E33 - From Chef to Airline CEO, With Koustav Dhar, CEO At Zoom Air

Empowering Indian Expats: Create more Impact & Influence, beyond just making a living

Success leaves clues.

It's intriguing how a Chef can become CEO of an airline.

Not only that, Koustab became an authority in starting full-service airlines from scratch in the Build-Operate-Transfer model.

As a hotel management graduate, Koustav started as a chef and grew rapidly into leadership positions in the hospitality industry.

By a twist of fate, Koustav sat next to Sahara Airlines chairman in a flight. That conversation led to him getting invited to work at Sahara Airlines. That's where he learned about the airlines business. Again, with his dedication and hard work, he grew rapidly in ranks; he was given the responsibility to expand the airline outside India.

After Sahara airlines got sold to Jet airways, by another twist of fate, he was invited to start the MDLR airlines. And he hasn't looked back since then.

He has built 9 airlines so far in the Build-Operate-Transfer model and 2 more are in the pipeline.

There is a lot to learn from his journey.

He shared his story in the following stages

• Chef to general manager
• General Manager to Vice President at Air Sahara
• Building MDLR and Jagson Airlines
• Creating Zoom Air

In this episode of Empowering Indian Expats, you will learn about

• Business strategies
• What does it take to create exponential career growth
• Entrepreneurship
• Brand building
• Networking
• Managing failures
• Being generous

Koustav M. Dhar coordinates:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/koustavmdhar/?locale=en_US

Blog: http://indiaregionalaviation.blogspot.com/2009/01/indian-aviation-hopes-2009-new.html

Host Ehsan coordinates: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alimohammadehsan

If you are concerned about your career, take the 3-minute quiz to find out what gaps in your career is costing you the most: https://empoweringyourcareer.scoreapp.com/