Bangalore: On a cold Saturday morning in January 2003, 84 teams across the globe pitted against the best in the Satyam Community to vie for the top position. This was the first-ever Satyam Problem Solving and Multi-Location Contest in India — ProSolve 2002.

The participants at their Satyam offices spread across the globe sat down to a programming challenge set to them by professors of IIT-Kanpur in India. The teams had to collaborate to rank problem difficulty, deduce the requirements, design test beds and then build software solutions using C, C++ or Java.

The contest comprised of eight problems that needed to be solved within the given span of five-and-a-half hours. The problems covered a spectrum of subjects like Matrix theory, numerical methods, combinatorics, graph theory, optimisation problems, computational geometry, number theory, dynamic problems and back tracking.

These problems were given a domain flavour such as that of insurance and banking. Satyam Computer Services is practising a new form of leadership these days. They are morphing their employees into technology leaders, who can wrap technology into elegant solutions from knotty business problems.

ProSolv 2002, built along the lines of the competition organised by Association for Computing Machinery''s (ACM) International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC), is an attempt to identify and nurture analytical and abstraction capabilities of Satyam''s employees (referred to as associates), to encourage competitive spirit and building tech communities.

Today, the rules of leadership have changed. And given the speed of change, leaders must be able to build organisations that understand the demands of the competitive environment so well that individual managers can execute without constantly requiring guidance from above. "In the 21st century, leadership at all levels is the key," says Rajul Asthana, assistant vice-president, technocrat and leader of the Satyam Learning Centre (SLC).

That one thought underscores the Satyam think-tank''s major movements in recent months. In 2002, it launched two key strategic leadership initiatives in Satyam: the Business Leadership Program and the Technology Leadership Initiative (TLI). In year 2003, it is accelerating the movement with building leadership in software architecture, design and delivery.

The TLI, which is driven with immense zeal by the SLC, is all about building a supply chain of technocrats — a cadre of world-class tech-savvy people who can innovate technological solutions for business problems or bet the company''s technological future. Such persons will play a major role in Satyam''s services to its clients. Graduates of this initiative will be the future leads of Satyam''s global organisation.

Today, working smart is a full-time job and Satyam has realised that. Through its TLI process it covers the increasing maturity of its associates. The TLI has multilevel events such as global programming contests, design leadership programmes, architecture programmes, vendor-specific programmes and conferences to tie up all the community of practices.

After a rigorous selection process the select audience goes through a mind-churning set of experiences. Then there are edifying forums through various workshops on patterns, architecture, and assessment where mentors drive candidates through their next maturity level. Grinding assessments act as elimination rounds to separate candidates on the basis of maturity and depth of knowledge and expertise. This select audience shares its knowledge and expertise through various forums. These forums also serve as avenues to highlight their competency and demonstrate their work.

TLI''s span of activities in its year of inception was well received by the Satyam associates. The Satyam architecture conference — ArchConf 2002 — saw about 200 architects from all over Satyam converge in Bangalore; there were about five remote paper presenters from Satyam''s offices around the globe. The Satyam Project Mangers Conference — PMConf 2002 — was the meeting point of the leaders of delivery.

About 250 project Managers from Satyam offices in India and abroad, with its share of remote presentations and participation, made the conference a roaring success. And the Satyam Problem Solving contents — ProSolv 2002 — was a mind-blowing experience for the programmers. Over 250 associates in 84 teams participated simultaneously in this event, organised by a team of 12 across the hemisphere from Japan to the UK.

But not all the programmes are about technology. Business orientations for technologists are regular interspersed programmes that are a must for the budding leaders. Here the candidates familiarise themselves with business domains, facets and challenges.

In this technology leadership journey, sharing knowledge is the key. Apart from knowledge-sharing, which happens regularly through an intranet-based portal called K-Window, the TLI demonstrates its knowledge through many associate-friendly ways. The quarterly technical publication, Satyam Technology Review, launched in January 2003, is one such initiative that enables associates to showcase their remarkable innovations during the course of their work.

Another initiative, a knowledge base of challenging case studies called The Industry Connect, is under compilation. These cases will highlight real-life situations where demanding challenges meet innovative solutions and serve as examples.

Like the previous year Satyam has big plans for its TLI in 2003. In addition to the annual conferences held in 2003, this year''s blueprint also includes architecture and design workshops and special vendor days, which are spread throughout the year. These are but some of the planned events. Among others, the TLI is involving leading technology vendors like Microsoft, IBM and Oracle in bringing their industry practices into Satyam.

In the pipeline for the Future of Technology Leadership for Satyam, going beyond reactive upgrading knowledge, the TLI plans to have a live plug into technology development, as it happens. In addition to this, the SLC is planning to open up resource development centres.