrain and Culture
India is a large and diverse country that is more than thirty-percent the size of the United States. Like the US, much of India is rural, and if offers striking sights ranging from the Himalayas to beaches to deserts with everything in between. With so much to see, it’s hard to get bored travelling around India.
High-Value Destination
Though India is a backpacking hotspot, cheap hotel rooms and rural villages hardly define the travel experience. Your trip to India can be as lavish as you would like it to be, and you’ll still get more value than you would traveling around many other areas. You have everything from backpacker hostels to palace hotel rooms to choose from, and it’s up to you where you want to put your money.
Hospitality
India attracts millions each year, and the country’s government embraces its popularity as a tourist hotspot. The Indian Tourism Department created the Atithi Devo Bhavah theme to help tourists feel welcome and safe on their travels. Atithi Devo Bhavah roughly translates as “the guest is God,” and it exemplifies the attitude of most that you will typically meet in your travels. Indian hospitality is famous, and if you’d like to experience it more in depth, consider a homestay instead of a hotel during your trip.
Economy
When you travel to India, you help boost the country’s economy and the wellbeing of all businesses (and businesspeople) that you interact with. Though this is true for many tourism hotspots, as you come to know the people of India, you might acquire a greater sense of happiness for contributing to the country’s wellbeing.
Food
Indian cuisine isn’t what you’ll find served in the average Indian restaurant in the United States, as most restaurants focus on Northern Indian dishes, neglecting much of the country’s vast selection of foods. Just as India’s different regions have varied scenery, people and languages, they also have different foods. Once you begin exploring the country’s culinary selection, you might never want to leave.
You don’t have to be a native like Sujai Shriram to appreciate India, as the points above should demonstrate, but you might experience a bit of culture shock. Visiting somewhere new will expose you to seemingly-strange customs and environments, but this is true with traveling to anywhere vastly different from your home country.
Sujai Shriram - Project Management Mistakes
Sujai Shriram is a CrossView Inc. project manager who specializes in Omni-channel marketing. Experienced project managers like Sujai Shriram have often made, and learned from, mistakes during the duration of their careers. If you’re new to project management, you will probably make your own mistakes, too.
The key to minimizing your mistakes as a project manager is learning from others. Studying how to avoid mistakes like those touched on below will help you reduce the likelihood of them affecting your project. Mistakes will happen, but if you’re thorough with your research, they don’t have to occur as often.
Poor Explanation
As project manager, it is your job to explain expectations and plans to your team, clients and other stakeholders. Do not assume that everyone is on the same page, make sure that they are. Poor explanation can destroy a project when each person thinks that the goals or steps are something completely different. Keep an open, ongoing dialogue between everyone involved to help prevent this.
Communication Breakdowns
Even if you explained everything thoroughly at project start, and you’ve issued an open invitation for all involved parties to submit questions, you can still run into communication breakdowns. You must frequently communicate with clients and team members, because if you do not, the project can easily fall off track. Prevent this by establishing regular check-in and reviews, engaging all who are involved.
Budget Creep
When new features or ideas come up at a meeting, you or your client might get excited and revise the design to include them. Though this is okay, such happenings can easily allow your project to creep over budget without anyone realizing it. This is why you must keep your budget in check from project launch. Check each expense before approving it to make sure that it fits within the project’s budget; if it doesn’t, request or initiate a budget revision before proceeding.
Overuse of Tools
Today’s society of apps and programs means that project managers have a plethora of tools at their disposal. Though tools are meant to be used, becoming over-reliant on them can destroy a project. Nothing replaces the genuine critical thinking of a project manager or the brainwork that you use to make a new plan. Use tools sparingly and assess if you truly need the ones you are applying to prevent this.
Being Impersonal
If your team and clients think that you’re impersonal, you might demotivate them or sap the passion from the project. Project managers are typically meant to inspire and relate, not to sit back and be robots. Prevent this mistake by being friendly, passionate and communicative.
If you’d like to learn directly from a seasoned project manager, look for a local professional with experience comparable to Sujai Shriram’s. Contacting such businesspeople can help you find a mentor and expand your network, further reducing your likelihood of making common mistakes.
For the inevitable time that you do make a project management error, always remember this: Mistakes are okay, as long as you learn from each one.
Sujai Shriram - Vegetarian Travel Destinations
If you, like Sujai Shriram and his wife, enjoy dining out and trying new vegetarian foods, the following travel destinations might have just what you’re looking for:
- San Francisco, California, is known for its healthy population and, as such, it has drawn a number of vegetarians. As a result, eateries everywhere were established to cater to vegetarian and vegan diets.
- New York City, New York, is known for having a wide selection of food, and that includes vegetarian options in most restaurants. Additionally, numerous vegetarian-only spots line the streets wherever you roam.
- Taipei, Taiwan, has a large vegetarian population because of the Taoist and Buddhist demographic. Hundreds of vegetarian-only restaurants can be found in Taipei, and most are marked for easy identification.
- Mumbai, India, has the largest international vegetarian population. The food in Mumbai is typically lacto-vegetarian-friendly, meaning that it does not contain meat, fish or eggs, but it does often contain dairy.
- London, England, is the most vegetarian-friendly city in the world, according to PETA. It earned this title as a result of its massive offerings of vegetarian take-out, restaurants and even produce stores.
- Chiang Mai, Thailand, has cuisines inspired by a mix of Thai, Korean, Chinese, Muslim, Indian and more. Most restaurants have vegetarian offerings and many are vegetarian-only.
Don’t limit yourself to the locations above, regardless of their vegetarian selections. Instead, use them as a guide and go from there, as dedicated foodies like Sujai Shriram often do.
Sujai Shriram - Professional Benefits of Multilingualism
Sujai Shriram is a Florida professional who was born and raised in India. During his childhood, he moved around his home country, attending eight different schools in various regions of India. As a result, Sujai Shriram gained friends, knowledge and linguistic skills that he might not have otherwise acquired. He learned to adapt to, and speak, several languages, and he presently benefits from being a multilingual professional.
Whether you’re interested in learning one language or ten, the following benefits are examples of how multilingualism could benefit your career…
Understanding Nuances
Many works of art have nuances that can only be appreciated in native tongue. For example, reading a translated book is a much different, often more distant, experience than reading it in the language it was written in. When you understand cultural nuances, you’re able to relate with international colleagues and to bring insights to your organization that it would otherwise lack.
Professional Navigation
Job opportunities can be found everywhere, and when you speak more than one language, you increase your scope. Additionally, employers often seek those who are fluent in other languages because it provides the future opportunity for international expansion.
Connect with Your Heritage
If your family is from a different part of the world, speaking the language that your grandparents spoke can help you connect with your heritage. Professionals who are in touch with their heritage often have a greater sense of self-confidence, giving them a subtle edge in certain situations.
Multilingual professionals like Sujai Shriram stand out to hiring managers, in part because of the perks listed above. On average, multilingual employees earn higher wages and have a lower unemployment rate than their monolingual peers.