Golden Age to Platinum Years: Crafting a Spectacular 60+

One of my favorite poems about aging with a cheerful insouciance starts like this:

“When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.”

Meenakshi Menon, a grandmom of two who’s currently in her sixties, might be exactly the kind of stereotype-busting person that the poet Jenny Joseph conjures in these lines. Despite fracturing her spine and donning a back brace, Menon poses at 65, for a founder’s photograph. She has, after all, recently launched two enterprises: a non-profit and for-profit social impact venture, both aimed at boosting the joie de vivre of the 60-year-olds and older. Slicing the target group into two cohorts – 60 to 75, and 75 plus – GenSxty Tribe intends to build online and offline communities to address the desires and anxieties of a growing segment.

Dispelling notions of our demographic dividend resting on the shoulders of the 15 to 64-year-olds, Menon plans to demonstrate that the 60-plus crowd can yield an abundance of grey-celled and twinkly-eyed riches. Who better than one of its spry insiders to banish the concept of a passive or lethargic late life? Before delving into Meenakshi’s spirited plans for her venture, I’d like to briefly wade into her past. She has, after all, lived the kind of doughty life that embodies Michelle Obama’s words: “There is no limit to what we, as women, can accomplish…”

I draw lessons from a lively two-hour conversation with Menon, that has not just been hugely inspiring and instructive, but also loads of fun.

Embrace Diversity from an Early Age

Meenakshi was born in 1959. In 1961, her parents moved to a village in Vasai, in the Palghar district of Maharashtra. In an area pockmarked with banana farms and betel leaf or paan gardens, she attended a village school called St. Anthony’s. She frolicked with kids from the East Indian paan-maali community; or with children of farmers, tribals and fisher folks. Since her mother was Goan and her father Malayali, she spoke a mix of Konkani and English at home. “Dad couldn’t be bothered with teaching us Malayalam,” she laughs.

At school, however, and with friends, she spoke in Marathi. As a result, she remains deeply bilingual, with her Marathi as fluent as her English. Since her two older brothers had been sent to boarding school, she was mostly alone at home, with her much older parents.

Imbibe Offbeat Hands-on Experiences

Her mother, who was a registered nurse, also ran a nursing home in one corner of the farm. Meenakshi was often summoned to help, even when she was just 10 or 12-years-old. She grew up doing stuff that many kids wouldn’t have encountered ever. Like giving newborn babies baths, helping ayahs undress patients or assisting nurses with dispensing medicines. There was no sense of some tasks being loftier, or below your capability.

Much later in life, this experience was leveraged to found a nonprofit called Way Beyond Media to promote maternal education and behavioral changes in millions of girls and women.

Explore Diverse Pathways With Books and Conversations

Her father insisted that her language skills be superlative. So she devoured books. Conversations at the dinner table would revolve around politics, literature, architecture, ancient history, anything and everything.

At the age of 9 or 10, she had gobbled up Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy and was completely enamored with his wry, pithy observations. She resolved straightaway that she would build a career in the field. Thereafter, her Dad and she would dissect the book, the man and various ads.

Instill Equality Early to Build Confidence

On holidays, her rambunctious brothers brought mayhem into the house. The oldest was 9 years older than Meenakshi, and the second was 6 years older: “They were complete ruffians.” Once, when her brothers were home, her Dad was out looking for them, wondering where his three children had vanished. When he found them, behind a pig sty, he was horrified. “I was five at that time. My brothers were getting me to smoke, having rolled up some newspaper with coconut husk.” She had never seen her father as infuriated. He walloped the boys, without further thought. “In those days, if the children were out of line, you hit them.”

Because of growing up with these older, rough-and-tough brothers, Meenakshi was never daunted by men or by patriarchal systems. More significantly, her parents had always treated her as an equal.

Persist Through Setbacks

After acquiring a degree in Sociology and Geography from Elphinstone College, she intended to apply to IIM Ahmedabad. Unfortunately, her father passed away just then. To fund expenses, her mother, at 58, returned to her nursing work. Menon too needed to earn, so she spent her days selling cars at the Bombay Cycle and Motor Agency to gruff taxi walas. And signed up for evening classes at KC College, for a Post Graduate Diploma in Marketing and Advertising. To cap it all, she garnered a gold medal at college.

When she landed an interview with a top agency, she felt it was going really well, because the interviewer – a male senior leader – seemed deeply invested in their hour-long conversation. At the end, he said she was not cut out for advertising, and should try her luck elsewhere. In the hotel industry or in travel and tourism. Meenakshi left that meeting feeling utterly devastated.

At home, she wept like crazy. Her mother asked her: “So are you giving up?” The question shook Menon, because she realized she certainly wasn’t. She procured a book that listed all the nation’s advertising companies, planning to knock on each one, from A to Z.  Fortunately for her, the CEO of the very first company, Adplan, hired her.

Adapt to Industry Shifts; Mentor Generously

When she worked at Lintas for fourteen years on a spectrum of brands, exiting as the Director BBY1, she quickly intuited shifts in the landscape. She opted to move to the Media wing, setting it up and heading it for the agency. As a colleague and boss, she admits that she was fierce and demanding. Ashish Bhasin, who was later the India Chairman at Dentsu, was reporting to her at one point. He still jokes about how he needed leave to get married and Meenakshi insisted that he couldn’t take off. Not until he had handed over everything.

On the other hand, she also has many people – old colleagues, new acquaintances – who often reach out for advice. As someone who has always been invested in people, she can be remarkably empathetic when the situation calls for it.

