For this month’s Apollo member interview, we sat down with Meena Harne from India. Among other things, we discussed climbing the ladder at her current company, her concerns about carriers and always aiming for customer delight.
How did you get started in the logistics industry and what has your journey been like so far?
After finishing my post-grad in 2005, I was working as a lecturer in college for around 3 years. Meanwhile, my sibling started working for a shipping agency and I was attracted to how growing & challenging this field was. So I took a year’s course in shipping to understand the basics of it. Upon completion, I joined my first logistics company, where I worked for around 4 years as a customer service.
Later, I joined my current company in 2013 where I worked on various roles starting from pricing, key accounts, sales till being a team leader. I am happily associated with my company for 10 years now, taking care of Overseas Networking Dept. for our 27 branch offices nationwide. It has been a rising journey where I find myself emerged as a person who can use her skills in the best way, productively, effortlessly & enthusiastically.
If there is one thing that you could change to the logistics industry, what would it be and why?
Being a forwarder, we are always trapped between shipping carriers and end customers as both will always have their own set of terms in their favour. Most of the times, the issues arise due to unorganized/mis-managed process at carrier’s end, their monopoly and ignorant behavior, delays in their responses, due to this forwarders/customers end up paying huge extra costs. So I would strongly want to have some strict regulations set by some international governing body on shipping carriers to make them more responsible and professional in serving customers.
What do you like most about the industry and your job in particular?
This industry is an inevitable part of any business & economy and is always evolving. Hence it is going to be everlasting. That makes any shipping professional feel secure about their career growth as well as stability.
How do you set yourself apart from your competitors?
I would describe it in simple words, that is “customer delight”, we take care of customer’s needs and are flexible in customizing our service/process to suit their requirements. This, we do with our technical knowledge and expertise of handling various types of cargoes. Be it a project oversized cargo, a perishable/temperature controlled cargo or any general cargo, our process is always evolving taking in to consideration our customer’s feedback & requirement. For that, we keep ourselves upgrading matching current industry practices & customer’s requirements and also by being prompt in our actions/responses. And that gives us an experience of having a customer delight.
What do you like the most about being a member of our logistics network?
We are relatively new to your network, so far it has been wonderful interacting with network staff as well as network members. Also your web-portal is quite good and has detailed information about members.
How do you relax in your free time?
I listen to music, like to read and watch movies & travel/visit some good nature-rich places in my free time.
— Thank you, Meena !