About Nalanda Joglekar
Hi, I’m Nalanda.
I share thoughtful stories to help you cut through the noise and get better at what you do.
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I chose to pursue Humanities as an undergrad and it changed my life forever.
It freed me from formal education and allowed me to explore topics I was curious about. And it enabled me to go on adventures, physical and mental.
I traveled and collected knowledge, in the form of stories. About people from long ago, of places that are now gone and paradigms that have shifted with the sands of time.
I graduated with a Masters’s Degree in History from the University of Pune in 2000.
It was time to enter the university of life.
I continued to experiment, explore and expand my horizons.
Attempting an exam where 1.5 lakh candidate apply for a mere 600 jobs taught me persistence and patience. It was the same scene year after year.
I stopped my attempts after trying thrice to get in and began managing a bookshop instead.
From 2002 to 2004 I lost myself in books I could read for free until I realized I was not growing.
Instructional design was a nascent field in India in 2004 and I got my big break to get in. Only based on a story I wrote. It was the first time my words clicked.
It was a happy place that encouraged rapid learning which really meant everyone did everything and built processes as we grew. I managed 3 accounts and a team of 23 people. We consistently got first class customer ratings.
In May 2011, I popped into an international expedition crossing the Gobi desert on foot. We covered a 1000 km in wind, harsh sun and sand storms, in the ways of the nomads. Pitching tents each night, tending to the camels, cooking and walking at first light.
By then I felt like I had touched the professional ceiling at the company and accepted a move to a bigger organization.
I was a fish in the ocean but the learning did not stop.
I consulted for learning and org development, managed tech projects with high customer satisfaction ratings and moved into operations.
That was new game. It came with a much larger team – 46 people – and included staffing to site security. I was one helluva ride and I loved it.
My bosses pushed me in a good way. They encouraged independent thinking and allowed mistakes so I could learn from them – in short, nothing could be in the way of my growth, if I put in the work.
But I did not see me being them, in the long run. They were fantastic leaders, passionate about what they were doing. I had a ring side view as they created great teams, grew the biz and the people with it.
As much as I admired it, this was not me.
And I had too many other interests to focus just on growth at work – travel, writing, adventuring, woodworking.
It came down to a battle for attention and time.
I quit in 2018 to travel and write full time. It changed my life as I knew it once more.
All along, I continued sharing and listening to stories. Of people, places and new paradigms.
They helped me frame questions that I struggled to define.
And my unusually high levels of curiosity made me seek the answers to grow.
Questions is how I found my life’s purpose.
My purpose in life is to help.
To the best of my ability.
It has been a long journey. I am not audacious enough to define the end, but I am as eager as a bunny to see where it leads me.
Sometime those questions outnumber the answers. Then, I turn to the mountains for a way out.
It is a wonder that more people need to experience. To be up there, see the interminable peaks and witness incredible sunsets.
Time spent in nature is full of whispered questions and answers that come unprovoked.
Your needs are simple, the day is uncomplicated.
Your body needs to get you from point A to B, but your mind soars to heights your body will never attain and fetches the answers you’ve been seeking.
The more primitive it is, the better it gets.
To anyone hesitating to step out, I can only say don’t deny yourself the awe of outrageous magnificence that nature inspires.
Let your first adventure be the first of many.
One of the best outcomes of finding my purpose was I started writing grant proposals for NGOs in 2019.
There were a series of hits and misses as I struggled to understand how to craft compelling documents that would catch the funder’s eye.
Finally, I learned the ropes myself and after about 27 proposals, started seeing some acceptance.
Besides my grant writing service, I’m putting together a Grant Writing Course to take a you from a confused to a confident writer in a matter of weeks.
That’ll the first actionable course about grant writing in India. Know more here.
I’ve never confined myself to one role, skill or job. I’ve let my interests and sense of adventure lead me on.
My adventures include:
- Opening and managing a thriving bookshop.
- Learning on the job in the nascent e-learning industry in India.
- Walking a 1000 km across the Gobi Desert in Mongolia supported by Bactrian camels and a Kazhak crew.
- Up-skilling my way to head Operations of a Business Unit with a 4500 head-count in an Indian Technology Major.
- Trekking in the Indian Himalayas, and on multi-day hikes in the Alps.
- Turning around a loss making gymnasium in the middle of the pandemic.
- Surviving being scammed by a someone I called a friend.
- Traveling to 24 countries.
- Seeing a snow leopard in the wild among the high peaks of Ladakh.
- Heading an nonprofit to create life changing adventure experience for persons with and without disabilities in India.
- Writing two articles every week since 2020 here and on medium dot com
- Walking 63 KM in a day to raise Rs 1.12 lakhs for a personal fundraiser campaign.
- Launching a handmade clothing accessories and home decor business to a first year revenue of 0.5 million rupees.
- Crafting winning grant proposals for nonprofits in India with a top grant of Rs 22 lakhs.
- Completing several triathlons, half marathons and a Half Ironman races.
- And now, building India’s first actionable course on grant writing for writers.
