Shahani Group MD logs off from work at 6 pm, says discipline important to strike balance during WFH

Work from home has gone better than expected for Dr Akhil Shahani, MD, The Shahani Group mainly due to his company’s strong reliance on IT.

"We quickly adopted MS Teams for regular team meetings, Bitrix24 for tracking allocated tasks and projects as well as an inhouse developed CRM system for managing student lifecycles. Interestingly, our team was more productive during the lockdown due to this," he told ET Panache.

Shahani has a separate den for work and entertainment which keeps him out of the way of his family


"A good quality polo t-shirt and shorts is all I need for WFH," he added.

The 51-year-old's biggest issue was keeping his team members motivated and engaged.

"We interspersed our regular formal MS Team meetings with fun online events like Antakshari, quizzes, etc for the team and also had a company-wide WhatsApp group for jokes and forwards to encourage bonding among the team," he said.

Shahani wakes up at 6 am and goes for a walk. He then goes into his study around 8 am to start the work day. He eats lunch with family and then is back to his study for the afternoon work session. He switches off from all work sharp at 6 pm.

"I give strict instructions to my team to only contact me for emergencies outside work hours. I spend time with my family doing fun activities like playing board games, chatting, trying out new recipes, etc. It’s all a matter of having the discipline to switch off from work when needed," he said.

For exercise, the South Mumbai resident likes to take long walks in the morning or evenings.

"Otherwise I’ve controlled my diet and am doing intermittent fasting through the week. Without the attraction of restaurants, my health has actually improved over the last three months," he said with a chuckle.

Shahani has taken some interesting online courses to upgrade his skills. "Work related courses include data analytics, behavioural science and financial modelling. A couple of fun casual courses on mobile photography and learning the guitar have rounded off my continuing education," he ended.