Changing India’s image – One person at a time.

A management professional, image management consultant, soft skills trainer, relationship coach and NLP practitioner – Laja Woman Asmita Neve wears many hats.

A small, disturbing observation while vacationing in Thailand and Malaysia and Singapore made her determined to ensure that people of India do not take image management, both of themselves and their country – lightly. Asmita was on a vacation with her family and realised that their group of 25 people (all Indians) was allocated a different dining area, which was at a distance from where all the other guests of different nationalities were sitting. She asked the server why it was so, to which he replied irritably “because you Indians are loud and disturb other people’s privacy.”. She was taken aback and felt insulted and ashamed. It made her realise that because of a few people, the entire nation was getting an unpleasant image. And that unpleasant image was somewhat true because Indians lacked presentation and communication skills – hence most often, something invented by an Indian is presented to the world by a foreigner.

These things were troubling her mind when she read about a new career option called “Image Management” She hopped on to it. It was 2 years of rigorous training – grooming, dressing, body language, dining etiquette, communication skills and soft skills. At the end of the training, she was a transformed person and a Certified Image Consultant and soft skills trainer.

Since then she has been training individuals to be the best version of themselves, In the last 6 years, she has trained over 6500 people across India. She has been working simultaneously on her family business related to sales and service of high end medical equipment. She handles marketing, strategic decisions and financial aspects of the business.

This is a far cry from her childhood days when she suffered from probable dyslexia and had reading and writing difficulties. She was great at sports but unfortunately developed a rare disease called Osgood Schlatter which permanently damaged her knees and caused lot of pain and irritation and put an end to all sports and physical activities that she was pursuing. Hence her childhood was riddled with self-esteem and self-image issues.

Today, she is a successful entrepreneur. She works with professionals, entrepreneurs and individuals to build their personal brand and image by combining her image management knowledge and marketing experience. She also gets invited to B-Schools to train future managers. She has also hosted one of India’s biggest classic car events. No doubt, she has had goof ups along the way which have made her realise that it’s important to have a great team and that it’s not easy to build one.

When asked how she would define success, she says, “When you have added value in the other person’s life while making enough money so that you don’t need to see price tag. And you have enough maturity to not splurge money and have a philanthropic mind-set. That’s when you are successful, according to me.”

Her most satisfying moment was when a teenager, forcefully sent to her for coaching by her mother to learn social and presentation skills, declared at the end of the training, that those sessions were the best part of her life so far.

When Asmita started her image management and consultancy, the profession was very new – people did not understand the need for it. In that sense Ashmita Neve is one of the torch bearers for this profession.

We salute her enterprising spirit and wish her all the very best for her future endeavours.