Arjun Bhandari | December 28, 2015 | 6 min read

I quit

Arjun Bhandari and Varun Budhiraja,
Delhi and Dubai, Sales

Most of us at Zomato often say that a few months at Zomato are like a couple of years at any other company. Well, it’s true! The pace of change and growth at Zomato is intense, and unique.

I had spent a little over 24 months at Zomato, and in a short span of 2 years I had worked in the Delhi ad sales team across East Delhi, South Delhi, and Gurgaon; I was also a part of the launch team of Zomato’s first attempt at having a separate sales team for our Zomato for Business (ZFB) app, and then was briefly a part of the Online Ordering sales team as well.

Personal and professional growth was evident — I had more mentors in the office than I had in school. The farmhouse we worked out of, and our offices at Remfry Towers, Green Park, and Sector 44 were addresses I was commonly found at.

My relationship with Zomato had reached such a high that my friends and family had started to save my number on their phones as ‘Zomato’. I had more friends at work than I did outside of it. I used to love coming to the office, and never left earlier than needed, because it was simply amazing to be at work!

My partner, Varun Budhiraja, who had started with me in East Delhi and was still working with me in the ZFB team, was like a brother to me, and this story is about the both of us (so yeah, I’m writing on his behalf too). We were in the same boat, too busy enjoying our work to think about the world and its problems.

Then one fine morning, both of just quit!

Confused? Thought so. Let me elaborate.

We walked up to Khalid, our manager at the time, and told him that both of us had decided to move on from Zomato. He was taken aback to say the least! He walked out of the room, happened to see Pankaj on the same floor, and informed him of our decision.

Now, what would you expect from the Co-Founder of one of the most successful startups in India to do? I am sure he had a lot on his plate to worry about already — he was making decisions which would be defining the direction of the company, after all. Two people quitting surely wasn’t his biggest battle.

But Zomato, as I told you, is unique. The moment Pankaj heard this, he called Varun and me to understand what exactly was wrong, and why both of us had decided to leave. This was followed by multiple conversations with Neel Ghose (one of my closest friends & mentors at Zomato), Khalid, Sobbi, and then Pankaj again. Our answer, however, remained unchanged. We had decided to move on.

Why? We wanted to get out and try our hands at something new, something we could create from scratch. All other reasons were creations of our own imagination, because we wanted our ‘story’ to have more depth and reasoning.

Our notice period was to be one month or until all Zomato for Business client migrations were complete — whichever ended first. Normally, people stop performing during their notice period, but Zomans are built differently, and we wanted to end things on a high! Also, usually, news of exits travel around the team pretty soon, but in our case it was one of the best kept secrets, and even people working with us day in day out didn’t know until the very last day.

The days flew past, migrations had come to and end, and the 15th of July — which was to be the last day of Varun & Arjun at Zomato — had arrived. Having done our customary farewell party and teary goodbyes, we turned in our laptops and exited all our WhatsApp groups (which kind of makes you feel like you’ve lost all contact with the world).

While we were trying to soak in the last few hours of our time at Zomato, Daminee (one of the most Zoman Zomans you’ll ever meet) had just returned from her vacation. Actually, let me put it this way — the twist in our story had just returned. She sat us down, heard us pour our hearts out one more time, and asked us if anything could be done to change our minds. She was candid and told us that we were just being stupidly emotional kids. By this time, we were so confused that we decided to stick to the plan. As any seller would agree, once we’ve give our word, we hate going back on it!

There were still a few conversations to go; I went to say bye to Deepi, which was less of a goodbye and more of a thank-you! I met Naina, who told me that I was the biggest dumbo to not talk about issues but just decide to quit. In spite of everyone telling us the same thing, we were resolute on our call.

The best had to be left for last — one last farewell to Pankaj. We met, and PC’s opening line was, “I usually feel awkward having such conversations, but sahi hai, enjoy life. Mujhe pata hai mere Varun Arjun waapis aayenge” (I usually feel awkward having such conversations, but it’s cool, enjoy life. I know my Varun and Arjun will be back).

I don’t know if he knew it, but he had played his master stroke! That one line would make our heads go around in circles for the next few days!

Heartbroken, both of us headed home to pack for our next job, for which we were to travel to Mumbai for a company tour and then return to Delhi to start business here. But something wasn’t adding up. Were we confused again? The only people we had for advice at that moment were one other — were we supposed to tag team this as well?

We landed in Mumbai, and because we had the day free (we had to start work only the next day), we did what most people our age love to do — we went to get a drink. We started at around 3:30 in the afternoon, and before we knew, it was 9 in the evening and we were pretty tipsy.

In that state, people usually call girlfriends, family, or exes. We called Daminee — not kidding!

All emotional, we asked Daminee if we could come back. She took just about a second to respond with “give me 5 minutes, I will call you back”. Why would she say that? She could have waited until the next morning. After all, she was home with her family and it was dinnertime. Why would she drop everything to sort out our situation? The one-word answer — Zomato!

She called back to say she’d spoken to Pankaj, and he wanted us on the first flight back to Delhi so we could speak the next day.

Next, we had to call our families to tell them what had happened, and all they had to say was that we were being impatient, emotional, and stupid. My lesson from this — your family may always give you the right advice, but only you can know what you truly want.

Now that we were at peace, both of us slept well and woke up in time to quit the new company we had just joined. We spoke to Pankaj, who told us to come back ASAP. We went and told our new employer that we wouldn’t be able to join. He was shocked that two boys who had little knowledge about their new role or company had already decided to quit. “How could this be possible?!” was his first question, followed by “Where will you go? What will you do?”

The answer to this was simple — back home.

We landed in Delhi and landed up at the office, much to everyone’s surprise. We had officially quit and re-joined Zomato in a span of 24 hours. I still remember Deepi asking me what I was doing in the office, and when I told him I was back, his only reaction was to give me a hug!

For my parents, I was an indecisive child who didn’t know what he was doing.

For a few, this was joke or a publicity stunt.

But for me, I was back where I belonged. I was back home. And I was happy.

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