I still remember this moment like it happened yesterday. I was around 14 years old, living with my family in a small slum in Mumbai. It was the early 90s when India was changing fast, and new things were starting to show up in the markets due to the new globalization initiative.
One of those things was the Pilot Pen.
It had this sleek body, a fine 0.5mm tip, and it wrote so smoothly. It looked elegant, almost magical, especially compared to the leaky, rough pens we used in school. When my friends started showing up with their Pilot Pens, I wanted one so badly.
That night, I told my sister about it. We talked about how cool it looked, how we both wanted it. But there was one small problem: it cost 50 rupees.
Back then, 50 rupees was not a small number for our family. My parents were working incredibly hard just to make ends meet, to put food on the table and keep us in school. Spending that much money on a pen simply wasn’t an option.
But instead of giving up, my sister and I made a plan.
At that time, both of us worked part-time at a small box factory after school. We used to go there from 6 to 9 every evening and earned about 20 rupees for every 1,000 boxes we made. That money helped us pay for books and uniforms.
So we decided to stretch a little. We agreed to make 10–20 extra boxes each day. That would help us save enough money in a month or two to buy that Pilot Pen.
It sounded simple, but it wasn’t easy.
After long days at school, we would push ourselves to stay a little longer at the factory. Our hands would ache, and our eyes would burn, but every evening before going in, we would stop at the shop and look at that pen. Seeing that pen gave us energy. It became our north star.
We would count our extra earnings every night, imagining the day we would finally have that pen in our hands.
And eventually, that day came.
At the end of the second month, we finally had 50 rupees saved. We ran to the shop, bought that Pilot Pen, and walked back home with the biggest smiles you can imagine.
But the joy wasn’t just about owning the pen. It was about something bigger.
That was the first time in my life I experienced the power of setting a goal, creating a plan, and sticking with it, even when it was uncomfortable.
That little pen taught me the fundamentals of leadership long before I knew what the word meant:
- Vision matters. It gives direction and meaning to effort.
- Discipline beats circumstance. You don’t need perfect conditions to achieve something, just consistency.
- Shared purpose builds energy. My sister and I kept each other motivated. Leadership often means creating that shared belief.
- Celebrate small wins. They build the confidence to take on bigger goals.
That Pilot Pen wasn’t just a pen. It was my first real lesson in dreaming, planning, and doing, the same cycle that still drives me today as a leader.
Sometimes, the most profound leadership lessons don’t come from boardrooms or books. They come from the small victories that shape who we become.
Bhavin Gandhi's Blog 