24 hours with... Kaushik Mukherjee

Ever wondered what an ideal day in the life of someone from advertising/marketing/media is? We're here to spill the beans on it.

Every Tuesday, we'll have a person from the advertising/marketing/media industry profiled in this section.

Name: Kaushik Mukherjee

Job: co-founder and chief operating officer, Sugar Cosmetics

Professional mantra: There’s always a right-place right-time winning combination waiting for everybody. We just have to have the grit and patience to wade through the many disappointments and failures to reach that spot where the stars and our efforts align.

Personal mantra: More than personal growth, what matters is the growth we’re able to bring into the lives of our nearest and dearest ones. After all, the ones who have always been there through the ups and downs have been family and inner circle.

6:30-7:30am: This is what I call peak rush hour at our home – as both of our kids leave for their respective schools at this hour. Hence, from waking up myself to waking two sleepy kids and getting them to their buses – I supposed is the story of every urban nuclear family in India.

7:30-9am: This is when I scan by inboxes to check if there’s anything that happened overnight that needs urgent intervention – catch up on early news of the day and invest time in an unhurried breakfast before the chaos of the day sets in.

9am-2pm: This is the time usually when my workday begins, I start by walking the floor and catching up with my colleagues. I’ve learnt over time that informal unscheduled corridor banters are best to get a sense of what’s on the top of mind for my teams. Once the day settles in, I go over the task list for the day and join daily standup calls with the team to go over revenue, traffic, and other key metrics. 

2-3pm: While I have this hour marked as lunch hour in my calendar, usually it tends to get pushed on days where the first half discussions spill over. But lunch is also the time when I get my own time to look over some industry reports and make a few calls to my industry colleagues to exchange thoughts or just say hello.

3-6:30pm: The afternoon slot is usually a mix of responding to critical emails and Slack messages while connecting with the leadership of different teams to get a pulse of where the different teams are at and if anything needs to be debottlenecked to help them move forward.

6:30-7:30pm: This slot is usually reserved for informal conversations with new joiners and my immediate reportees to plan for the next day. This is also my designated slot to check-in on how the day’s metrics are performing and to plan intervention, if required, to secure the day’s performance targets.

7:30-9pm: Once home, I try to absolve myself of the guilt of not spending enough time with my kids by trying to catch them some for pre-dinner play before they get to bed. Phone calls to family members in different parts of the country also usually happen during the evenings at this time. 

9-10pm: This hour is usually reserved for some light workout – basic cardio, indoor cycling or strength training – but I say “usually reserved” because unfortunately, this plays out to plan on only 3-4 times in a week.

10-11pm: After cooling down and freshening up, there’s dinner to wind up the day – while there’s some music in the background while I check what’s trending on social media. It’s easy to get sucked into a vortex here, but I’ve always found that there’s merit in keeping a close ear to what your target audience is tuning into.

11pm-12am: As the day comes to an end, I check my calendar for the next day and my to-do list to pre-prepare myself for the game I need to play when I wake up. Beyond this, some light reading before I finally turn in for the night.