Negotiate Flexibility to Integrate Work-Life

While at Lintas, her life morphed in other ways. She got married and had a daughter. Soon after the delivery of her baby, however, Alyque Padamsee, the CEO, called her back to work. While she had been away on maternity leave, the Johnson & Johnson relationship had collapsed. This was a key Lintas account and Alyque needed Meenakshi to resuscitate it. She agreed to return in a month’s time on one condition: that she could return home during her baby’s feeding times over the next six months.

Menon acknowledges that she belonged to a generation, “where work was life, and balance was what you never had in your account.” Fortunately, she loved her work. She was, after all, spearheading iconic brands, altering the culture in memorable ways. Like launching the nation’s first credit card, the Diners Club card. Or running Johnson & Johnson’s campaign for baby care products with the striking “no one understands babies better than mothers and Johnson & Johnson.” Or launching ads for Wheel detergent powder, to wrest back market share from Nirma.

Learn From Unique Mentors

More than the campaigns, she vividly recalls the people she worked with. Like the iconic Alyque Padamsee who infused a theatrical flair into everything.

Or Ajay Shrikhande, who later moved to the Gulf. When Meenakshi describes Shrikhande, she chuckles: “Here was this lanky 6 feet 4 inches man, who would walk into the office with a steel tiffin box.” She remembers him nonchalantly digging into his tiffin, with his tie flipped over a shoulder. With a childlike candor, he admitted that he couldn’t brook bhaaji stains on his tie. Such mellow and unpretentious mannerisms masked stringent expectations for superlative work.

Looking back, she says she learned marketing from Shunu Sen of Hindustan Lever (now Unilever), advertising from Alyque Padamsee, and business from Subhash Chandra of Zee, where she worked after Lintas.

Chase Success with Sass

At a time when Zee was setting up shop in an exploding mediascape, she worked closely with Subhash Chandra. It was a stint that taught her the mechanics of starting up a business.

Wooed away from Zee by the Carat team in the UK, she then built out the Carat India business. While kickstarting the first independent media business in the country, she fought an uphill battle with the “old boys” at advertising agencies.

Menon, of course, was a gritty go-getter. She wasn’t cowed down by folks who ghosted her. “If people didn’t reply to me, I’d write to them two, three times, and then I’d write to their bosses.” Such persistence paid off. Non-responders were asked to proffer apologies by chafing bosses.

Turn Clients into Lifelong Fans

After Carat, Menon was confident about running her own business. Leveraging her expertise in the media and marketing analytics space, she set up her own company, Spatial Access. By the eleventh month, the venture broke even on operating costs.

Intent on adding discernible value to her clients, she wasn’t chasing soaring valuations. For instance, earlier Bajaj Auto used to spend about INR 250 Crores on advertising. Menon’s team shrunk this to INR 80 crores. A book titled “Pathbreakers”, about the nation’s 26 top achievers, featured Meenakshi on its list.

She ran the business successfully for 17 years, and sold it to Deloitte in 2020, at which point she had garnered 150 blue chip clients, ranging from MNCs to Indian companies. For instance, Hindustan Pencils, one of their first clients, was still on board when they were acquired.

Leave a Green Footprint

Menon has always harbored a strong social conscience. Her parents had always transmitted the message: “But for the accident of birth, you could be in that place.” In addition to cofounding Way Beyond Media, she founded Vanashakti, a nonprofit that helps conserve forests, wetlands, wildlife corridors and habitats.

Some of their wins include the mapping and protection of ecologically sensitive zones at the Sanjay Gandhi National Park or having portions of the Thane Creek declared a “Flamingo Sanctuary”.

Flip the Script on Invisibility

Her latest venture, GenSxty Tribe, was sparked off by a personal experience. One day, when she walked into a Chroma shop to buy an iPhone, the salesperson sized her up. By her silver hairs tucked into a disheveled bun, and her cotton sari. With the gentle tone of a Kindergarten teacher, he suggested she look at an Oppo instead of an iPhone. Menon promptly whipped out her iPad and retorted that she was already familiar with iPhones.

Reflecting on the incident at home, she realized what had transpired. Because of her silver hairs, she was framed as being rather klutzy with technology. “Suddenly the penny dropped, and I said, you know what? When you get old, you become invisible.”

Sensing how such invisibility could seep into many dimensions of one’s being, including one’s relations with family, friends and ex-colleagues, she felt that she had stumbled on another raging social issue. One that affected not just her, but everyone in her cohort: “From Mukesh Ambani to the watchman at our complex.”

While joint families might cushion the transition for some folks, nuclear families, a pervasive youth culture, sudden layoffs and the empty nester syndrome amplify the psychological and physiological impact of retirement. GenSxty Tribe intends to address gaps in Health & Fitness, Finance & Legal, Travel and Community for the 60-plus crowd.

Interactions with her platform and with other members of the Tribe would drive positive behavioral changes  that can foster many more healthful decades for Gen Xers, and Baby Boomers. GenSxty will tie up with hospitals, insurance providers, job portals, fitness and nutrition experts to curate a range of goods and services for members. Initially launching in five cities – Delhi, Bombay, Bangalore, Goa and Pune – they plan to spread to many more locales.

While she embarks on this zesty journey, Menon herself proves that age is no barrier. As she imbues her life and the world with many more splashes of purple.

References

https://www.gensxty.in/

https://vanashakti.org/