These days I'm learning to build with intelligence. AI agents that do real work, starting with my own personal assistant. It's uncertain, it's hard, and some days it humbles me.
Twenty-two years ago, on a call centre floor, I could never have imagined this. To explain how I got here, I have to go back.
I started by learning. Customers on the phone, all day, every day. That is where I learned the business, from the side most people never see.
Then I built. A corporate channel where there wasn't one. Apollo, a digital distribution model that brought the whole channel, from distributor to the smallest retailer, onto one platform for sales, stock, loyalty and communication. Easypaisa, taking a digital wallet to merchants and customers across the country.
But what mattered most was never a platform. It was culture. Teams that put the customer first and held each other to a high bar. A region ranked ninth became national champion within a year. Engagement held at 83 percent through a merger. That is what high performance looks like to me: people who choose to bring their best, even when it's hard.
Underneath all of it was one belief: telecom is about empowering societies, not selling connections. Taking networks to underserved communities. Putting a wallet in a phone. Bringing more women into field sales through Parvaz. That is the part I'll carry the longest.
Some years asked for more than skill. Turnarounds. A restructuring that changed people's lives. COVID. The Sindh floods. Those were the years I learned that leadership is showing up for people, not presenting to them.
I made my share of mistakes along the way. Each time, a boss or a colleague was kind enough to tell me, and patient enough to let me put it right. I owe them more than they know.
Later I was asked to advise, sharing what we had learned with sister companies in Bangladesh and Malaysia. And the part I'm proudest of was the teaching: watching people I'd worked alongside step into leadership roles of their own.
None of it was mine alone. Thank you to my family, who carried more of this than anyone saw: the late nights, the missed dinners, the weekends that weren't. To my friends, who kept me honest. And to every colleague who sat across a desk from me, on a call centre floor, in a regional office or in a boardroom. Whatever I built, we built.
Looking back, it was always the same four things, on repeat. Learn something new. Build with it. Help others with what it taught me. Teach it forward. Whenever I stopped doing one of them, I got slower. Whenever I did all four, I got sharper.
I've lived through every wave of this industry. Voice, when a phone was still a luxury. Connectivity, reaching places that had waited years for a signal. The internet, then e-commerce, then money moving through a wallet. Every wave felt uncertain when it arrived. Every time, the same loop carried me through.
In July I closed my chapter at Telenor, on my own terms. Now the next wave is here: intelligence. Same game. I've just changed ends.
NOT THE FINAL WHISTLE.
KICK-OFF.