Extracts from ‘Doing the right thing: Learnings from Ratan Tata’ by Harish Bhat and published by Penguin Business.

B. Muthuraman was managing director and CEO of Tata Steel between 2001 and 2009, and thereafter vice chairman until 2014. During this time, he reported directly to Ratan Tata, who was chairman of the company.

Once, in 2007, Muthuraman and his leadership team were in the midst of discussing a complex commercial deal with another company. Discussions had been continuing for around a month. Ratan Tata and Muthuraman held different views on the proposed deal, hence further consultations were required.

Eventually, the deadline for taking a decision on the deal came close. Muthuraman had to convey a final decision to the other company, indicating to them whether Tata Steel would go ahead with the deal or not. Muthuraman had committed to that company that he would revert to them latest by 10 p.m. on a particular day.

On the morning of that day, Muthuraman proceeded to his office. He knew that he would need the concurrence of his chairman, Ratan Tata, before he conveyed Tata Steel’s decision to the other party.

Ratan Tata was away in Delhi, so an in-person meeting was not possible. However, Ratan spoke to Muthuraman and told him, ‘Muthu, don’t worry. I am coming back to Mumbai this evening. I will be landing in Mumbai at 7 p.m., and should be in my car at 7.30 p.m. I will call you from my mobile phone around that time.’

Muthuraman waited in his office that evening, accompanied by his CFO, Kaushik Chatterjee. It was a tense wait. Promptly at 7.30 p.m., Ratan Tata called.

He said, ‘Muthu, what have you thought about this, what would you like to do?’

Muthuraman put forward his point of view. Ratan listened, and then put forward his own point of view, which continued to be at variance to what Muthu felt. There appeared to be no meeting ground.

Chairman calls

Muthuraman felt that he should explain once more how moving ahead with his view on the deal would benefit the company. Therefore, he responded to Ratan Tata on the telephone and spoke again about the benefits of what he was suggesting. It was not easy to be persistent in that manner, when the person at the other end was the chairman of the Tata group. However, Muthu felt that this was the right thing to do in his role as CEO, because he had high levels of conviction in his point of view.

Finally, Ratan Tata spoke. He said, ‘Muthu, if you want to pursue this line of action, please go ahead and decide, but please leave me out of the decision-making process.’

Ratan’s voice came through clearly over the telephone, and Muthuraman could sense his irritation. He was perhaps irritated that his CEO was insisting on a certain path ahead, and was unwilling to change his point of view.

At that exact moment, just after Ratan Tata had concluded his statement, the phone went dead. As Muthuraman listened, there was silence on the other side.

The first thought that occurred to Muthuraman was that Ratan Tata had got so irritated with his (Muthu’s) unchanging stance, that ‘he had banged the phone down on me’. For people in positions of power, this is not an uncommon thing to do, to display displeasure.

Muthuraman felt very bad. Had he hurt Ratan Tata with his persistence? Had he done the right thing in continuing to argue in favour of his point of view? It was not a good feeling to think that one had displeased the chairman so much that he had so brusquely disconnected the call.

Even as Muthuraman was wrestling with these emotions, Kaushik Chatterjee asked him, ‘Sir, what do we do now?’

Frankly, Muthuraman did not know what to do. The deadline was only a couple of hours away. The chairman had asked him to decide but had also told him in an irritated tone to leave him out of the decision-making process.

Even as Muthuraman was struggling with all these thoughts, he heard his phone ring. It was Ratan Tata on the line once again. Muthu wondered what Ratan would say now.

Just a call drop

‘Muthu,’ Ratan began, ‘I rang you up not for any discussion on the deal. You can decide on that. But you should not think that I banged the phone down on you. I did not bang the phone down. My car went over a big road bump, and there was a sudden call drop (on my mobile phone).’

Muthuraman recalls that he was not just amazed, he was moved as he heard Ratan speak. Here was the chairman of the Tata group, calling him back just to clarify that the call had dropped and was not deliberately disconnected.

Muthuraman says, ‘He did not have to call me back to say this, but he did. He intuitively sensed what I was going through, the discomfort I was feeling. And he wanted to tell me not to get perturbed, not to misinterpret why the call had closed down. This was a call driven by his respect and care for his colleague.’

Muthuraman goes on to say — ‘With that call, Ratan Tata was putting his arms around me, all the way from his car.’

They also then went on to discuss the deal. Eventually, they reached a common point of view, which was then communicated to the other party well in time.

Muthuraman concludes by saying, ‘That second call was not about the transaction at all. It was a call about human grace, respect and care. It brought tears to my eyes. It was an amazing gesture.’

As Muthuraman completed narrating this story to me eighteen years later in 2025, he began crying. He said, ‘I was reimagining that entire scene just now. What an amazing person Ratan Tata was.’

That is the power of respect and care for your colleagues, for human beings who work with you. Ratan Tata did what he thought was the right thing to do, in making that second phone call to Muthuraman. Through gestures such as this, he touched a million hearts.

Extracts published with permission from Penguin Random House

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Published on November 21, 2025