Last 2020, began like any other new year.
With ambitious plans for growth and all the related developments associated with it.
But then, by February we all learnt that it was going to be a phenomenally different year for all kinds of reasons. And as a firm we have learned a few invaluable lessons from the pandemic. The business paradigms have been altered drastically.
Till the year a virus shook the world into a new reality, businesses including ours were comfortable with long term planning and vision, with a quarter by quarter calibration of measuring our success against the annual plans.
The pandemic forced us to be cognizant of the reality that we have to be very nimble and agile, factoring in new actualities into the modus of operation. Therefore while it is imperative that we have a directional roadmap looking far ahead, we have to be deft and ready to evade the obstacles that we will, inevitably stumble upon.
The large containership blocking the Suez Canal, delaying supply chains all over the world, negatively impacting a whole host of businesses is a warning signal that we need to heed. We have to be ready to handle the several, simultaneous challenges that might be hurled at us by a whole array of unknown factors – as was the Suez Canal blockage – and be ready to transform these threats by devising new options and creating fresh opportunities.
The alarm bells have been ringing out there for years. Innovative minds, scientists, thinkers, visionaries and futurologists have been warning us of the dangers of the periodic occurrence of cataclysms and pandemics, the increased frequency of occurrence triggered by climate change and humanity’s careless destruction of nature and habitat. Kreston Menon takes all these alerts and challenges with all the seriousness they deserve.
We are also confident that our skillful teams have the wherewithal to design positive outcomes during challenging times. It has been proven during the financial crisis of 2007-08 and during the pandemic of 2020-21. Kreston Menon has now retooled our thinking, approach, systems and processes, readying the firm for the immediate, short, medium and long term, making sure that all systems are ready to go as required. With our new robust, resilient, responsive and ready for the unforeseen challenges approach we are keen to make the coming years even more rewarding and profitable for you – our clients.
Raju Menon
Raju Menon is the Founder, Chairman and Managing Partner of Kreston Menon. It is his vision of the new possibilities, opportunities and growth prospects in a booming UAE that inspired him to found an auditing and consulting firm 28 years ago in a compact office in Deira, Dubai and which has been nurtured into one of the leading players in the UAE.
A Chartered Accountant by profession, Raju has more than three decades of post qualification experience in the field of auditing, consultancy, taxation, incorporation, commercial and company law. Raju is a fellow member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), fellow member of the Association of International Accountants (FAIA), UK and a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) from USA. He also holds a M. Com degree and a law qualification, LLB, from the University of Calicut, Kerala, India.
He has served as the Chairman of the Dubai Chapter of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, the largest overseas chapter of ICAI with more than 3000 members. Kreston Menon is closely associated with many Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives in Dubai and the UAE. We consider it a privilege and honour to have partnered with “My Community… A City for Everyone,” an initiative launched by His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of The Executive Council, transforming Dubai into a disability-friendly city by the year 2020. It was a great success.
Raju has received many prestigious awards for his contributions to the profession, economy and society:
- BRICS Business Forum Leadership Award by the BRICS Alliance in New Delhi, India
- Lifetime Achievement Award at the prestigious CFO Middle East Awards
- Listed in the coveted Top 100 Leaders in the Arab World in 2018 by Forbes Middle East for 6 consecutive years
- Greatest Leader Award by Asia One
- NRI Divas Bharat Samman Award
- Bharat Gaurav Award
- NRI Visionary Award
- International Business Reliability Award
- VK Krishna Menon Memorial Award
A dyed-in-the-wool philanthropist who fervently believes that every human being has a constructive role to play in the community in which he functions, both on a corporate level and also in an individual capacity, Raju and Kreston Menon have made creative interventions through corporate, familial and personal CSR. Both have a long track record of altruistic service to the society in multiple ways.
Kreston Menon’s journey under the leadership of Raju Menon has been a remarkable one. Starting as a 3-member practice 28 years back he now leads one of the leading auditing and consulting firms currently ranked No. 6 in the UAE, second after the Big Four.