Tech Inspirer: Karthik Lakshmiram

Can you tell us a bit about your early life and growing up?

I’m from India, a city called Bengaluru in Karnataka province. Bengaluru is also known as the Silicon Valley or the IT hub of India. I was brought up as a sportsperson, with little focus on academic education. I played lawn tennis, and in my third year of playing, I broke into professional tennis. I represented my province as a captain and continued to be so for many years. So, that’s how my life started – average education – and a whole lot of sports.

I played professional tennis for 8 years, got a bunch of awards and a couple of small sponsorships, but tennis is an expensive sport and it’s hard to find sponsors to pay for the coaching. So, ultimately my tennis journey hit a roadblock where I couldn’t progress any further, mentally or physically. This was my sporting career, a bit of success, and probably not the best ending.

How did you end up pursuing IT?

I still remember the day when I saw the Nintendo Gameboy. It filled me with wonder and intrigue and I wanted to know more about technology. After my sports career ended, I needed to transition myself from sports to something completely different. I didn’t have proper schooling or any external life coaches, so this transition was quite hard for me. It was difficult for me to even write, read fast enough or to keep up with the deadlines of exams. It took me a lot of self-motivation and self-development activities over the course of about a year to get confident in being academic full-time.
I transitioned into a computer science undergraduate degree and then a postgraduate. In both cases, I was ranked among the top three in my class, so I was reassured that I was on the right path. It was very different from sports but I enjoyed beating my own benchmarks and being motivated by new milestones.

I got a job with a major company in India – Indian Space Research Organisation – similar to NASA. I was a junior scientist there and got a chance to work with some of the best scientists in the country.
I have this characteristic of always wanting to explore different places and meeting new people, so I wanted to head overseas. I narrowed down the countries I was interested in, and now I’m here in Australia.

What are your interests outside of work?

Transitioning from sports to another career led me to understanding more about human psychology as I learned continually about myself. I encountered a lot of open thoughts and took to yoga and meditation to be more stable, feel better, achieve more, and manage failures and success in a more balanced way.

I did a course in a yoga school called Isha Foundation in India. It’s renowned in India for the guru who teaches there – Sadhguru. I got to meet him personally and had around 20 days of training with him at the facility. I was sceptical initially, but slowly started understanding more about the mind through meditation and yoga exercises. It’s been almost six years since I’ve been doing my practice daily.

I practise a yoga sadhana (exercise) called Shambhavi Mahamudra. It’s a process that helps bring more clarity, self healing, happiness and stability. Research done on people who perform Shambhavi Mahamudra regularly states enhanced neuron activity in the brain.

I aspire to be a part-time coach at Isha Centre in Melbourne someday. I can help people by training, sharing the knowledge I have, my experiences and what it gave me.

What parts of these incredible life experiences do you take into your work?

As a sportsperson, every day is a fight to improve oneself mentally and physically. Coming from that foundation, that capability stays within you, whatever happens in life. When you face a challenge, you will be like, okay, let’s do this. This has been a real positive for me. I see a lot of tennis players here in Australia. They have different coaches who coach different aspects – physical, mental, diet and so on. My tennis experience was limited to just physical training. Nobody cared about the other required aspects like psychological training. I wish I’d had that support – maybe I would have gone a few more steps ahead.

How did you find your way to Transpire?

I met Kuldeep through some common friends in Melbourne, and we were having a hit of tennis and talking, and I told him about the work I do. He made the connections and here I am.

I met with Josh (Guest, CEO) quite early after starting and he said – let’s not talk about the company or project, let’s go into your personal life. I’ll tell you about mine, you tell me about yours. At Transpire we can connect to anyone and I really appreciate that.

And do you still enjoy playing tennis?

For a long time, it was my dream to play in the Australian Open. Now, I am here, maybe not as a professional player, but still a passionate player and a spectator. I’m looking forward to the Australian Open in January.

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