The Eq Of QI

Dato’ Sri Vijay Eswaran, Founder and Executive Chairman of the QI Group, gives up a slice of his packed schedule to talk to Business Today as the group celebrates two decades of growth.

- Amanda Suriya Ariffin & Aron Raj

Walking into the brightly-lit and cool lobby of the QI Tower in Petaling Jaya, the first thing one would notice is the life-size statue of Mahatma Gandhi captured in motion, dressed in a loincloth and grasping a walking stick. It is a beautiful sculpture in its simplicity, and a sign of what’s to come.

Dato’ Sri Vijay Eswaran, Malaysian success story, born in Penang to a civil servant father and a schoolteacher mother, is a devoted follower of the principles and ways of the late iconic Indian leader; as Eswaran and his phalanx of sharply-dressed CEOs and Deputy MDs follow us as we are given a tour of the office, there are more artistic tributes to Gandhi on more walls.

“I regard Gandhi as a corporate icon for us,” he beams; “He spanned the entire globe as a man on a mission.”

Which isn’t too far a description of Eswaran, really. Despite his careful, quiet demeanour, there is evidence to show he, too, is on a global mission to conquer.

Adulation and deference follow Eswaran everywhere he goes. The soft-spoken man, dressed in a well-cut charcoal grey suit for our meet, commands the kind of snap-to-attention loyalty and readiness more often seen in, for example, the Oval Office.

I mention this to him; after all, whilst waiting for him I was first greeted by his PR team, and a short while later, a trio of his right-hand men, including a deputy MD, a CEO and a Director. They are all charming and erudite; and all of them look as if they’d stepped out of the pages of GQ; Eswaran laughs good-naturedly when I mention this in passing. More to the point, they are all ready and focused, standing close by.

Clearly, Eswaran is in charge, and his army of deputies gush nothing but admiration for him.

He smiles beatifically. “20 years – it’s in the blink of an eye. It’s hard for me to swallow the thought that it’s been 20 years.”