Sunil Gavaskar and Zoya Akhtar on courage, craft, and conviction
McKinsey Partner Raunak Shah (left) hosts a panel with filmmaker Zoya Akhtar (middle) and cricketer Sunil Gavaskar (right) at McKinsey’s Brilliant Moves: Live event in India.
At McKinsey’s Brilliant Moves: Live event in India, cricketing legend Sunil Gavaskar and acclaimed director and producer Zoya Akhtar reflected on the instincts, setbacks, and convictions that shape enduring careers. From the cricket pitch to the film set, their stories revealed that bold leadership is about discovering an inner compass early, sustaining discipline through failure, and leading with integrity when others are counting on you.
Their journeys echo a broader truth for leaders today: Lasting impact comes not from chasing applause, but from staying grounded in values and showing up consistently for the people you lead.
Building confidence before the spotlight
Before instinct becomes reliable, confidence has to be earned—often in the least glamorous roles.
For Zoya Akhtar, that foundation was laid long before she directed her first film. At 21, she was an assistant director on Kama Sutra, managing logistics on a period production without mobile phones or digital tools. Her job was to cast hundreds of extras—soldiers, ministers, villagers—by traveling into communities, photographing people, explaining the project, and organizing daily transport to the set.
It was painstaking operational work, far removed from the creative authority she would later hold. But it proved formative: Doing difficult work well, repeatedly, until complexity felt manageable built her confidence. “I felt after that job, if I could do that, I could do anything,” Zoya says.
For Sunil Gavaskar, confidence was forged under a different kind of pressure—public, relentless, and physical. As a young and, as he puts it, “vertically challenged” cricketer facing some of the fastest bowlers in the world, intimidation was part of the job. “Everybody used to bully you,” he says. But the more he faced it, the steadier and more resilient he became.
Over time, repetition evolved into something deeper: “Self-belief has got to be your strongest suit.”
In different arenas, both leaders found that early mastery of the fundamentals builds the inner certainty that later supports bold decisions.
Discipline in the face of doubt
While early success can build confidence, sustained excellence requires discipline—especially when results falter.
Sunil’s debut series in the West Indies made headlines. But what followed was a three-year stretch without scoring a century. “That was the time when I had started to actually doubt my own ability,” he says.
Instead of retreating, he recommitted to the fundamentals and sought advice widely. “I must have talked to hundreds of senior players and coaches to try and find out what was going wrong,” he says. Hours of deliberate practice slowly rebuilt his confidence.
From that period emerged a counterintuitive philosophy—to remember what it feels like to succeed in more difficult moments: “Success should go to one’s head,” Sunil says. “For as sure as night follows day, you’re going to fall down. And if you can lift yourself up, you also become a better human being.” Failure, in his view, is not a detour from leadership but one of the forces that shapes it.
Humanity as the universal language
A chance experience encountering a young rapper reminded Zoya that discipline in her work is important, but it can’t replace humanity—the universal arc.
“This is the Rocky of rap,” she remembers thinking of the rapper. “I don’t know anything about boxing. I love Rocky because it’s a human story. It’s about an underdog.” She saw he had formed an emotional connection with his dedicated following. “Just go with the emotion of the story. Everyone will come to the rap.”
Her philosophy is simple and expansive at once: “The human experience is the same. Trust the humanity of it. The humanity has to be up front. Whatever your story is, that is one thing that is common.”
In business, as in film, leaders often grapple with complexity in markets, metrics, and strategy. Yet the connective tissue remains human motivation: aspiration, fear, belonging, hope. When leaders anchor decisions in that shared emotional ground, they widen their reach.
Elevating the team, not just the individual
For both leaders, leadership matured in moments that required standing up for others.
Sunil became one of the earliest high-profile players to advocate for improved conditions and fair treatment within cricket administration. “For me, it was all about trying to do something for my cricketing brotherhood,” he says.
He felt speaking up was a responsibility. Many teammates, he observed, were hesitant to challenge the status quo. Leadership meant using his platform on their behalf.
Zoya echoed this ethos from the director’s chair. “When things go well, it has to be shared with all,” she says. “But when they don’t, you’re the captain of the ship.”
Over the course of multiyear film development cycles, she focuses on creating environments where people feel ownership of the work. “Only when they feel the project is theirs do they bring their A game,” says Zoya.
Across sport and cinema, the pattern is consistent. Enduring leaders see their role not as the star performer, but as the steward who creates conditions where others can excel.
Instinct guides decisions, discipline sustains performance, and integrity holds it all together.
Whether facing hostile bowling attacks, navigating creative risk, or challenging institutional norms, both Sunil and Zoya return to the same principle: Stay true to your values. While external validation and headlines may fade, credibility with teammates, collaborators, and oneself will endure.
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